News in Brief.

Evening Post, Volume L, Issue 54, 31 August 1895, Page 1 (Supplement)

News in Brief.

A Chinese custom is the throwing into the ocean of thousands of pieces of paper when friends are about to sail. Each piece bears written on it a prayer. The plans for the great bridge whioh is to connect New York city with the New Jersey .shore have been finally approved. The river is a mile wide, and is to be crossed by a single span carrying six lines of railway. The work is estimated to cost £5,000,000, and to extend nearly ten years. . - The Thumb Bible, published in Aberdeen in} 1670, measures one inch, square, and nearly half an inch thick. If a ohimney is on fire, close all doors and windows, and hang a blanket in front of the grate. A curious addition will shortly be published in Germany to Tolstoi literature. A lady, Mdme. Seuron, who. lived for ton years as governess in the house of Tolstoi, and who is at present spending a lengthy holiday at Berlin, is just now putting the final touches to a volume of souvenirs and anecdotes relating to the author of ''Anna Karenina." A shower of black ants fell in the city of Winnipeg recently.' The sidewalks, the roads, the roofs, and the insides of. the houses were thickly covered with colonies of black ants crawling about, and they were found' as plentiful in the outskirts of the city as in the main streets. They were large, black-bodied specimens, about the size of a wasp, and had the strong nippers of their race. No fewer than 600,000 children are insured in Great Britain, every year. The knick-knacks of life interest Lord Rosebery. He is particular about everything around him — even abont the position in which a table may be placed. He is a collector of tiny articles whioh can be handled and looked at, such as old silver and 'china. The relics, too, of great men appeal to his fancy. It may be remembered that the theft of a snuff-box from the noble lord's room in the Foreign Office gave rise to the report that he took snuff. Warm dishes for the table by immersing them in hot water, not by standing them in the oven. The earliest form of the glove was a mere bag for the hand. The Paris-Lyons-Mediterranean Rulway Company has recently put clocks on the outside of its locomotives on the aide towards the station platforms, for the benefit of both passengers and station agents who wish to note the instant of arrival and departure. A tablet has been placed in the church, of St. Giles, Cripplegate, recording the fact that Oliver Cromwell was married there in 1620. The French are shortly going to pass a law fining railway companies for late trains. A French physicsn warns ladies against kissing their bp-dogs, the pets being one of the great agencies for spreading disease. Mr. Gosae says that the two most notable young writers or the day are the English Kipling and the Italian poet and novelist, d'Annunzio. Eton now has 1019 students. Among them are four earls and seven eldest sons of peers. Great Britain pays £100,000,000 a year for imported foods. Although possessed of immense wealth, young Mr. -Harry MoCalmont, the new president of the Sports Club, is a man 'of rather simple tastes, and he much dislikes anything savouring of ostentation. He is quite a Scotsman, and, though the reverse of mean, never throws his money about recklessly. He rarely bets on horses, though he owns some of the best in England, and when he does make a wager it id always a very modest one. The Japanese are the grestest fish-eaters in the world. The eating of meat is almost entirely confined to the rich, and even they usa it sparingly. Mr. Gladstone hat been working for ten years on a work in two volumes, which it now nearing completion. He regards it as his chief literary work, and devotes suoh spare time to it as is not occupied by the some more pressing snort article. The work is a new edition of Bishop Butler, with annotations. The text of the book will be in .one volume and the annotations in the other. An Atlantic steamer's screw oosts about £4000. Harvard graduated 678 students this year, and Yale 575. - A paste of earth and water is a rough-and-ready bnt valuable application after, the sting of a bee or wasp. It is estimated that nearly £21,000,000 was spent in England alone in charity in 189*. In a distance march of SO kilometres from Berlin to Weissensee, organised by a Berlin club, eight young men out of 13 accomplished the march within seVen hours. The Esquimaux give the doctor his fee as soon as he comes. If the patient recovers he keeps it ; otherwise he returns it to the family. It is proclaimed that "miracles" are constantly being wrought by the Virgin at St. Winifride's Well, Holywell. The latest is that of a young girl, who, atter being dumb for three years, occasioned by a fright, recovered her speech on entering the water. It is, however, pointed out, but not by the priests^ that the doctors had all along stated that the ailment which has been produced by a shook would be removed by a shook. , A medical authority warns women against wearing their hair short. The cause of baldness in man, he says, is the faot that he outs his hair. : Butter put into clean pots and well surrounded with charcoal will keep good for a year. The underground electric railway from 3hepherd's Bush to Liverpool-street, Lonfdon, will be six and a-half mileiin length, and there will be fourteen stations. The oity station will be under the open space in front of the Mansion House, and wUI serve as a subway for pedestrians. The cheeks become pale with fear because tho mental emotion diminishes the action of the heart and lungs, and so impedes the circulation. The fish-hooks used to-day are of precisely the same shape as those employed 2000 years ago. The only difference is that then they were made of bronze, whereas--w-now they are made of steel. A great auk's egg, slightly cracked, realised 165 guineas at an auction sale in London recently. A motion has been adopted in the Frenoh Chamber making Ministers personally responsible for the expenditure authorised by them in then? official capacity. A scientist declares that the beautiful complexions of British girls are due to the fogs which sweep over Albion. ' Dampness keeps the skin soft. A physician has discovered that mental activity enhances physical beauty, thus controverting an old theory. -He says: — "A handsome man, or woman either, who does nothingbutlive welldr self -indulgently, grows, flabby, and all the fine lines of the features are lost ; but the bard thinker has an admirable sculptor always at work keeping his fine lines in repair, and constantly going over iia face to improve the original A Frenoh juryj ury recently acquitted a forger at Cherbourg, because be said he wanted the money to, send his intended bride to Paris to undergo a surgical" operation on whioh her life depended. A notable example of a big resuU produced by small means is found in the fact that lead pencil users have whittled away several big forests of cedar trees in Europe, and the supply of wood 'suitable for lead pencils is practically exhausted in the Old World. Dr. Porker said at the City Temple thathe could not but feel that it would be a national disaster if the chief statesman of any country were a loading patron of the turf, and he thus hoped that Christian England would never again have a horse-raoing Prime Minister. Immediately on hearing this some of his congregation began to lay oddi/ in whispers, on the return of a Unionist-Government. The Earl of Jersey has established a large oleomargarine factory in the outskirts of London,