VARIETIES.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 3217, 20 November 1900, Page 7

VARIETIES.

About 10,000,000 of the bovine species are now to be found in the Argentine Republic They ara all descendants of eight cows and one bull which were taken to Brazil in the middle of the sixteenth century. Lord Roberts says that if the British soldiers could bo so trained as to make it certain that one shot in twenty would reaoh its billet, our Army might be pronounced five times as formidable as any Continental army had yet shown itself. Great Britain has more women workers than any other country in proportion to population; twelve per cent, of the industrial classes are women. Seventeen private soldiers of the French Army in Bonaparte's time, by their bravery and talent, raised themselves to the following distinguished stations : Two became kings, two princes, nine dukes, two fieldmarshals, and two generals. An organist says that a cow moos in a perfect fifth octave, or tenth ; a dog barks in fifth or fourth ; a donkey brays in a perfeot octave ; and a horse neighs in a descent on the chromatio scale. "W ater drinkers are not teetotallers • Natural water contains alcohol in the proportion of about 1000 th, There are 500,000 collectors of stamps in New York City, more than 1,000,000 in the United States, and about 5,000,000 in the world. Blood oranges are now prepared arti ficially, the ordinary oranges being punctured and a small quantity of ciaret injeoted. Toe diameter of the crater of Vesuvius is about 2000 feet ; the depth is about 600 teet. Both diameter and depth vary with each eruption. The Prince of Wales, simple and unostentatious as he always desires his private visits to be, cannot be fittingly entertained for even two or three days without an expenditure of £3000 or £4000. Crime in the Army is punished on a scale ten times more severe than anything known to civil life. The most trivial offence* against discipline — a momentary ebullition of temper, or a casual indiscretion in the matter of drink — are almost every day involving men in loss of rank and permanent disadvantages in their profession, "mere often than not accompanied by sharp terms of imprisonment. The tallest officer in the British Army is Captain Oswald Ames, of the 2nd Life Guards, whose height is over 6 feet 8 inches. His weight is about seventeen stone. A funny tariff case is reported from a German port of entry. The Custom H-jm-e agent assessed as ' poultry' a collection of butterflies because they had wings. At' f er much argument the specimens were passed free as objects af science and art. The busiest telephone exchange in the world is in Chicago, lt is tha Washington Street Exchange, where the daily average ia 180,000 messages, which means that double that number of persons talk over the telephone line. In Hungary, the legal age of in individual is reckoned to data only from baptism, no matter at what period of life that takes place. In 1892 a p;omsn was arretted at Presburg, in Hungary, charged with receiving stolen goods. She pleaded infancy, and that ehe could not consequently be held answerable by Hungarian laV for what she had done. After adjournment for serious cogitation on the point, the learned tribunal declared the defence to bo a good one, and that the prisoner, a woman of forty, was legally only six months old, thus giving her a score of years to turn to dishonest account with impunity. In Japan, age is legally counted from the first day of January following birth. A shoplifter, recently convicted, carried a bogus baby with her during her predatory excursions. The infant had a wax face and a hollow 'eather body. It was the thief's custom to dexterously transfer purloined articles, such as gloves, laces, Seo., to the spacious baby, which usually gained muoh in weight during these little excursions. Apropos of the Czir's recent plea for the disarmament of the world's great fighting powers it is interesting to note that peace is a luxury for the enjoyment of which the nations ot Europe pay between them something like £209,000,000 per annum. Great Britain heads the Hat with the largest amount, for while our army is comparatively small — 263,569 of all ranks, not including the forces in India — the sum expended on our navy is so large that the cost for navy and army combined exceeds that of any other country. The gross estimate for 1897-8 shows £21,362 452 for the British Army, and for our Navy £23,280,473 — a grand total of £44,642,925; Russia comes next with £39 539,851 ; then France, with £36,573,876; Germany pays £27,266,700 ; Italy spends £13,510,117; Austria-Hun-gary, £12,896,371 ; Spain (in normal years), £6,818,615 ; Turkey, £5,860,824 ; Holland, £3,155,583; Sweden, £2,519,650 ; Belgium, £2,129,499 : Roumania, £1,778,813 ; Portugal, £1,748.441 ; Switzerland, £1,019,914; Denmark, £945,635; Greeoe, £933,831; Norway, £759,984 ; and Servii, £564,615. — '■■■■■■' —■—*—■———■—■————■—■——-»■—————■■»—■»—————_—__■___!