Irvine Express and North Ayrshire Post. — 1886-01-29 (Irvine, Strathclyde, Scotland)

SOUTH WARK WATERSIDE POTATO—During the past week the arrivals, although moderate by vessels, have been large by rail, which, notwithstanding the wintry weather, have not a slow sale at former prices. The following are the quotations :—Dunbar and East Lothian, magnums, sis Lo 850 per ton ; do. regents, 850 to 05s; Perth, Forfar, mei Fife magnums, 65s tsi 704; do. regents, 75s to 85s : do. champions, —et to 60s ; Irish (Ulster) magnums, 605 to 00$; do. champions, fiOs to 550; English best magnums, 755 to Ws ;do. inferior magnums, 40,0 to 550.  IT may, perhaps, be juat as well to remark that there are tunes, even now, when a man forgets all about polities, and one of those times is when he is engaged in a search expedition for the collar stud that has rolled under the bed. .  THERE is a painful rumour afloat to the effect that Jumbo committed suicide imitead of meeting the accidental death as reported. It seems the brute had been feeling for a long time that Mr. Barnum was not giving him a fair show. —Lynn rnion.  A RKMARKAIILK STRoKK OF LIGIITNINu.—The Granite Falls Journal, Minnesota, gives an account by N. 0. Carle and Christian Olson, farmers of Granite Falls, of the remarkable results of a stroke of lightning which struck the prairie about a mile and a half from Olson's house. It occurred in June last, during a heavy storm. They say it made a hole in the ground between five and six feet across, and nearly six feet deep, and from this hole there extend six trenches two feet deep, branching off in different directions, and extendiag for a distance of from six to eight roils. And what was very singular, not a particle of the sod and dirt thrown from the hole and trenches was to be seen, except now and then a large piece of sod twenty or thirty rods away. Mr Olson says that by actual measurement the ditches plowed out by the lightning from where it struck were all of an equal distance apart ; four of them were of the same length, and the other two six feet shorter. The report is said to have been as terrible as if an explosion hail occurred. A lady sitting at a window in a house a mile away sensibly felt the shock; two men were sitting outside another house a mile away from the scene, and so forcibly did they feel it that they immediately jumped to their feet and went into the house without speakiog. Mr C. A. Bennett, editor of the Journal, writes that lie vouehes for the truthfulness of the above account.  _ To give the ...rad number of dogs young and old, at present actually exisiting in the United Kingdom is of course impracticable, but the following statistics showing the numbrr of dogs licensed inGreat Britain, or registered in Ireland, and the number exempted from coming under the Act 41 and 42 Viet., e. 15, ail! enable us to arrive at a good idea of the probable figures. The number of dogs registered in Ireland for the year ending 31st Dec. 1884, wan 339,572. The number of licences issued in Great Britain for the year ending 31st Dee. 1884, was 894,738. There are however, many dogs exempted by age, or specially by statute, from any licence or tax—such are slicepdogs, cattle-dogs, blind meted dogs, all hounds under 12 months of age which have never been entered for U. in the pick, and finally all other dogs under 6 mouths old. The certificates ot exemptions granted in respect of farmers' and shepherds' dogs in Great Britain alone, amounted, for the year coiling Dee. 31st, 1884, to 256,996. Lastly, there are, of course, a large and unknoam number of stray dogs without any apparent owners, for whom no tax or licence is ever pahl or taken. The above figures and statistics are the latest, and on adding them together and allowing for the unknown numbers of dogs under age, stray dogs, exempted dogs and so on, we may safely conclude the total number of dogs alive in the United Kingdom to be over two millions.  A DA:CI:ER(II7S