The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1912-08-31
Curious Condensentions

At one time Easter marked the
dawn Of a New Year.
A gasoline engine driven dynamo
that is entirely automatic in its action
Is attracting attention in England.
In the five months from May to oc-
tober. 1911, the French army in Mo
rocco lost eighteen per cent OF its
forces.
Italian shipbuilders have construct
ed a floating drydock. in which sub
marine boats can be subjected to OK
ternal pressure tests without the ne
cessity of sinking them into deep wa
ter.
BY a decree recently issued by the
Argentine government, four holidays.
or feast days, are eliminated from the
Argentine calendar. They are Febru-
of the feast of Corpus Christi (Which
this year fell on June 81, June "a and
September 8.
Herr BARNARD Baumeister recently
celebrated the sixtietr anniversary Of
his Joining the imperial court theater
of Vienna. This is believed to be a
record for any player. and as Baum
eister is now eighty-four years old and
still plays regularly on the same stage
he is believed to hold the double dis
tinction of being the Oldest actor in
Europe, and the one who has played
the longest at n and the same the
alter.
Mrs. Mary A. Cronan has been ap-
pointed official story teller to the Bos-
ton public library. For the lastsever-
al years Mrs. Cronan has been a vol
unteer story teller to the children Of
one Of the branch libraries. giving a
part Of her spare time each week to
various settlements. The children
grew to know her as the story-lady
and her popularity grew so great that
the city authorities decided to make
her a regular member of the library
staff.
Wakao Ippel, the w%ealthiest man in
the province Of Yamanashi, Japan,
did not learn to read until he was 60
years of age. o had he up to that
time begun to accumulate the present
great fortune. At one time he was a
raepicker. His first real business ven-
ture was the purchase Of crystal balls.
which sold at a good profit. After
reaching the age of sixty he engaged
a tutor in Chinese classics. which
study he pursued until his ninetieth
year. He Is now ninety-three.
by a process recently developed in
England a very desirable cloth is made
from the fiber of p%osidonia australis,
a species of seaweed found in the
southern seas. Experiments made at
Manchester university show that the
fiber. after treatment is soft, pliable,
strong much like wool in it's DISPOSE
ton to curl and twist and easy to spin
in its raw state. 1t takes dye we'll ex.
cept green.
The dormant project of a railway
across the Sahara has been actively
revived. A French commission charg-
ed with the task Of a~scertaining the
most favorable route landed at Algiers
and proceeded to the southern termi-
nus of the present South Oran rail-
Colombo-Bechar whence a march
across the desert was to be undertake
en-. The party is led by Captain
Nieger of the colonial infantry.
The amount spent on secret service
by European governments last year
was as follows: Austria Hungary,
$4,000; France. 100000; Germany'
S261,1So; Great Britain. $3.50, 900;
Italy, s604,000. Russia spent $780,.
600 in 1910 under direct order of the
emperor" and for the present year
appropriated s1,675.O0o for miscellan-
eous police expenditure mot subject
to publication"