Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 November 1880 — BITS OF INFORMATION. [ARTICLE]

BITS OF INFORMATION.

The meaning of the word amen is “so be it. ” It was introduced from the Jewish into the Christian church about 390 A. D. The drink known as “ punch ” was introduced into Europe from the East Indies by Anglo-Indians at some date between 1746 and 1760. It is so named from the Hindoo word pantsc-A (Persian, pans), because it consists of five ingredients, which, when first made, were arrack, tea, water, sugar and lemonjuice. The famous Vauxhall punch was an admixture of arrack, brandy, sugar, lemon-juice and water. The President of the United States cannot be arrested. If he commits any high crime or misdemeanor he can be impeached by the House, tried by the Senate, and if convicted can be removed from office. After removal from office he can be arrested and tried, the same as any other citizen, for any crime which he had committed while in office. If the President could be arrested on charges preferred against him, any petty magistrate might endanger the peace of the country. The mammoth trees of California are the largest known. The dimensions of one tree, in the Tulre group were, according to the measurements made by members of the State geological survey, 276 feet high, 106 feet in circumference at the base, and 76 feet at a point twelve feet above the ground. The redwood tree frequently grows to a height of 300 feet, and a diameter of 15 feet. The hark of a California tree on exhibition is thirty-five inches thick. The origin of the game of philopena is said to have been as follows : The people of Alsace and Lorraine were formerly under German rule, as they now are ; but while a part of France they lost in'a great measure the use of the German language, and what they retained became corrupt. It was an old custom among them for young couples to engage themselves by eating the halves of double almonds, and then to salute each other as “well beloved” each time they met. The word in German was vielliebchen, but, having forgotten the meaning of this word, they gradually changed into “ phillipo,” which sounds like it, and “ phillippina.” The first meteoric shower which attracted attention in modern times was that witnessed by the Moravian missionaries in Greenland, in 1799. This phenomenon was observed over a wide extent of territory. Humboldt, then traveling in South America, said: “Toward the morning of November 13, a most extraordinary scene of shooting stars was seen. Thousands of bodies and falling stars succeeded each other during four hours. Tiieir direction was very regular from north to south; from the beginning of the shower there was not a space in the firmament equal in extent to three diameters of the moon which was not filled every instant with bodies of falling stars. All the meteors left luminous traces or phosphorescent bands behind them, which lasted seven or eight seconds.”