Rensselaer Republican, Volume 23, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1890 — SOMEWHAT CURIOUS. [ARTICLE]

SOMEWHAT CURIOUS.

Three years ago a lake in the Moosejaw district, near Ottawa, Canada, which was more than a mile in circumference, disappeared entirely from some cause. A farmer purchased the lake bottom, and has this year raised a magniticent crop of wheat upon it. The postal savings banks in Japan, which for several years received but little attention from the people, have become a great success, They were established in 1878, but at the end of the year had only $15,320 on deposit. In 1882, however, it amounted to $1,058,000, and in 1889 to $20,450,000. There is a country store in Arkansas which is defended by a spring-gun. j The gun has caused the death of seven ! different robbers in the last four years, killing two at once one night last week. The owner of the store is out in a local paper advising the fraternity to tackle something else—a stage or railroad train. The fastest bird on the wing is the swift, which has been known to attain aspeed of two hundred miles an hour. | It feeds exclusively on Insects, which jit captures while flying. The speed of the swallow, which comes next to that of the swift, is usually sixty miles an hour, but sometimes goes as high as ninety miles an hour. I The pug dog, as a pet, has an ihteresting history. He was at first imi ported from China and Japan, and ' came into fashion in the reign of William 11. It is st ited that the King believed his life to have b'deu saved by a dog of this breed awakening him to his danger when a murderous attack j was about to be made on him. | A man who spent ten mbpths in , South Carolina, where divorces are never granted, made a record of 540 i separations, many of them with A mi.r.derasthe result, and several hundred cases where husband and wife have lived together for years without speaking. He says that divorce would have | been a godsend in every ease, I A Carbondale spiritualist), consulting a medium as to the condition of his deceased wife, was informed she was unhappy because she was not dressed as well as the other angels, He shelled out large sums of money to replenish the celestial wardrobe, but now, convinced of his folly, sues the medium for the return of the money. Years ago in Japan there was a com called the monseng, which was worth about one-two hundred and ’twbntyfourths of a penny. It was an iron pioce. In England they have had a piece worth no more than a quarter of a farthing, and a very pretty piece it is A piece of one-third of a farthing was also minted in the reign of George IV and William IV. If in good condition, ; it is now worth a shilling as a curiosity. A citizen of Brooklyn has caused the arrest of a druggist in that city for refusing him permission to look over the book in which sales of poison are recorded. The complainant has a wife who is addicted to the morphine habit, and he desired to ascertain if she got her supplies at the druggist’s store. The law imposes a fine of SSO j when each a request is denied, and the defense in the case Is that the demand ; was not couched in civil language. ,