It is shown by the annual report of one of the largest mining companies in Colorado that since the organization of the company the average cost of producing $1 in gold has been thirty ■even cents. It says much for the recuperative powers of St. Louis, Mo., when the fact is realized that already 8000 of the buildings blown down or damaged by the great tornado have already been cither re-erected or repaired. Massachusetts has established eighty-five free libraries siuce the public library commission was ap pointed in 1800; Connecticut forty since 1891, New Hampshire 130 since the same year, and Vermont tifty-nine since 1894. Another idiotic exhibition of shoot ing backward with a rifle at a woman, the aim taken from a lookingglass, has proved fatal, this time at Berlin. An expert named Kruger, after shoot ing various objects from the bauds and shoulders of his sister, put a bul let through her head in the presence of 4000 persons. The London Chronicle calls atten tion to the remarkably low death rate in many of the model dwellings in that city. In particular there is found in the houses of the Metropolitan Asso ciation for Improved Dwellings of the Working Classes, which is now in its fifty-third year, a death rate of only 9.64 to 1000. The inmates of these houses number 6430, and are housed in fourteen blocks in different parts of the city. This rate is only half the rate for the whole of London. An attempt is being made to galvan ize into new life the mediaeval city of Bruges, Belgium, and to shake oil'the rust and dust of its long ages of quiet by converting it into a seaport. A great canal is now being cut from the seashore at Ostend to Bruges, a distance of twenty miles. Electrio power is being extensively utilized, and this is the first application on a grand scale of this agency in Bel gium. Not only are the huge 250-ton cranes operated by electricity, but electric power is being applied to the brick-making machinery, and during the present year will turn out about 18,000,000 bricks for the sluice works aud docks. The widening market for fruit and the action of the railroad companies iu giving the growers facilities for reach ing the market in the great centres of populations havo led to more serious attention being given to horticulture in many parts of the country, some of which are more or less remote from the large cities, notes the New York Sun. The conditions in the central West, the Southwest, and on the Pacific Slope havo been reflected from time to time in these paragraphs. Just now grape-growing, which for some time has lagged in Florida, Ims reached so prosperous an activity about Orlaudo that grapes are being shipped from the Niagara vineyards at the rate of a carload a day. In exploiting its resources Kansas is now directing attention to its min eral deposits and their possibilities. It produces coal, building stone, zinc, salt, gypsum, oil, gas, cement, min eral water and clay, the output of all these iu 1895 being worth about $5,- 000,000. This was triple the output of 1885, and is regarded as promis ing much for the future. The State stand.} first in the production of gyp sum, its output being more than dou ble the combined product of all the other States, Michigan excepted. It is eleventh among the coal producing States, eighth in oil production, nnd fifth in gas, having an oil and gas area of 9000 square miles. Nearly a million and a half barrels of salt are marketed annually, and about 21,000 tons of zinc. The zinc-bearing ore is very rich, the yield being 66 i per cent. The system of vertical handwriting adopted by the school boards of inatly of the larger cities is held to have scored a triumph in Boston already' in turning out pupils who write rapidly and legibly, the two prime qualifica tions in chirography. The paramount virtue in handwriting is legibility. No matter how pretty and artistio hand writing may be, if it cannot he read easily it falls short of its purpose. This is secured in a conspicuons de gree in the vertical system, while a majority of pupils add to it both sym metry and grace. With such results it will not be necessary for graduates 4f the public schools to take a course in penmanship after they have en tered a store or office, as they have frequently been required to do in eities that boast the thoroughness and efficiency of their public school methods- "BEAR YE ONE ANOTHER'S BURDENS." It any little wont of ours If an y little love of onrs Can make a life the brighter; May make a life the sweeter; If any little song of ours If any little care of ours Can make one heart the lighter; May make another's fleeter; God help us speak that little word If nuy little help ranv ease And take our bit or singing, The burden of another; And drop it in some lonely vale God give us love and care and strength lo set the echoes ringing. To help along each other. <*> G THE * STRIKE * OF TILLIE * SLATER. M ✓♦s, d x \ s . •♦ - ♦s, ♦ '*\/'\/* ~ V\, v v N/v 'i\/v\/i\ fILLIE SLATEB often