Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 June 1881 — BITS OF INFORMATION. [ARTICLE]

BITS OF INFORMATION.

The first records we have of geographical knowledge are in the Pentateuch and in the Book of Joshua. Anthracite coal was first discovered in the Lehigh valley, Pennsylvania, in the year 1791, by a hunter named Philip Ginther. The Mohammedans are the most numerous sect in the world by at least 100,000,000. The Buddhists are next in number, being estimated at 360,000,000. The word Fenian is derived from Finian or Finii, the old militia of Ireland, so called from Fian or Fingal, a popular hero of Irish traditionary history. The paving of streets is of early date. The Romans paved their streets in a very elaborate and solid manner. Portions of the pavements still remain, and are in use at the present day; and the pavement of Pompeii remains entire. In the whole continent of America there are 47,200,000 Catholics and 30,000,000 Protestants. In the United States there are the following church organizations and church sittings: Church Churches. ’ Sittings. Roman Catholic 4,127 1,99',514 Baptist (regular) 1 ',474 3,997,116 Christian 3,578 86 >,<>o2 Episcopal 2,835 991,9 >1 C0ngregati0na1................. 2,1487 1,117,212 Lutheran... 9,034 977, i.>2 Methodist 25,278 6,528,209 Coffee is said to have been first used as a drink at Aden, thence introduced into Egypt, and thence into Turkey. An African traveler mentions that the coffee tree was taken by the Jesuit missionaries to the western coast of Africa, where it has since become naturalized, and covers vast spaces of waste land. It was introduced in England in the early part of the seventeenth century. • The expression “humbug” is a corruption of the word Hamburg, and originated in the following manner : During a period when war prevailed on the Continent, so many false reports were manufactured at Hamburg that at length, when any one would signify his disbelief of a statement, he would say : “ You had that from Hamburg,” which was soon corrupted into humbug, and has become a common expression of incredulity. There is little or nothing known with certainty in regard to the invention of glass. Some of the oldest specimens are Egyptian, and are traced to about 1,500 years before Christ (by some 2,300 B. C.) Transparent glass is believed to have been first used about 750 years before the Christian era. The credit of the invention was given by the ancients to the Phoenicians. , The story is a familiar one, of the Phoenician merchants, who rested their cooking pots on blocks of natron (sub-carbonate of soda) and found glass produced by the union, under heat, of the alkali and the sand on the shore. The first locomotive engine ever seen in the United States was one imported from England in the spring of 1829. It was built by George Stephenson at New-castle-upon-Tyne. It was put upon exhibitionin the yard of E. Duncomb, Water street, New York, on its arrival here. The first locomotive that was used on an American road was one brought from England early in the summer of 1829, and in two or tliree months it was running on the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company’s road. The first steam locomotive engine constructed in the United States was built by the Messrs. Kemble, New'Yoik city.