The Savannah morning news., 1904-04-01
ITEMS of INTEREST.

| bought a. fine collection of rare foxes
some time ago and started a fox farm.
! He trusted TO the sea to keep the ami
mails on the island. but it recently
| froze between the island and the
| coast, and the foxes escaped.
A New Orleans friend of the Sal
walton Army has offered to give to
that organization a centrally located
three-story building in the Crescent
City for "A Workingwomen's hotel and
! emergency home. The benefactor is d
practicing physician who has been
much interested in the work of the
Salvation Army.
Colorado Springs, Col, has the
purest water of any city in the United
States. The supply is derived from
reservoirs and lakes on the side of
Pixies Peak, which are fed by springs
and melting snow. Chemical analyses
of the water have repeatedly shown it
to be purer than that of any other
city in the country, due to the fact
that the supply is derived at such an
altitude as to make contamination i'm
possible.
"A severe windstorm in Whitesboro,
KY, last Thursday picked up hive of
bees and dashed it through a farm
house window. The hive was de-
molished, and the liberated bees soon
made it so uncomfortable for the hui
man occupants of the house that they
were compelled to vacate it and rush
out in the storm. Lightning struck
tree in the orchard under which were
several other hives, and all the bees
were shocked to death and the honey
in one hive melted by the heat of the
electric discharge.
Prof. John Trowbridge of Harvard
University. says that some recent ex-
periments he has made in the Jeffer-
son Physical Laboratory show that
the astounding noise of a lightning
discharge is largely due to the dis
ISOLATION of water vapor," through the
explosion of the hydrogen and oxygen
gases produced by such dissertation.
In his mimic lightning experiments
Prof Trowbridge produced a torrent
of huge electric sparks. The noise of
the discharge was so great that the
operator had to stop his ears with cot
ton and then wrap a heavy cloth
around them.
Not less than ninety-three fortified
places of modern type, some of them
being nearly impregnable, guard at
present the French frontier from Dun
kirk to Nice. Most of them have been
built since the Franco-Prussian war
at a cost of $400.000,000. France has
to appropriate annually about $1,000
600 for the maintenance of these for
tresses. Recently not a few military
men, and among them Gen. Pierron,
the former commander of the Fifth
Army Corps. have expressed grave
doubts as to the value of this chain
Of fCrtiRnottn11e in fiO1n nf THEW
point to the fact that it would take
about 100000 men to garrison all the
fortresses, including Paris and Lyons,
an army which would undoubtedly be
of more value in the icld. Gen. Pier
rcn predicts a total collapse" in case
of a new war with Germany If the
numerous Notifications are to be re-
tanned.
A statistician says that taking L.
100000 as a basis of calculation there
will still survive at the end of sew
enty years $4,000 out of the 100000
persons, says the New York Sun. At
the expiration of eighty years there
| will be 107, 900 survivors of the original
| 100000. When it comes to ninety
years of existence, there is a terrible
| thinning out of the ranks. Only S,S41
| out of the 100000 or l in lis, will
live to that age. At 81, but 244, or l
| in 4,10O, will be alive. At SO. half of
these will have dropped out, leaving
only 119 souls alive out of the original
1000, 900. Ones chances to reach SO,
| according to these tables, is about l
in 8,400. "Of the original 100000 only
| "a will be alive to see SO years, or
about 1 person out of 1S,5OO," he con-
tinues. THE century mark will be
reached by only % out of the 100000.
Only l in 100000 persons will reach
the age of 104 years; just l in 100000
can be expected to see 105 birthdays;
and as to living to be 106 years old,
| these tables place that contingency as
out of the range of practical calcula-
| tions Possibly one human being out
of the 100000 who shall have seen the
| light for the first time in 1904 will be
! alive in 2010."
"A deplorable condition of indus
trial life in Spain is reported to the
Consul General Lay, stationed at Bar
| celona, says an exchange. He shows
that the daily wage of a skilled artisan
was SO cents per day in 1927, about
| the same in 1868 and only 48 cents
day in 1902. There was, therefore,
in the period of seventy-five years an
actual decrease of cents a day.
Meantime there has been an increase
in the price of food. Samples of the
| increase of the food prices are given
by Mr.. Lay as follows: Bread, 1927,
4 cents; 1902, 6 cents; meat, 1927, 10
| cents 1902, 81 cents; bacon, 1927, 20
| cents; 1902, 80 cents; rice, 1927, 8 cents
1902, 10 cents. These are based on
the amount charged for a kilogram
of each of the articles mentioned.
Commenting upon this condition of af-
fairs, Consul Lay says; 1T should be
noted that the values given for the
year 1902 are for the lowest qualities.
whereas in the case of 1927 they re-
| fer to the average cost. Thus we see
that during the seventy-five years the
cost of these necessaries of life has
vastly increased, and that in reality
the position of the laboring classes
| has become worse, the purchasing
| power of the silver peseta having
| steadily declined. 1t is this fact that
lies at the root of the perpetual labor
troubles in this country" The labor
ing class would welcome a change in
rulers as a possible means to a better
condition.
Even in the unhappy ages when
people knew nothing of the bath and
| its rejuvenating properties noted beau
ties found out the secret of preserv-
ing their loneliness by ablutionary
aids, says an exchange. Isabeau of
| Bavaria heard that chickweed was
good for the skin, and had enormous
| decoctions brewed thereof and Dathed
in them daily. Diana of Polctiers was
another of the cleanly coquettes and
nj int f.,n Of In for