said she was working her fing but nobody seemed Tillie's sister Alice was the "fa sh i onab 1e" dressmaker i n Koseberry row, and Tillie was her assistant. She cut buttonholes, sewed straight seams on the machine, pulled out basting threads, helped to cook the meals, washed dishes, swept floors and read the news to her brother Geoffrey. There had been a time when the Slater girls had looked upon Geof frey as a helper and a protector in the struggle with poverty, which was the only legacy their parents had left them. But that was before the accident on the new schoolhouse, where he was working. After that his arms were limp and lifeless, his back was bent and his eyes were bad, and the poor boy, with the hope and strength of his seventeen years all blighted, became nothing but u bur den to bis faithful sisters. There were a good many times when Tillie worked herself into the belief that she was a martyr. Then she secretly rebelled against the hardness of her lot; but, with the exception of commenting on the condition of her linger tips, she considerately refrained from complaining in Alice's presence. But when they took the baby to raise she felt that she was justified in open rebellion. "It's a downright shame," she cried out, bitterly, when Alice brought the little fellow home with her from the funeral and announced her intention of keeping hiin. "I declare, I won't put up with it. Just as if we haven't had a hard enough time already with out this happening. It's been noth ing but work, work, work, all my life. I've never had the time nor the money to go to places and do things like other girls. I've never said anything about how I felt, for I supposed you and Geoffrey were suffering just as much as I did. But when it comes to saddling ourselves with other peo ple's children, I won't stand it." "But he's our own nephew," per sisted Alice, gently. "Our own sis ter's child. Just before Clara went she called me in and asked me to take him and bring him up, aud I've got to do it. Remember, he is an orphan as well as ourselves, Tillie. If we don't care for him, who will?" "I don't know," said Tillie, stiffly. "I suppose you can put him in an asy lum or an institution. That is where other babies go when their fathers and mothers die, and he's no better than the rest of them. There's one thing sure, we can't have him. One more mouth to feed and one more body to clothe means a good deal to poor folks like us. And we need #>o many things, now, too. Besides, who's going to take carc of him? A two-vear-old baby can't very well shift for himself." "Yes, I know." returned Alice. "I thought you could take him out for an airing sometimes and look after him a little nights and mornings. Geof frey and I can manage to got along some way during the day. Then va cation will soon be here and you will have lots of time to give him." Take care of him nights and morn ings and haul him arouud during va cation! Yes, indeed, I see myself do ing it. I'll strike, that's what I'll do, Alice Slater. I won't turn my hand over to help about one solitary thing. If you're going to burden yourself with troublesome babies you'll have to get along the best way you can. I shan't hell}." Alice sighed and commenced to pare the potatoes for supper. Tillie took up her Latin reader and tried to study, but somehow she could not concen trate her thoughts on the lesson. Through the open door she could see the baby sitting by the sewing-room window iu the midst of some flowering plants that Tillie had carefully nursed throughout the winter. He was a bon nie child, and he looked so sweet and pretty iu his pink dress and white ruf fled apron that even Tillie's hardened heart was touched, and the thought was borne in on her mind as she watched him that of all the flowers blooming there the daintiest and fair est was her little nephew. "Why don't you kiss the baby, clear?" said Alice, as she began to set the table. "Don't act that way. Poor little thing, he has been so lonesome yesterday and to-day without his mother. Clara always spoiled him, I guess. He'll get over it soon, but it's pitiful now to see how his heart is grieved for her." Alice lifted a corner of her apron to her eyes, but Tillie turned her atten tion to the Latin reader once more and refused to welcome the addition to their family. She did not refer to the subject again, hut her actions gave positive proof that the strike was on. "Tillie's still sulking," Alice said to Geoffrey one morning, after her sis ter had gone to school without heed ing the boy who had held out his chubby hands aud asked, in his baby way, to be takeu, too. "There's been an awful change in her. She never does anything unless I ask her to, and she seems to hate little Hiram. I'm sure I don't know what I'm going to do about it," and the 19-year-old bread-winner sighed. "Don't worry, Alice," said patient Geoffrey. "Don't pay any attention ; to her and her bad humor will wear oft* at'ter awhile. Anybody'd have to love i this