Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 November 1893 — SOMEWHAT STRANGE. [ARTICLE]

SOMEWHAT STRANGE.

ACCIDENTS AND INCIDENTS OF EVERYDAY LIFE. Queer Facts and Tlirllllnz Adven Sure* Which That Truth is Stranger T han Fiction. A single sponge has been found on the coast of Florida with a circumference of live feet six inches. J. W. Garrison, of Flat Creek, N. C., boasts of a pig which has two heads, two Bets of teeth, three eyes, two tails and six legs. A woman named Marm Smeaton, residing in the suburbs of Cincinnati, although past the age of ninety-one, has within the last year cut four new teeth. A little dog at Woburn, Mass., whose master had taken a passenger train, followed it on a run to the next station, which it reached only 200 yards behind the iron hoise.

After a separation of sixty-four years William Shaw, an inmate of the Binghamton, N. Y., county farm, has been restored to his family.. Mr. Shaw is reputed to be nearly 105' years old. A living curiosity is in the possession of Henry Gerbending, of Fort Wayne, Ind. It is a freak of nature in the shape i>f three kittens which are inseparably joined at the hips. There are three heads, six fore feet and only three belied. Samuel Leffeiis, an aged resident of Moraine,- N. D., who has been a great sufferer from rheumatism for over twenty years, has been entirely, and, it is thought, permanently cured by a slight stroke of lightning. A horse that fell down a well on the Bailey farm, in Polk County, Oregon, recently was rescued in a novel manner. Straw was thrown down the well, and the horse tramped it and rose until he was able to climb out. An English sparrow met a curious and untimely death in London recently in trying to take a drink of water from the famous Temple fountain. A gold fish, it is declared by witnesses, jumped up and seized the bird by the leg. A second fish did likewise by the bird’s other leg, and between them the sparrow found a watery grave.

Three years ago William Brown, of Lost Creek, Pa., walked down a mountain path to the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad tracks just in time to have his leg cut off by a passing train. A few weeks ago he was on the same mountain, walked down the same path, and at the spot of his former misfortune, he tripped and fell and had his remaining leg taken off by the same train. A natural wonder of British Guiana is Mount Ror&ima, a peak famed for its inaccessibility and peculiar formation. It is only 6,000 feet high, but the last 2,000 feet of the ascent baffled the attempt at exploration until 1884. This main peak is a solid wall of sandstone, flat at the top, except for depressions and cavities worn by the rainfall. From the table-top are supplied innumerable streams, and equally numerous lakes in the depressions make natural reservoirs. A flower lately discovered in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec is white in the morning, red at noon and blue at night, and is called the chameleon flower in default of any botanical name. It is probably a species of the hibiscus mutabilis. The colors do not pass abruptly from one shade to the other, but change gradually from the white of the morning to the pink and red and thence to the blue at night. The Tehuantepec tree grows to the size of a guava tree and gives out a slight perfume when the flower is of a red color.

A proposed fox hunt at St. Joseph, Mo., recently, was prevented by the persistency of the hounds. The tale reads as follows: “A fox was taken out of tight of the crowd and freed. The dogs were released, and before the fox had got twenty feet away hud killed it. The crowd patiently waited half a mile away. As a sort of consolation race the fox was attached to a bicycle and the cycler started off before the people, and the dogs caught the fox within a dozen steps and pulled it loose, and that ended the sport.” Thb English papers tell the following story of a badly malformed lamb: Mr. W. Hewitt, of Harrington Mills, has ewe which this spring yeaned a lamb that is certainly curiously and wondrously made. It has two eyes, both in the centre of the forehead and in a single socket, both covered with one eyelid. One ear is situated at the back of the head and the other directly under the lower jaw, near the hinge. It has no tail, but in the place of that very necessary appendage a fifth leg almost as long as the other four, fully equipped with hair, hoofs, etc. It was living at last accounts, being almost three months old.

The oldest one of the white elephants, which was born in 1770, died in its temple at Bangkok in November last. Everyone knows that the white elephant, before whom a whole people bow the knee, is the emblem of the Kingdom of Siam. It is honored with the most beautiful presents, for the Indians, full of the idea of metamorphosis, etill believe tlmt so majestic an animal could only be animated by the spirit of heaven or of an emperor. Each white elephant possesses its palace, a vessel of gold and a harness resplendent with jewels. Several mandarins are attached to its service and teed it with cakes and sugar cane. The King of Siam is the only person before whom it bows the knee, and a similar salutation is rendered it by the monarch. A few days ago William Bell was released from prison at Birmingham, Ala., after having been convicted of murder, and sentenced to hang. He managed to get a new trial and proved an° alibi through a Memphis man, for whom he was working when the crime was committed. It appears that the murder was committed by n man named William Bell, who very much resembled his innocent namesake. This man moved to Memphis after the crime, and joining the church, got so much reputation for piety that he became a deacon. The other night Mr. Persica, of Memphis, found a burglar on his premises and blew off his head with a shotgun. It turned out to be William Bell, and the facts, which came out ut the inquest, proved that he was the wanted murderer.” Edward Lane, a painter employed in painting the smokestack of a flouring mill in San Diego, Cal., recently passed through a thrilling experience. He had painted'hnlf of the stack, 120 feet high, and had jnst been drawn to the top when the hook holding his platform gave way. He fell twelve feet, striking a guy rope with his legs, whioh he wound afound the rope in a twinkling, but without effect. He fell again, dropping fortv feet further, where he struck another guy rope, luckily catching it with both hands and feet. He held on pluckily, although considerably bruised on the breast and

