The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-07-19
OUT OF THE ORDINARY.

Railway employees and their families
make up s per cent. of the population OF
the United States.
Sicily is the home OF sulphur. The island
exports $4,000 tons a year, of which the
United States gets one-third
Balloonists who assembled about 10000 feet
in Europe the other day found a tempera-
ture of q degrees below zero.~
The first life insurance company was
started in London in 1893 and another in
100. Neither was successful.
Anonymous remittance amounting to $780,
S6S were sent to the conscience fund of the
United States during the fiscal year.
In America alone $4,000 automobiles will
be placed on the market during the pres
ent year. which will only supply half the
demand.
In 1870 the German people barely exceed
ed 40, 10000 in 1856 they had risen to nearly
AZ, 100000. and in 1900 the census return gave
SO, Ola.
twenty-five inhabitants; in the United
States there is one soldier for every 1900 in
habitants.
The largest glass bottle ever made in the
world will be exhibited at the worlds fair,
st. Louis, next year. 1t was blown in the
plant of the Illinois Glass Company at
Alton, Ill.
Last year 6OOOO,0OO barrels of kerosene
were produced in the United States, and it
is reckoned that the proceeds from the
sale of this and the various by-products
from crude petroleum aggregated nearly
$500, 000, 900.
Cider is the only alcoholic beverage that
is not taxed. When sold fermented in bot
ties it contains ordinarily or 5 per cent.
of alcohol, but this amount may be in
creased largely by adding sugar-sufficient-
ly, indeed to render the beverage quite in
toxicating.
Louisiana Purchase Exposition is to be a
reproduction of the historical Colonial
house Cambridge. where Washington es-
tablished his headquarters during the siege
of Boston, and which later was the home
of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
In the Alps Mont Blanc, the highest, is
tedious, but easy. Delicate women make
it by hundreds without much danger. The
lower Matterhorn, when conquered took
four lives. Whymper one of the three who
escaped death, afterword broke his leg by
falling off platform at a lecture.
The large insurance companies now in
Sist that individuals are much more dam
gerous risks i'm the matter of tuberculosis
If they are twenty pounds under the normal
weight than IL they are the descendants of
families with tuberculosis heredity on both
sides of the house, when not intimately as
ISOLATED with those who are actually suffer-
ing from tuberculosis.
Ether and chloroform, so useful in send
| ing men to sleep, have the very opposite
effect on plants, which are stimulated to
the greatest possible activity by these
drugs. In Denmark and Germany advan-
tage has been taken of this fact to force
| flowers in rooms and glass houses, and to
make them bloom out of season. The re-
suits are said to be marvellous.
Not more than 400 of the ''Cedars of Leb-
anon" are standing to-day. They do not
though their age is measured in years by
thousands, rival in dimensions the cedars
of the western world, the largest, so slow
is their growth, being but twelve feet in
diameter. No tree gives SO great an ex-
panse of shade as the CEDAR and it never
dies, except from lightning stroke or the
woodman's X.
In 1910, the year i'm which the United
States census began to enumerate the num-
Der of persons that had attended school
schooling for each inhabitant was 2OS days,
and, according to the census of 1850 the
average amount of school had increased to
420 days, for this decade was a period of
agitation on the part of Horace Mann and
his disciples In 1870 the number had
reached 672 days, and in 1890 1,02s days.
The tea garden of DR.. Sheppard at Sum-
merville twenty miles inland from Charles
ton, s. c., now covers 100 acres and Yields
5000 pounds of tea worth a dollar a pound
The United States imposed no duty on tea.
and France 20 cents. A duty Of Is cents
on foreign teas, says DR.. Sheppard, would
enable the American planter to meet COM
petition and would exclude the ..fra shv''
teas, while adding but one twenty-fifth of
cent to the cost of ones cup of tea.
The average daily wage of English rail-
way employees set against that in the
| United States is as follows: Engine drivers,
| sl.5O. against 1878 in the United States |;
| firemen sl.02, against s2.16; conductors, ST. 90
against $3.17; other trainmen, 96 cents
| against So; machinists, $1.16, against 1922;
| carpenters, s1.23. against sos; section fore
| men, $l.3S, against Sill; trackmen, IA cents,
| against 1923: switchmen, fiagmen and
| watchmen, 81 cents, against STA: telegraph
| operators. SLIP in England, against 81 9S
| in America.
curious old marriage custom, called
| locally 1.-The settling" still survives i'm
| County Donegal. Ireland. and In tina Scot
| fish districts of Kintyre and Cowal. After
| the marriage has been publicly announced
| the friends of the couple meet at the house
| of the brides parents to fix a suita BILE date
| for the marriage. A bottle of whisky is
| opened, and as each guest drinks to their
| happiness he names q date. When each
| guest has named an average is struck and
| settling is complete. Neither the bride
| nor bridegroom ever thinks of protesting
against the date. so curiously chosen.