child. It's contrary to human nature to hold uukiud feelings toward him." But Tillie's bad humor did not wear off. The strike was continued through out April and May, and when vacation began her dislike for the little boy who had, by common consent, been con signed to her care, was at fever heat. Tillie herself often wondered how she could treat him so badly. "Hiram Stewart, Hiram Stewart, I hate you," she said one day in a low, tense voice that fairly frightened her when she realized what a terrible state of mind such a tone must express. She bad taken him out to the park that afternoon for au airing in compli ance with Alice's request. She placed him in one corner of a wooden bench and knelt before him that she might look him squarely in the face when telling him what she thought of him. Even in the midst of her anger Tillie involuntarily pronounced him the pret tiest baby in the whole world, with his soft brown hair, long dark lashes and beautifully molded face,but the thought did not cause her to releDt. "Do you know what you have done to me, Hiram StewartV" she went on. "You've made me work ray fingers to the bone." Tillie could not forbear using her favorite expression, in spite of the fact that she had been do ing comparatively little since his com ing. "You keep me from having any lun. I can't go visiting with the girls, but have to lug you around every bright day instead." Great tears were coursing down the baby's cheeks, and his breast heaved with the storm of sobs that was about to break. Tillie saw his grief, but she went on mercilessly. "I had completed plans for having a little pleasure this summer for the first time in my life, and you had to come in and knock them all in the head. Hiram Stewart, you're the pest of my existence. I'm not going to put up with you any longer. I'm—going —to—lose—you." It seems as though the child under stood the import of the words, for he set up a cry that echoed through that part of the park and attracted the at tention of everybody who chanced to be lounging near there. "Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" lamented Tillie. "I've done it now. I ought to have known better than to get him scared. I must try to quiet him some how. There, there, baby," and she assumed a coaxing tone, "don't cry. Tillie didn't mean it. Come on, darl ing, and go to sleep, Tillie'll sing for you." She took him in her arms and sat down iu his corner of the bench. Then, swaying herself gently backward aud forward, she murmured a lullaby with which her own heart had often been soothed when heavy with infan tile woes. The afteruoon sun was sinking low, and its last rays fell athwart the fair face nestled against her shoulder, when Tillie ceased sing ing and assured herself that the baby was sound asleep. One little hand was closed over the end of the lace ccarf at her throat, but she deftly loosed his grasp, and with a dexterity born of a settled determination she slipped him from her arms to the bench. Then she stood up and looked round. That corner of the park was momentarily deserted. The only per sons in sight were three boys in a boat, quite a distance out on the lake, and a fisherman, who was just returning from the end of the pier. She watched the fisherman until he struck into a path way leading south, then turned to the baby once more. One tiuy hand was doubled up under his head and the other nestled beneath his chin. There were tear stains on his cheeks, and even in his sleep his breathing was convulsed now and theu, as though dreaming of the sorrow he had just borne. Tillie gave one more quick, fright ened glance at the child on the bench, then turned and ran, with the swift ness of a young gazelle, through a deeply shaded path that branched off from the wide carriageway. Twilight had already settled down in the tree lined walk, and there was no one to watch her flight. She had almost reached the street, where the cable cars were running two nnd fro, before anyone crossed her path. Then she slacked her speed and walked out into the wide drive with apparent uncon cern. The clock in the tower of the railroad depot at the head of Roseberry row was striking seven when Tillie walked into the kitchen—alone. Supper had been standing for half an hour, and Alice already had grown nervous and anxious. "Where's HiramV" she asked, when she perceived that Tillie did not have the baby. "O-o-oh," moaned Tillie over and over again. Her grief was not feigned, for her alarm had by that time become genuine in realization of her o flense. "What's the matter?" repeated Alice. "Where's Hiram?" "He's lost, or stolen or something," said Tillie. "I had him on a bench close to the lake, and I just went down to the edge of the water for a few minutes, and when I went back he was gone. O-o-oh!" "Somebody's stolen him," said Geoffrey. Alice was weeping piteously. "Did you speak to a policeman, Tillie?" she asked. "N-n-o," faltered Tillie. "I didn't think about it." Within an hour's time a description