shoulder, until help reached him, and he was lowered to the ground. It was a narrow escape, but he did not appear to be especially disturbed over his accident and was at work next day as usual. Hat stealing is said to be one of the favorite occupations of the footpads in the City of Mexico. The scoundrel marks his victim, often in the most public streets and in broad daylight comes up behind him, grabs his hat and makes off at the top of his speed; and from his knowledge of the byways aud hidingplaces of the city usually succeeds in making his escape. An ordinary American reader will wonder why anyone would want to steal a hat, but perhaps he does not know that the hat, or sombrero, affected by the average Mexican is the most expensive part of his apparel. These hats are very large, made of the best of felt, and often elaborately decorated with gold and silver embroiderv. A Mexican oowboy will wear the biggest and costliest hat that he can afford to buy, and it is not uncommon to see them with hats worth from S3O to SSO, when all the rest of their garments would not be worth $5.

Mind-waves which strike separated friends at the same time and make each sit down and write to the other after six months or six years of silence are common enough. But the case of two brothers living in the South comes a little nearer the rarity of cases placed high in the investigations of the Psychioal Research Sooiety. It appears that recently a Mr. McCrory of Oglethorpe decided at a certain hour on a certain night to visit his brother, who lived in Florida. It had been a long time sinoe the two brothers had seen each other, and the strange part of it is at the very hour on the same night the Florida man had decided to visit his brother in Georgia. They both started about the same time and were both eminently successful, for each reaohed the home of the other about the same time and was much sui prised to find the other gone. One of the most curious applications of the phonograph to praotical use was made by an American student of languages. Being desirous of studying Chinese so that he might speak it, he asked an acquaintance to send him an instructor. When the latter arrived he proved to be a Chinaman of unpromising exterior but fair English. Teacher and pupil got on well the first day, but the latter found his instfuctor so offensive in personal characteristics that, he decided to avail himself of his knowledge without enduring his presence. So the Chinaman was set to work to talk his lesson into a phonograph, and at night the pupil, having gone to bed with the lights out, turned on the phonograph and memorized the lesson. He gave up, the experiment, however, for the whimsical reason that he dreamed of Chinese dragons and other hideous products of Oriental art.

An amusing story comes from the South Sea islands. A missionary there not long ago concluded that his house would look better for a coat of whitewash, and to get the lime burnt sonw coral. This operation the natives watched with a good deal of interest, thinking that the coral was being oooked for the purpose of being eaten. They were greatly disappointed when they found that this was not the case, but when in a short time they beheld the missionary’s cottage gleaming in the sunlight as white as snow, their delight knew no bounds. They danced, they sang, they screamed with joy. The whole island was in confusion. Whitewash became the rage. Happy was the coquette who could enhance her charms by a daub of the white brush. Contentions arose. One party urgfed their superior rank; another obtained possession of the brush and valiantly held it against all comers. A third tried to upset the tub to obtain some of the precious cosmetic. To quiet the hubbub, more whitewash was made, and in a week not a hut, a domestic utensil, a war club or a garment but was as white as snow; notan inhabitant but had his skin painted with grotesque figures; not a pig that was not whitened; and mothers might be seen in every direotion capering joyfully and yelliag with delight in the contemplation of the superior beauty of their whitewashed babies.

A correspondent witnessed a strange duel on one of President Crespo’s big cattle ranohes in the interior of Venezuela. Two vanqueros, or cowboys, were enamored of the same dark-eyed little Indian girl of the great Orinoco plains, and they decided to settle by a duel with the lasso which of them should take her to wife. A dozen fellow vaqueros assembled to witness the fray. The lovers soon appeared mounted on mettlesome mustaDgs, each with a long powerful lariat of tough cow hide. They were both experts with the lasso, and their horsemauship was a marvel. They approached to within forty and fifty yards of each other and then began to manoeuvre for a deciding cast. After several feints the lariat of the younger of the rivals, a handsome, sun-bronzed fellow from Carabobo, went whizzing through the air so swiftly that the eye could scarcely follow it. The other sank his spurs deep into his mustang. The animal sprang lorward just in time, to save his master from the noose, and as he did so the second lasso rose in the air and settled round the shoulders of the man who missed, pinning his arms to his sides as in a vice. He was jerked headlong out of the saddle. His successful rival drew him along hand over hand, half lifting him from the ground by the tenacious thong, and put a bullet square between his eyes. He then turned and rode directly to the :amp where lived the cause of this barbaric scene. She mounted behind him and he came gal loping back swinging his sombrero.