Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 April 1881 — BITS OF INFORMATION. [ARTICLE]

BITS OF INFORMATION.

The populati on of Prussia is in tne proportion of eleven Protestants to seven Catholics. The Revolutionary war cost the United States $136,193,703. Great Britain lost 60,000 men, incurred a debt of £100,000,000 or $600,000,000, and lost her American colonies. The selection of Friday as “ hanging day ” probably was due to the superstition that Friday is an unlucky day and the fact that the most unlucky thing that can possibly happen to a man is io to be hung. There is a kind of lemon which grows in Southern Europe as sweet as an orange, but all other species of lemons are intensely sour. The term “ Gotham” was first applied to New York city in “ Salamagundi ”, (a humorous work by Washington Irving, William Irving and James K. Paulding), because the inhabitants were such wiseacres.

Under the rulings of the Postoffice Department, “Postmasters are not obliged to aoeept, in payment of postage stamps or stamped envelopes, wrappers, etc., any currency which maybe 60 mutilated as to be uncurrent, or the genuineness of which cannot be clearly ascertained.” •> Dew is the condensed moisture of the atmosphere. During the day, under the sun’s rays, water is exhaled from all moist and watery places, and is held in the air in the form of vapor. When the son goes down the air is cooled, and therefore contracted or condensed, and the water is deposited upon dool substances. Drops of water on the outside of a pitcher of cold water in the summer is dew. Octavo, also written Bvo, is from the Latin octavus, the eighth, and describes a book formed of sheets folded in eight leaves. Duodecimo is similarly derived from duodecimus, the twelfth, and is written 12mo. So we have 4to, quarto, 16mo, sexdecimo, and so forth. The terminal follows the Latin form. The deepest well in the world is said to be that at Sperenberg, near Berlin, which was excavated in the attempt to obtain a supply of rock-salt. This was reached at a depth of 280 feet from the surface, and the boring was continued to a maximum depth of 4,194 feet, the stratum of salt boring being followed to a depth of 3,907 feet without being pierced through, and the boring then discontinued on account of the mechanical difficulties of the operation. The following figures will show the extent of the United States as compared with the British possessions in North America: Country. Square Miles. United States 8,602,884 British Possessions— Ontario 121,260 Quebec 210,020 Nova Scotia 18,670 New Brunswick 27,037 British Columbia, 233,(.00 Manitoba 16,000 Northwestern and Hudson Bay Territories. .2,206,726 Labrador and Arctic Ocean island make a total of ..8,600,000

To “ out a dido” is a very common phrase. We never heaad of but one derivation of it, and that is somewhat mythical. According to that account, it aaose from the conduct of Dido, who was Queen of Tyre about 870 years before Christ. She fled from that place upon the murder of her husband, and, with a colony, Settled upon the northern coast of Africa, where she built Carthage. Being in want of land, she bargained with the natives for as much land as she could surround with a bull’s hide. Having made the agreement, she cut a bull’s hide into fine strings, and, tying them together, claimed as much land as she could surround with the long line she had thus made. The natives allowed the cunning Queen to have her way; but, when anybody played off a sharp trick, they said he had “cut a Dido.” You can believe as much of this statement as your judgment will allow.