of the lost child had been sent to every police station in town. That was a proceeding Tillie had not counted on, and she wondered what the outcome would be. It practically resulted in nothing, for in spite of the assurances of the officer who patroled Roseberry row that Hiram would be restored by morning, the next day dawned without bringing any news of the pretty boy. Tillie passed a miserable night. She begged to be allowed to sit up with Alice and the neighbors who had come in, but they bade her go to bed. "It isn't your fault, child," they said, kindly. "Nobody blames you. You look like you'd been sick for a week, Go to bed and try to rest a lit tle." Their tender solicitude increased her feeling of guilt. Along toward morning she fell asleep, but she was tormented by such awful dreams that she was glad when they told her it was time to get up. A week passed, and in spite of the efforts of the police the Slater baby was still missing. Tillie had accom plished her object. She had rid her self of her troublesome little relative, but somehow his absence did not bring the sense of freedom she had expected. The strike had been called off, and she again helped Alice of hei own accord. But there wasn't much to be done. Sewing was slack just then, and all the duties pertaining to the baby were no longer needed. She had plenty of time to go visiting with the girls, but she had no inclination to improve her opportunity, and every day she looked longingly at the high chair which stood empty among the roses and geraniums and carnations, and wondered what had become of him. Of afternoons she went to the park and sat on the bench where she had left him in the chill of the coming night. The picture of the baby as he lay there was constantly before her, and she cried out that her heart was breaking. It was her first great sin, and the punishment was terrible. On the eighth day after "losing" the baby Tillie walked dejectedly through the park toward the fateful spot. Her head was bent, and she did not raise her eyes from the ground till near the familiar bench. Then she stopped short with a cry of alarm and rubbed her eyes to make sure she was awake. Yes, she was right; she had lost her mind indeed, for there on that self-same bench, dressed in the same pink frock, and lying in the same attitude, in the same corner, was the despised baby. Her heart gave a mighty bound as though it would jump clear out of her mouth. "He's dead, and that's his ghost," she cried, faintly; "but I'm going to look at his pretty face once more, anyway." A moment later she stood beside him, and in another instant Hiram Stewart, in flesh and blood, not in spirit, was clasped in her strong young arms. "My darling, darling baby," she sobbed. "I love you; indeed I do." There was a note pinned to his dress. It was addressed to her. She opened it and read as follows: "On the afternoon of June 25 an old man who was resting in the shadow of a clump of bushes in Lincoln park heard a little girl sayiug some very cruel things to a baby. Among other things she threatened to 'lose' him. The old man was sorely grieved at that, and after the little girl had run away ho went over and sat on the bench beside the sleeping boy. It was dark when the baby awoke and sat up and looked around him. Ho was chilled and hungry, and frightened at the lonesome stillness, and if the little girl could have heard his pitiful crying she would have vowed never to 'lose' him again, but to love him dearly. "The old man took him home. He soon learned, through the newspapers, to whom the child belonged. He made a trip to Roseberry row and told the little girl's brother and sister a few things, and they decided it would bo well to bring the little girl to her senses. The old man has given the child the best of care. He would like to keep him always, but there are others who have a better claim. He is yours henceforward." There was no name signed to the letter. Tillie looked all around for the old man, who, she thought, must be near, but he had disappeared as mys teriously as he had come the day she "lost" the baby. Tillie clasped Hiram's chubby arms round her neck and pressed him close to her heart. She went straight to Koseberry row. "I've found him, Alice," she said, simply. "You know all about it. I'm sorry. The strike is over, Alice, and if you don't let me work my Angers to the bone now, I'll never forgive you."—Chicago Record. A Remarkable Cat. Professor Hill, of Princeton Uni versity, once owned a very remarkable cat. It bad but two legs, having been born that way. But in Bpite of this deformity it was a most engaging pet nnd walked glibly upon its two fore feet and frisked about as lively as cats blessed with four legs. When she died her skeleton was mounted and now reposes in a glass case in the uni veieitj museum. THE MERRY SIDE OF LIFE. -TORIES THAT ARE TOLD BY THE FUNNY MEN OF THE PRESS. The Married Man's Discovery Undci Mitigating Clreuiiifttanceft—An Expert Observer—fining l>y Contraries— Both Force of Habit. Etc.. Etc. The Happy Han—"l tell yon, old fellow, a man doesn't know what real happiness is until he's married." Cynical Married Friend—"Then he finds it consists in being single."