Rensselaer Republican, Volume 24, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 October 1891 — SOMEWHAT CURIOUS. [ARTICLE]

SOMEWHAT CURIOUS.

There is only one sodden death among women to every eight among men. There are twice as many large game animals in Maine now as there were ten years ago. A velocity as high as 2,887 feet per second has been attained by a projectile from a rapid-fire gun. Cheapside street, London, is traversed by 13,000 ancLMansion House street by about 26,000 vehicles daily. Harvard College is 225 years old and has graduated 17,000 students. A little more than half of them are living. The cannonading at the battle of Waterloo was heard at the town of Oriel, in the north of France, about 115 miles from the field. The other day General Custer’S father, who is now eighty-four years old and resides in Michigan, went to Detroit and spent the day looking at a panorama of the Little Big Horn. Officer Rollings, of Philadelphia, is said to be the largest policeman In the United Sfates. He is six feet eight inches in height and weighs 340 pounds, A philological statistician calculates that in the year 2000 there will be 1,700,000,000 people who speak English, and that the other European languages will be spoken by only 500,000,0lX) people.

The United States leads the world in the number and extent of its libraries. The public libraries of all Europe put together contain about 21,000,000 volumes; those of this country contain about 50,000,000. There are more women it British India (124,000,000) than there are men, women and children in Great Britain, France and Germany put together, with the population of several minor European States cast in as well. A gold chain was found in a lump of coal that Mrs. S. W. Culp, of Morrisonville, 111., was about to put on a grate fire. The chain weighed eighi pennyweights, and was only hall imbedded in the coal, one end hanging loose. It is known that wasps’ nests often take fire, supposed to be caused by the chemical action of the wax upon the paper material of the nest itself. This may account for many mysterious fires in barns and out houses. A vast banyan tree covering between six and seven acres has been discovered on the tiny Lord Howe island, three hundred miles from Port Macquarie, in Australia. It is surpassed in size only by the greatest of those in India. The Japanese language is said to contain 60,000 words, every one of which requires a different symbol. It is quite impossible for one man to learn the entire language, and a well educated Japanese is familiar with only about 10,000 words. , . , Blankets are loaned to the poor during the winter months, free of cost, by a kind hearted citizen in Brunswick, Germany. They are stamped to prevent them from being sold or pawned, and they are returned at the close of the cold weather. The wealthiest insane asylum in America is said to be the Sheppard asylum in Baltimore. It was endowed in 1857 with $500,000. Since that time the trustees, using its interest alone, have expended SBBO,OOO in buildings and land and still have a capital of $600,000. According to the superintendent of the San Francisco House of Correction the opium habit has been the chief agent in breaking up the lawless gangs of Sah Francisco hoodlums. It so stupefies and enfeebles them that there is no longer any fight in them.

Of the entire human race 500,000,000 are well clothed —that is, they w’ear garments of some kind; 250,000,000 habitually go naked, and 700,000,000 cover only parts of the x>dy; 500,000.000 livein bouses, -700,--000,000 in huts and caves, and 250,000,000 virtually have no shelter. The youngest and favorite daughter of the late Hugh Hastings, the editor, is the wife of an English country gentleman. In her yoqnger days she was engaged to Antonio Nevarro, now the husband of Mary Anderson. Singularly enough, her own husband was at one time supposed to be “Our Mary’s” betrothed. The statistics of the average size of the .families of the various countries of Europe are as follows: In France, 3.03 members; Denmark, 3.61; Hungary, 3.70; Switzerland, 3.94; Austria and Belgium, England, 4.08; Germany, 4.10; Sweden, 4.12; Holland, 4.22; Scotland, 4.46; Italy, 4.56: Spain, 4.65; Russia, 4.83; Ireland. 5!20.