Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 October 1873 — CURRENT ITEMS. [ARTICLE]

CURRENT ITEMS.

Men of Scents—Perfumers. The public debt of Massachusetts is over $27,000,000. lowa has 10,500,000 acres of land under cultivation. Contentment is natural wealth; luxury, artificial poverty. An oyster ship will run between America and England this winter. The average receipts of the Chicago billiard saloons reach $5,0C0 a day. A hippopotamus which escaped from a menagerie is sporting in the Savannah River. Coal lias recently been discovered near Golden, Col. It is hard and bright in color. A mill at Minneapolis, Minn., is sawiDg an average of 145,000 feet of lumber per day. Experiments show that corn loses onefifth and wheat one-fourteenth of its weight by drying. A water-spout on Lake Erie was recently seen from the summit of Little Mountain, near Cleveland. A member of a base-ball club in Baltimore ran 100 yards recently against a trot-ting-horse and won a wager. No Saratoga hotel -except Congress Hall paid exposes this last season. Stewart’s grand house lust SBO,OOO. A new uniform for our entire standing army of 30,000 men is now being made at Frankfort Arsenal, Philadelphia. Jkrusiia Peck, a maiden miser, of Riv. erside, Conn., died recently, leaving gold which she had hoarded for thirty years. There is one school-district in Marar thon County, Win, which has 304 more square miles than the entire State of Rhode Island. Mrs. Jane G. Swisshelm claims the credit of suggesting the system of redlight, signals now in use on all railroads "ill this country. Nearly $200,000 rent are annually paid by the National Government for private buildings, which are used for offices in Washington. In Ceylon, the marriage ceremony is performed by tying the couple tog< tlier by the thumbs. lij this country they are usually put together by the ears. At St. Louis the courts are now occupied with litigation between two strew beggars, father and daughter, over $15,000, the proceeds of several years’ collections on ihe streets.

An unstamped letter was deposited in a Western post-office last week, and underneath the address was the indorsement: “Let her slide, P. M.-, she’s all hunk; inside air one of them post hole keerds.” An. important order of Catholics in lowa is the Monks of St. Troppc, Dubuque County, who have one of the largest and best farms in the State, comprising over 3,000 acres, and an immense monastery. The rails are 811 laid on the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad as far north as Little Traverse Bay, Mich, and although a few days will be required to complete the balasting, the road may be regarded as finished. Hazing is not so popular at Yale College this season, as was once the case. A freshman, measuring fifty four inches round the breast, and standing six, feet five, 'Showed the boys where the laugh came in, and they couldn’l find any sport in it. Additional reports from Minnesota, Illinois, lowa, Wisconsin, Missouri, Kansas and Ohio confirm the’ estimated fau.ing off in the Irish potato crop in those Slates, which In 1870 produced over 43,000,000 bushels. The loss at the given rate would aggregate over 16,000,000 bushels. Although Dukes County, Mass.,,has probably been in existence for two hundred years, it never sent a convict to the 98tete prison until recently. It wants it .distinctly understood, however, that the two men “sent, up” on that day were outcasts from the abandoned and profligate State of Vermont. Complete reports received of the disasters by« the storm of August 24 show that the total number of vessels destroyed along the coast of Maine and Nova Scotia was 1,123, and the number of lives 600, including three by the cyclone on the laud. The records also show that about 900 buildings were injured or totally destroyed. The international money-order system between this country ana England and Germany is availed of to a much larger extent than was expected. The American Post-Office has to remit to Great Britain about $17,500 a year, so much more mondy is sent thither than hither. Successful immigrants sending home their wages .is the explanation The Wareaw I radian van says Mr.Saln Hemphill, while trimming his grape vines last spring, slipped a small potato over the end of one to keep it from "bleeding,” as it Uktermed. The potato sprouted and and grew all summer, and the suoots il sent forth can scarcely be called either grape or potato, but have a peculiar look and formation of their o wn. Eastern papers are talking about the wonderful magnetic powers of a boydown in Bangor, Me. It is said that by simply touching with the tips of his fingers the back of a chair on which a person is seated, the sitter. will be thrown quite across thrown from his seat as suddenly *s if % a young earthquake. Owners of threshing machine* which do not have the tumbling rod faoxedv cannot sue for threshing done by such machine, and are liable for all injuries done by such exposed tumbling rods. Eightythree persons in Illinois have this year been killed or maimed for life by * neglect of the act of March 21,1869. A few more suits would make this class Of-acci-dents less frequent. . , In Aroostook County, Me., a Swedish woman named Mme. Ochestranei manufactured a bunch et shingles with bee own hands. She filled the tree, sawed, split, shaved, and bunched the shingles, Carried them on her back three and * half miles, and sold them for flour for the support of her family, her husband being sick- and not able to work. The shingles have been sent to the State House to be placed in the museum. A Novelty in the Baibt.— Butter made from milk two years old i* certainly a curiosity, but is not likely to remain so much longer. A few week* agi \ ** the International Exhibition, in London, butter of good quality was made from some milk condensed and preserved oy ttawt* SSKSa*