Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 May 1894 — BITS OF HISTORY. [ARTICLE]

BITS OF HISTORY.

The first Christian school was established by the Panta'us in 181. Golconda mines are now exhausted. At one time 60,000 men were eihployi 1 in them. When the Sultan Mahino d, who reigned in 1177-1206. died, he le.t in his treasury 400 pounds’ weight o! gems taken from the mines at G>l conda. The first aerial voyage was made Sept. 19, 1783. by a sheep, a cock and a duck to a height of 1,500 Let. The first human traveler through the air wis M. Francois Pilatre de Rozi r,' who mounted the following month in a free ball.on. The earliest known lens is one of rock crystal unearthed by Layard at Nineveh. This lens, the age of wh ch is measured by thous nds of years now lies in the British Museum. *vi bright and as clear as it was the day it left the maker’s hands. In the appalling catastrophe which destroyed the city of Lima and its harbor, Callao, in Peru, in October, 1.4 t, the earthquake shocks were re; eaten every seven or eight minutes, and eve 200 of the most violent kind w re counted within twenty-four hours, i. th j great earthquake of Caraccas, on the 26th of March. 1812, fifteen shocks were felt on the first day, and they continued numerous every day until the sth of April following. The oldest dressmakers’ bill in the world has been discovered on a Chaidean tablet, dating 2800 B. C. It haan entry of “ninety-two pure vestments for the priests. ” Among the items are “ten white robes of the Temple, eight robes of the house of his lady, ten collars of the house of his lady, ten pair of gold collars, two white robes and four scented robes,”also“twowinders,” probably scarfs for binding about the waist. Before this the oldest account of this sort was on a tablet dating over 1400 B. C. The Revolutionary War, 1775-1783, cost the United States $135.193,703. The Colonies furnished 395.0 >4 troops. The War of 1812 cost $107,159,003; the number of troops estimated at 471,62'. The Mexican War cost $100,(00,0 0: the number of troops engaged was A 01.282. The Civil War, 1861 1- (i , eost $6,189,929,900, according to tho official records; the number of troop, engaged on the Union side was 2,859,142, the total loss 460,503: the number engaged on the Confederate side was about 493,000 and loss about 300,000.