The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-12-12
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

to it. The man manipulating the
handle pushes the spade into the
ground. Then those holding the ropes
throw an insignificantly small amount
of earth a distance of about two feet.
In the Korean fields one may often see
nine men thus employed on one spade.
The British commissioners who
came over here to study city govern
ment in the United States took home
with them number of American ideas
which they will endeaVor to have
adopted in their own country. They
were not favorably impressed with the
police regulation of traffic in some of
the Eastern cities. I'm London" says
one of the commissioners, a policeman
holds up his hand and then traffic
stops. In New York a policeman holds
up his hand and then-jumps out of
the way to avoid being run down.
in explaining the necessity for the
use of scientific terms the Engineering
Record points out that ordinary words
do not have the same meanings at
all periods of their existence. The rush
of affairs drifts them from their orig
inal meanings, as ships drag their an
chors in q gale, but terms sheltered
from common use hold to their moor
ings forever. The word 'let," for ex-
ample. has driftcd in 200 years from
meaning hinder until now it means
permit" but the term "bisect' has
remained unaltered in significance for
centuries.
An eminent Berlin nerve specialist,
who had his attention attracted to the
chronic nervousness of many pianists,
has been studying the piano from the
pathological point of view. Out of
1000 young girls whom he examined,
each of whom had begun to study the
piano under IA years of age, no less
than 600 had some nervous malady,
while out of 1000 who had never stud
led the instrument only 100 were af
fiicted. The specialist, therefore, has
promulgated the theory that no child
should be allowed to learn the piano
before the age of 16.
Very few are aware that William
H. Taft, prospective secretary of war
and now Governor of the Philippines,
got his start in life through perform
ing the dangerous feat of whipping an
editor. His father, after a distinguish
ed public career, had just formed a
law partnership in Cincinnati, when
a weekly paper attacked his private
life in scandalous way. The young
man, fresh from Yale, at once called
minutes had polished off his man in
fine style. The exploit called public
attention to the victor and he was
shortly appointed to public Office. He
has steadily advanced in prominence
ever since and now is to be Secre-
tar of War, position which his father
once held.
"A British publication tells a story
which it says is typical of war office
methods. An officer having occasion
for the use Of a screwdriver, made ap-
plication for the supply of that hum
BILE but handy implement from the
government stores. His application
was banded about from officer to Off
Ger, and finally reached the upper au
thority, from whom a reply filtered
back by the same devious way to the
effect that screwdrivers were supplied
only in tool boxes and not singly.
Nothing daunted, the officer at once
applied for a box of tools, and, after
the usual circumlocutory tactics, was
informed that boxes of tools were sup
piled only to carpenters shops. By
this time the officer, who had quite for
gotten what he wanted the screwdriver
for, had thoroughly entered into the
spirit of the campaign, and his next
application was for a carpenters shop.
And he got it.
During the Boer war British SOL
diers in Africa discovered a new and
extraordinary form of intoxication.
The ingenious privates found that they
could get all the excitement of a pow
erful narcotic by eating a cordite
charge of cartridges each of which
contains sixty grains of cordite and is
very similar in appearance to VERNE
celli. The British Medical Journal
gives particulars of this form of in
toxication. 1t says that Maj. Jennings
of the British army, on learning that
the men had been eating cordite, made
experiments himself. On sucking
strand, he found it sweet, pleasant and
pungent, but it resulted in a headache
which lasted for thirty-six hours. Dis
solved in tea it produces almost imme-
date exhileration, ''inciting almost
demoniacal actions" followed by
heavy sleep and stupor of from five to
twelve hours, according to the quantity
| taken. Added to beer it produces the
worst effects, exciting a quarrelsome
and destructive mania and producing
the most rapid intoxication.
Travellers have noted that in the
Bismarck archipelago cats without
tails are very numerous. The explana-
ton as given is curious. The natives
of the islands have a superstitious be-
lief that remnants of food falling into
the hands of an enemy enable him to
cast a spell over the eaters of the meal
at which the remnants were left. Now,
the natives value their cats less as pets
than as a convenient source of fresh
meat. 1t follows that thefts of cats
| are frequent, or rather were frequent
until some genius envolved the happy
| scheme of cutting off their tails and
storing them away in a safe place.
For" said he, "if a thief should steal
my cat and eat it, an incarnation NUT
tered over it's residue will make the
mscreant so sick that he will be sorry
| he ever tasted stolen cats flesh" 1t
| was an idea worthy of the great cham
| cellor himself, and the humble, brown
Bismarckian, in pursuing the blood
| and-iron policy which it entailed, was,
| like him, serenely Indifferent to blood
shed, pain and caterwaulings, so long
as he secured his ends or his eats
| ends.
In $500 years hence, writes John
NJ Clarke in Harpe1's Weekly, the dis
charge of the Niagara will have be-
come intermittent, ceasing at low
stages of the lake, and finally the Nj
| agara river, on the rising edge of the
| basin, will have it's waters turned back
! and southwark and no water will flow
over the Niagara escarpment of that
.-rI, \, tie 81