Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 October 1895 — NOTES AND COMMENTS. [ARTICLE]

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Ptlqck, the national Mexican drink, is a dangerous intoxicant, aud Mexico may pass a law making it punishable by death to raise cactus, from which pulque ia made. It is proposed to prohibit the sale of glass lamps for burning kerosene in England, on account of the danger of their exploding. They killed twenty-five people in London last year. \ There is nothing new under the sun—not even bloomers. A party of tourists happened on a bunch of Digger Indians, the very lowest of the red remnants, and found the women attired in veritable bloomers. Wbat will the new woman say now ? From official statistics collected in Baltimore it appears that only one person of every ten who die leaves property, and that two-thirds of the property owners hold only 6 per cent, of the property. Iu the same connection the Boston Herald notes the fact that in Massachusetts savings banks four-fifths of the depositors have only a quarter of the deposits. Mr. Couthiia, of Loudon, in the course of a paper read before the Scientists’ Convention at Springfield, Mass., predicted that in 1920 the population of the big cities of the world fvould approximate these figures: Loudon, 8,344.000: Paris, 3.308 580: New York, 6,337,500; Berlin, 3,422,221 ;• Chicago, 7,797,640: Philadelphia. 1,856,100; St. Petersburg, 1,470,883. A recent paper gave an account of an arrangement of electric wires, by which in India a man hoped that a snake intending to enter his house would receive a fatal shock; and we can see what a blessing such an arrangement would be, when we learn that iu 1N93, 21,213 human beings and 5,122 cattle were killed in India by snake bites, notwithstanding 117,120 snakes were killed in the course of the year. The English Society for the Protection of Birds appears to have made a total failure of its crusade against the cruelty of feathers in the female hat. The British plume is composed of bird-of-paradise feathers and osprey tips, and one firm in London lias decorated 720,000 British females with these evidences of cruelty. The fashion, however, will not last, as the supply of birds is almost exhausted. Here is a modest allusion to Chicago in the News of that city: “She has been burned out of existe nee in a day ami fattened od the ashes; she has builded a dreamland for the world to play iu and thought little of the an hievement; she has essaj ed a drainage canal, and before the people berely know of it the bulk of the gigantic enterprise is completed and the glorification exerejses are over. This is not boasting; it is a modest recording of a glittering, sparkling, radiating fact. It is a measly testimonial of the grand, whooperup, ripsuorting vastness of the greatest aggregation of human souls ever brought together under one municipal canvas.” The Toledo Blade gives the testimony of a druggist that calisnya drunkards are rapidly increasing in number. He says: “The unfortunate victims of tiie calisaya habit ignorantly think that in Calisaya they have found a drink which lias the stimulating effects of whiskey without any of its physical penalties, when the fact is that they are practically only adding the spur of quinine to their whiskey, which is thinly disguised by calisaya. A man witli a calisaya jag is sincerely to be pitied. He is just a little short of being a raving maniac. His ears ring like an anvil from the effects of the quinine, while his blood riots through his brains like a mill race at the bidding of the alcohol.”

Commander McGiffen, of the Chinese battleship Chen-Yuen, at the tight of the Yalu, agrees with Captain Malian, historian of the fighting ship in all ages "that the result of the conflict shows that armor was a better protection than is always indicated by the experiments on the testing ground, and that it holds its own against the heaviest projectiles which up to this time it is possible to hurl against it. But witli this success for thick armor comes the failure of minor steel protection. The gun shields and conning tower of one and two inches of steel were simply man traps.” On board the Tsi-Yuen, the consort of Commander McGiffen’s flagship, the TsCn-Yueu, the conning tower, pierced by a comparatively light projectile, did not protect one of its inmates, and was itself torn to shreds. The North Atlantic Pilot Chart, issued by the Hydrographic Bureau at Washington in July, 1891, published the following: “The especially dangerous West India hurricane months are indicated by the following easily remembered lines: June, too soon; July, stand by; August, look out you must; September, remember ; October, all over.” The Bureau admits that the collection of further data than it bad on hand at that time indicates a necessity for a modification of the 1891 statement. and publishes the further statement that the especially dangerous months for the class of storms referred to are' August, September aud October. A graphic diagram is given on the Pilot Chart, showing the frequency of West India hurricanes in the years from 1885 to 1894, inclusive. The totals for the several years show that six occurred in June, four in July, sixteen in Aqgust, twenty-one in September and twenty-two»in October. A revolt against world’s fairs lias been begun in France, and some of the reasons advanced will appeal to the people of other countries. The first protest against the Paris Exhibition of 1900 comes from the municipal council of Nancy. All the arguments against the scheme have been admirably summed up in a resolution. The people of Nancy are against the exhibition because it does not appear to answer to any important rational want. Statistics show that the former exhibitions have caused the most serious damage to trade in the provinces; that even if it does bring money into Paris, it will also bring in a lot of unemployed, and will permanently raise the cost of living. Paris is itself a great, permanent exhibition, aud French industry has no interest in offering hospitality to foreign competitors at her own oost. It is inconsistent to hold a universal exhibition with a system of high tariffs. The preparation of the great exliibition)inust iiave an influence on home and foreign politics. A nation that devotes five years to organize a gigantic fete has its bauds tied. Under the present financial circumstances the exhibition will cripple the future budgets. Es-Senator Henry L. Dawes, the chairman of the Indian Commission, says that the town site question in the Indian Ter- : ritory lias become one of great importance. There are now about 300,000 white people lin the Indian Territory. They have built i up towns, but are mere tenants at sufferance, without a particle of title to the ; lands on which they built. The Indian i courts are closed against them, as are the Indian schools to their children, 30,000 of ! whom have no other opportunity for ! schooling, excepting those whose parents I are able to hire private teachers. They 1 have no voice in the governments of these

five nations, nor a police officer to protect them or their property against violence. It will be the object of the Commission, first, to obtain snch a solution of the town site question that those who have built up these towns and invested large sums in costly buildings and expensive stores and trading places may have some title to the ground upon which the structures stand, and some voice in their government, and, secondly, to see that the vast and valuable territory shall be held either according to the original title, for all Indians equally, or shall be allotted in severalty to them, so that each shall hold his own share In fee. Travelers from the East Indies often bring with them necklaces made of seeds about the sire of i>eas. and which are scarlet with a black spot on one side. The plant producing them is knowu to botanists as Abrus precatorius. It is grown as commonly around Indian dwellings as an ornamental twining vine as the morning glory is with us. It is known there, says a correspondent of the Botanical Gazette, us wild licoric^—much of the licorice of that regiou being expressed from the roots, though it is inferior to the licorice employed by us. The flowers, which are butterfly-shaped, are as handsome as the scarlet seeds, and the seeds themselves are used as weights in the apothecary stores, where they represent one grain. The fact is interesting, as showing that mankind generally start their weights and measures by adopting some seed as the primary standard. In Englund, the chief home of ••John Barleycorn,” as the Englishman’s ale is called, barley was taken for the original unit for measurement. Three barleycorns, or grains of barley, made an inch; and when an English boy could calculate “how many barleycorns would reach round the world,” he was read} 1 for promotion.