Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 105, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 May 1910 — Topies of the Times [ARTICLE]

Topies of the Times

Rats are eaten by the natives of Northern Australia. Printed musical notes were first made use of in 1473. » A wen two and a quarter miles long has been taken from the body of a spider. The administration of police and' justice for a year costs London 510,,000,000. ( Not more than 6 per cent of the natives of British India can read and write their own language. In Sweden nearly 120,000,000 crowns’ worth of alcoholic drinks are consumed annually, whereby the national treasury profits to the extent of 45,000,000 crowns Since coffee labels have been required to tell the truth, there is only one pound of Mocha coffee sold in New York where there were half a hundred pounds sold before. Ip European Russia, with a population of eighty millions, there were,' in 1907, 93,448 deaths from scarlatina, 75,161 from measles, 61,404 from- typhus, typhoid and relapsing fever The importation of English styles, which is increasing constantly in this country, has not stopped at mere clothes and manners. The use of the monocle is becoming common in New York. Three hundred years ago the first home of wood was erected on Manhattan island. It was near where the west end of Pearl street is and was mpde of rough logs, quite different from the last one of steel and stone now being built not far from the same site. Dr. Gourand, an eminent French dietetist, says a rational diet is one .that, “while pleasant to the taste, maintains the bodily equilibrium, favors the easy working of all our organs, and reduces to a minimum the work which its presence necessarily imposes on them.” Charles Frohman tells a London reporter that the performance of “The Climax ’ on the Mauretania was impossible because Marie DorO, his leading woman, became so ill that “she threw up her part.” Unquestionably this is the worst case of seasickness, on record. —New York Press. Lord Kitchener in his late report xeaffirms hi 3 high opinion of the military capacity of Australians, but insists that longer compulsory training for the men and more education of the officers are necessary. He advises the establishment of a college on the lines of the United States Military Academy at West Point. It would at first be staffed with English officers, and later with Australians. i

Wild honey as a change is an agreeable sweetmeat, but after a few days constantly partaking of it the European palate rejects it as nauseous and almost disgusting. Our experience extended over a fortnight, during which period our food consisted solely of it and maize. It has escaped the Biblical commentators that one of the princlpaf 'hardships that John the Baptist must have undergone was his diet of wild honey.—National Geographic Magazine. A physician, in speaking of his patients the other day said a great many men would be surprised it they should happen to meet their wives while the latter were on the}r way to £ome doctor's office. “Many women have a firm belief in the policy of wearing their shabbiest garb on such occasions,” said he. “Their idea is that physicians judge the state of their patients’ finances by the clothes they wear, and charge accordingly—and there is a go'od deal of truth in it, too.”—New York Sun. France has very recently solved the machine gun question ajid has proceeded very energetically, so that at present all infantry regiments have four (in time of war six), the chasseur battalions two (in time of war four) machine guns, and the reserve regiments are fitted out- ip the same wayp The machine guns of dismounted troops are carried on pack animals. Every cavalry regiment, including the reserve, is to have two machine guns on wheeled carriages, and every field artillery regiment is to receive two guns as support. Riding uptown in a semi-c°rowded Broadway car the other night, a well dressed woman was having a great deal of difficulty trying to pacify a crying child'who was sitting on her lap. She was evidently the child’s mother. After she had exhausted all the ordinary means she tried an entirely new one. Whenever a male passenger boarded the car and made his way up the aisle the woman would jounce the kid on her knee and whisper to the child, “Sh! here cdmes your father.” It may not have been exactly the proper thing, but it served to pacify the child.—New York .Sun.