— Brooklyn Life. A Selfish View. She—"Look at that poor moth flut tering around the light." He—"That's better than having it fluttering around my overcoat."—Puck. Force of liablt. "Does your husband act as he did before you were married, Mrs. Lightly?" "Much the same. When he goes out at night he remains very late."— Detroit Free Press. Merely a Suggestion. Bridget—"Sure, ma'am, I wud call your attenshun to the beautiful sun set out nv the kitchen winder." Mistress—"That's nothing, Bridget. You ought to see it rise some morn ing."—Life. An Expert Observer. Charley Checks—"Wouldn't yer like ter be an umpire, Sammy, an' get into all de games free?" Sammy Spots—"Naw! What would be de use? Dem fellers never soe nut tin' uv de game."—Puck. Convicted of Insincerity. •'My motto," said the summer boarder, "is 'live and let live.'" "Hypocrite!" sneered the mosquito which had been perched on his nose. Only by a precipitate retreat had it been able to avoid a crushing blow.—- Puck. Under Mitigating Circumstances. Jinks—"How ranch do you think a minister ought to get for marrying a couple?" Filkins "Well, if wholly unac quainted with them, perhaps he might be let off with six months."—Town Topics. Coins by Contraries. Askins —"What do you think will he the outcome when you propose to Miss Swift?" Teller—"She is such a contrary girl that I am inclined to think she will accept me became I feel sure she will reject me?" His Usual I'or.c. "Julia had her husband's photograph taken with his head stuck in a news paper." "Why did she do that?" "She said that was the way he always looked to her when ho was at home." —Chicago Record. Both Nervous. Suitor (nervously)—" Mr. Matchittj T—er—w liy—er— your—er — dau g h t cr —I wish to—er—speak—" Mr. Matehitt (also nervously)—" Look here, young man; out with it. If you wish to marry my daughter, ray so. Don't keep me sitting lierej in this awful suspense!"— Puck. An Unnecessary Admonition. "Did you tell that young man not to call hero any more?" asked Mabel's father, severely. "No-—no." "Why not?" "I didn't think it was necessary. I don't see how he could call any more, now. He calls seven times a week." —Washington Star. Understood the Case. Stranger—"l should like to retain you in an important case. It is a Aght over a child." Great Lawyer—"Between husband and wife?" "No; she is an orphan and has no near relatives. The contest is between distant relatives on both sides of the house." "Ah! I see. How much is she heir ess to?" —New York Weekly. Another Long-Felt Want. Customer—"My wife has been pes tering the life out of me to get her an easy chair. She's always nagging about something, and if it isn't a chair it'll be something else, and it's hardly worth while getting one; but, still, I thought I'd drop in so as to see what you had. She'll be sure to ask." Furniture Dealer—"Here, sir, is a chair so perfectly easy and comfortable that she'll fall asleep the minute she touches it." Customer—"Cracky! I'll take it." —New York Weekly. The Season*. Little Girl—"Mamma, is this sum mer?" Wise Mother—"Dear me, will you never learn to know the seasons? Now remember. When it is so hot one day you can't breathe, and so wet and chilly the next that you can't go out, it's summer; when it suddenly gets so cold that everybody Bhivers, and ice and snow appear, it's autumn; when it becomes warm and balmy, and the birds sing, and grass gets green, and trees begin to bud, it's wiuter; when the winds start up nnd cyclones sweep over the country, and blizzards carry death nnd devastation in their ivake, and the rivers freeze, and the snow piles up three feet high, it's spring." —New York Weekly. Public Land In Minsouil. According to the figures furnished by the Department of the Interior last year, Missouri has still 017,000 acres of publio land subject to entry, a sur prising quantity considering the age of the State and the price at which land iB held in the more densely set tled portions. The land offices for this State are located at Booneville, Jronton and Springfield. HOUSEHOLD AFFAIRS. Four-Minute Ice Cream. Ice cream for a waiting invalid may be made in four minutes, as recently; proved by a cooking-school experi ment. Put two tablespoonfuls of cream into a bowl, sweeten with pow dered sugar, flavor with a teaspoonful of clear strong coffee, beat light with a cream whisk for one minute. Then put it into a half-pint oyster pail, tit on the cover carefully, and set the small pail into a quart one, filling the space between them with shredded ice and fine salt. Three minutes' turning in this freezing mixture will give a saucer of smooth coffee ice cream. A Hard Sauce. Hard sauces are preferred by most persons to liquid ones. One that is very good is made by rubbing to a cream two cups of brown