FACTS AND FANCIES.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XIX, Issue 2061, 30 December 1924, Page 6

FACTS AND FANCIES.

The Clock of Beauvais Cathedral. Tbe dock of Beauvais Cathedral to said to be composed of 92,000 separata pieces. One sees on the fifty-two dialplates the hour, the day, the week, and the month; the rising- and the setting- of the sun, the phases of the moon, the tides, the time of the principal capitals of the world, together with a series of terrestrial and astronomical evolutions. The framework is of sarved oak 8 metres by 5 metres, or 26ft. by 16Ht. Wbcn the clock strikes all the "edifice" seems in movement. The designer wished to depict the Last Judgment. This wonderful work recalls the clock of Strasburg, and is of modern construction. It is the work of a Beauvaisian, M. Write, who was in the engineering department of the Nord Railway. lie died in 1887.

Chinese Cycles of Years. Among the many extraordinary customs of the Chinese is that of banding years together in groups of twelve, called "cycles," and naming each year of the scries after some animal. Thus, the 6rst year of a new cycle is tbe year of the Rat, the second the year of the Ox, I'aq third the year of the Tiger. Every Chinese born in the year of the Rat belongs to the Order of the Rat, and so on. The animal "class" of every Chinese man and woman is thus recorded, and is held to be of great importance in foretelling the future. Another curious faeb about the Chinese reckoning of time is that in the Celestial Empire a child is held to be one year old, as soon as it is born. With the absurd superstition so dear to tbe Oriental mind, a baby boy is frequently given a girl'9 name in order to deceive the evil spirits, who, apparently, have an objectionable habit of making it as hard as possible to rear a male child successfully.

French Bits of India. The fact that the Indian town of Pondicherry was a French possession came quite as a surprise to many people when they read of Us possible bombardment by the German warship Emden. But there are several places in the Indian Empire that come under the French flag, although they are mostly towns. Pondicherry is the capital or chief settlement of the French possessions in India. It was purchased by a French trading company from the Rajah of Vijayapnr in 1G74, and has been taken once by the Dutch, and alternately taken and lost by the British several times, being given to the French finally in 1815. Other important French possessions are Karikal. Yanaon, and Mahe, all of which cover an area of about 200 square miles, and are controlled from PoikKcherry by the Governor. Mahe is alone tm the western side, the other possessions being all spread over the eastern ooasri). The Great Pyramid. The greatest monument in the. world is the Great Pyramid of Egypt, which was built nearly 6000 years ag-o. It was built by Cheops, King of Egypt, who, following the example of previous Icings, wished to have a magnificient tombstone, so that he would be vemembered. He is remembered, but not at all as he would have wished, for it is certain that the thousands of men who were engaged in buildingit worked under the lash. The result is Cheops is always put down as a tyrant. According to Herodotus, the ancient Greek historian, 100,000 men were at work on it for twenty years. It covers an area of thirteen and a-half acres. and contains 7,000,000 tons of masonry. It was built in layers—over 200 in number—and then the edges were filled in to make the sides smooth. The stone used varied in weight from two tons to sixty tons. When it was built it was about 480 ft. high, and the sides were each 775 ft. long. Passages led to the centre of tbe pyramid,

Facts About the Fly. Before tlie men of science terrified the world with their talk of germs, most people thought that the house fly was a harmless creature, and very cleanly in his habits, since he seemed to spend a great part of his time in cleaning his legs. But since public opinion has turned against him some explanation has to he found for his apparent cleanliness. Trie fact that the fly can walk on a glazed or a slippery perpendicular surface has for long been a matter of observation. It was at first thought that the line hairs that covor his legs were so small that they could enter the pores of the smoothest surface, and in that way bear the weight of his body. Later it was thought that a sticky fluid was secreted by tho feet, which caused them to adhere slightly to the wall.

The advent of the microscope has made it possible, says a popular writer, to observe the precise facts about the fly's unusual powers. It is true that the fly's feet secretes a kind of grease, but not in a liquid form. Each leg has from 1600 to 2000 minute hairs, and each hair carries a certain amount of this fat. When the fly lights on a smooth surface the whole mass of hairs adheres to it, and each individual hair can bo seep under the microscope to leave a distinct grease spot, which has a little circular mark in its centre made by the hair itself. With such sticky feet it is naiurally the case that the fly collects a good deal of dust in the course of his daily perambulations. If ne wishes to walk on glass or upside down on ths ceiling he must spend » tew hours every day keeping his fee* •lean of thU coaling of dirt. \