Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 July 1895 — SOMEWHAT CURIOUS. [ARTICLE]

SOMEWHAT CURIOUS.

In the last five years the population of France has decreased. Of the twenty-seven royal families of Europe two-thirda are of German origin. The average life of a locomotive is said to be about fifteen years, and the earning capacity $300,000. Bees in order to collect one pound of honey must visit the clover fields not less than 3,750,000 times. An albino frog with beautiful pink eyes base lately been added to the curiosities in the museum at Berlin. It has been calculated that the saline matter-held in solution in sea water comprises one-twentieth of its weight The London milk supply is 1894 was 43,500,000 imperial gallons, or 3,625,000 gallons per month, and 119,070 gallons per day. A cigarette smoker sends into the air about 4,000,000,000 particles at every pull, according to Dr. Atkin’s investigations.

In 1709 a race meeting was held at York, England, and from that day to this there has never ceased to be an August meeting at York. It Is estimated by engineers who have studied the subject that 16,000,000 horse-power goes to waste every hour over Niagara Falls. The value of foreign timber imported into England annually is not less than $85,000,000, not to speak of tons of paper manufactured from wood pulp. One of the curious facts but recently noted by the biologists and physiologists is that men have more red corpuscles in their blood than women have. The Ink used in printing the Bank of England notes was formerly made from grape stone charcoal, but now it is man. ufactured from naphtha smoke. In Mexico, and Slam, as well, judge, jury and lawyers all smoke in court, if they wish to, while a case is being heard. Even the prisoner is not deprived of his cigar or cigarette. King James I. bought of a Mr. Markham the first Arabian horse ever owned in England. The price was £SOO. He was disgraced by being beaten by every horse that ran aganist him. The manufacture of carpets In Syria is carried on exclusively by women and children. The trade,' although important in its way, is not large, and power looms do not exist in the country. The Egyptians believed that the soul lived only as long as the body endured, hence their reason for embalming the body to last as long as possible. It is estimated that altogether there are 400,000,000 mummies in Egypt. Soda-propelled engines are now being used on some French railways. The invention is based on the principle that solutions of caustic soda, which have high boiling points, liberate the absorbing steam, and work noiselessly. When a person in the Soudan is bitten by a dog supposed to be suffering from the rabies, the animal is instantly caught, killed, and cut open; the liver is taken out and slightly browned by being held to the fire, after which the whole of the organ is eaten by the patient. According to the trials of carrier pigeons recently made in the American navy, these birds are likely to prove very useful at sea in carrying dispatches. Only 10 per cent of the pigeons sent off failed to return “home,” and some of the “homers” covered 200 miles of ocean at a speed of thirty miles an hour.