sugar and one cup of butter,, adding three table spoonfuls of milk, one by one, at the last, aud beating the whole at the least one hour. A teaspoonful of van illa should be stirred in just before serving. Another sauce is made from one cup of granulated sugar and nearly one-half cup milk, boiled together to a thick syrup, aud then stirred till cool, when it may be flavored; or two cups brown sugar, one and one-half cups of milk; and butter the size of a walnut may be boiled to the consistency of honey aud then strained. Barley Pudding. t Soak half a box of gelatine for two hours in enough cold water to cover it. Turn over it a cup of boiling milk, and stir until the gelatine is dissolved. Heat one pint of milk to boiling point, and stir into it three tablespoonfuls of sugar aud the well-beaten yolks of four eggs. Do not allow the mixture to boil after the yolks are added, but take from the fire and stir frequently until partly cool; then add the dis solved gelatine. Flavor with a tea spoonful of vanilla, lemon or orange, and finally add the whites of the eggs beaten light. Line a lightly buttered pudding*mold with fitted half inch slices of rick, black fruit cake. Fill the lined mold with the custard, and set it in a cool place for a number of hours or overnight. When serving, turn the mold of pudding out upon a dish, and heap round it whipped cream that has been suitably flavored aud sweetened.—The Housewife. Potato and Tomato Salad. Boil in tlieir jackets four medium sized potatoes. While they are boil ing make a French dressing aud slice into it one good-sized onion; as soon as the potatoes are done, drain, salt and dry them. Remove the skius and cut the potatoes while hot into the dressing; toss them carefully until every piece is well covered. Put the mixture on a cold dish and stand aside until serving hour. Then garnish the dish thickly with parsley; sprinkle over the dish a tn'olespoonfal of linely cliopped parsley or celery tops; a small pickled beet may be chopped tine and placed diagonally across the dish. Sardines or pickled herring may also be used as a garnish aud to give vari ety, and one may also stir into the dressing a teaspoonful of Anchovy paste. Scald, peel and coo! small sound, well-shaped tomatoes. Dish them neatly on lettuce leaves, aud put over each a teaspoonful of mayonnaise dressing. Keep in a cool place until it is time to serve.—Mrs. S. T. Borer, in Ladies' Home Journal. > Hints For the Housrhohl. Many drooping flowers will freshen wonderfully if the tips of the stems are trimmed off and the ends uro then held in hot water for a few moments. Wheu making corned beef hash moisten it with a little beef stock, if you have it, in place of water. A pinch of sugar added with the salt and pepper helps to bring out the flavor. Marshniallow stuffed dates make a delicious after-dinner sweet. Remove the pits from the dates, fill the space with marshmallow and roll the dates in powdered sugar. One marshmallow will stuff four dates. tt-When one is hurried in mailing a let ter, and the only available postage stamp is found to be without sufficient glue, moisten the stamp, rub it on the gummed flap of an envelop, and quick ly press it in place upon the letter. In ornameuting summer cottages a have corner may be made very effec tive at a trifling cost. Secure an empty nail keg from a hardware store, cover it with ebony paint and gild the hoops. Partly fill the keg with sand to give it weight and fasten a piece of board over the top a little larger than the keg. Place it in the vacant corner and cover the wooden top with a fringe-trimmed square of pretty silk or cretonne. Stand an unused ginger jar or a cheap effective vase upon this pedestal and fill it with grasses, driod ferns and cattails. To stiffen sheer handkerchiefs, laces, wash silks, or any othef thin fabric, it is best to use gum nrabic starch. To make it, put into a bottle one ounce of gum arabio aud pour over it one cup of cold water; stand the bottle in a dish of cold water and plaeo it over the lire until the gum is dissolved; then strain it through a flue sieve or piece of cheese cloth into an other bottle. When it is cold put in a half gill of alcohol, and it will keep and be ready for use when needed. When dainty laces are to be stiffened, half a teaspoonful of the starch, mixed with a small cupful of water, will give the lace ample stiffness, adding a larger amount cf the starch as it is needed for diflhrent fabrics. It "Dopes'* Files. A stupefler for flies is made by one teaspoonful of black pepper, two tea spoonfuls of moist sugar and two table spoonfuls of cream, and place a little of it in oaucers flies abound. SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL. The small British torpedo boat Turbina attained a speed of thirty three knots an hour near Spitliead, England. In England and Wales the death rate from typhoid fever has declined from 277 per million in 1876-80 to 135 in 1891-94. A large Dussand microphonograph, now being constructed for the Paris Exhibition of 1900, is expected to make the voice heard by 10,000 people. A medical authority asserts that death caused by a fall from a great height is absolutely painless. The mind acts very rapidly for a time, then unconsciousness ensues. There are about one hundred grains of iron in tho average human body, and yet so important is this exceed ingly small quantity, that its dimi nution is attended with very serious results. At present it is estimated that there are in the world's oceans 7,000,000 cubic miles of salt, and the most astonishing thing about it is that if all this salt could bo taken out in a moment the level of the water would not drop. Professor Dubard, of Dijon, con tributes to the Province Medicale an article showing that tuberculous dis ease occurs in cold-blooded animals, fishes (carps) and frogs, and can be communicated to these animals ex perimentally. The United States Government has been invited to participate in an in ternational conference to be held in Berlin from October 11 to 16, to dis cuss the leprosy question. An ex hibition appropriate to the conference and leotures on leprosy will be given. The Schenectady (N. Y.) Locomotive Works has received an order from Japan for twelve passenger locomotives for the Kiusiu Bailway Company. The engines are to be of the American type, with-cylinders sixteen inches in diameter and twenty-four inches stroke. This order is said to be the first of a series which will be placed in this country. Nature provides a series of hooks on the front edge of the hind wings of in sects, each hook fitting into a groove on the hind edge of a front wing. The front and hind wings are thus fastened together on each side while the insect is flying, and are unfastened at other times. This explains why you have occasionally noticed one of the species flying, apparently with two wings, aud have seen him display four upon alighting. This arrangement is ex tremely convenient for such little creatures as the honey bee, which has to enter small holes, where a large ex panse of wing would be useless. President Pierce's Presence of Mind. In the course of some reminiscences of President Franklin Pierce, G. M. McConncll tells this story in the Chi cago Times-Herald: Some days later I went with the member of Congress whose Secretary I was to call on the President on some urgent official busi ness. My chief was a very absent min (led mail in some respects, and in catching up the short eloak then worn, on leaving home, and throwing it over his arm, lie had inadvertently caught up with it a certain intimate garment of his own which happened to be on the same chair. While he stood talk ing with Mr. Pierce he for the first time shifted this cloak from one arm to the other, and to my dismay this garment—an undershirt, in t fact— dropped to the floor between them. Mr. Pierce saw it, but its owner did not, and turned to depart. The Presi dent saw my look of horror and heard the expressed snort of his own Secre tary behind him, but only tbe faintest flicker of a smile flashed across his face, and as the gentleman—quite as courtly as himself—was in the act of turning he caught up tho ridiculous estray, twirled it with a deft move ment into a wad, so to speak, and passed it, unseen by its owner, to mo as lie moved partly between us and bowed us both out of tho room with grave, urbane, unruffled courtesy. Artificial "Antiques." A case came before a London Mag istrate the other day, involving the possession of certain "antique" or molu articles about which there had been an abortive trial. A firm of deal ers claimed them, and two workmen did the same. The latter were partic ularly assertive in their ownership, saying they ought to know, because, as a matter of fact, they made the ar ticles. To prove their point they set to work and showed, to the amuse ment of a critical audience, how or molu was made "antique" by the aid of pumiee powder. An Electric Spur. M. C. Tuttle, bailiff of the Com mon Pleas Court, Cleveland, Ohio, will spend his vacation in introducing a device for putting life into lazy horses. It is an electric appliance to be fastened to the harness. A battery is carried in the driver's pocket. In stead of whipping a horse, the driver speaks to tho animal and at the same time touches a button attaohed to the rein. The horse is given a slight shock, which is said to have a wonder ful effect on the animal.—New York Telegram. A Wonderful Cat. On board of Her Majesty's ship Pal las, a cruiser, at anchor in Boston harbor, there is a very remarkable cat, the pet of the officers and crew, and a sort of mascot. This cat has a uniqne habit of div ing off the side of the vessel and get ting a fresh supply of fish for himself at times. Most cats are afraid of water, but not so this tabby, and the officers and crew are naturally very much attached to such a distinctively eailor cat.—New York Telegram.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers