FACTS AND FANCIES.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XX, Issue 2063, 6 January 1925, Page 6

FACTS AND FANCIES.

Notsd Epicures. The foibles and men are always interesting. uiagne liked especially well Hfc sorts The Emperor Frederick many was excessively fond of melons 3 Tasso, the great Italian poet, had *| marked predilection for baked sweetmeats. King Henry IV. of France was an immoderate eater of melons and oysters. Voltaire was a victim of th« coffee habit. Paid 1., Czar of Russia, was a noted lover of pato de foie eta canards. Button, who enjoyed a hearty meal, had the reputation of making away with a large part of a roast when opportunity offered. Rabelais had lettuce imported from Rome for his exclusive use, and Louis XVIII. was not able to go t\>. o days without spinach. Facts About the Fop-:;. Some facts about the Popes are given in the "Fniverse." No fewer than 101 were Romans, 103 natives of other parts of J.aly, -is were Frenchmen, 9 Greeks, 7 (ioniums, •"> Asiatics, 3 Africans, 3 Spaniards, and 2 Dalmatians; while Palatine, Thrace, Holland, Per nigal, and Knglan-1 have each contributed one to the I'upal chair. Nine Popes re"; ,;c;l I .•■•:-.•■ than one month, 30 less than one ."•oar. 11 more thou twenty years, and (3 o\or twenty-three years. Pius JX., whose death occurred in 1878, terminated a reign of thirty-one years, and it is not a little remarkable that the third in length of reign should have been his successor, Leo XIII., who occupied the Papal throne for over twenty-five- years. Improving Lamplight. Reading and writing by artificial light are often very trying to the eyes, and though a lamp may be placed quite close to th-j reader, it seldom seems to give sufficient and certainly never too much light. By placing a small mirror behind the lain]), so that the light may then bo direcled upon the book or, in fact, in any direction that may be required, the intensity of the light can be increased ivondei fully. The glass may be propped up on the table, with a few largo books placed behind it, and the direction of the light will depend at what angle the glass is adjusted. Quite small print may be easily read by this means, where under other circumstances it would 1)0 very difficult, and short-sighted people and old people will find it useful. A Murderous Tree. There is a singular tree in Cuba called the yaguey tree. It begins to grow a; the top of another tree. The seed is carried lit a bird, or wafted by the wind, and. falling into some mots?, brandling part, takes root, and spec lily begins to grow. It sends a kind of thin, string-like root down the body of the tree, which is soon followed bj others. In course of time these footings strike the ground, and growth immediately commences upward. New rootings continue to be formed and gee strength, until the one tree grows as a net around the other. The outside one surrounds and presses the inner, (strangling its life, and augmenting its own power. At last the tree within is killed, and the parasite that has taken possession becomes itself the tree.

Concerning the Snake. The snake's power of getting over the ground is intimately associated with its flexibility from s'.de to side. The flexibility is not as powerful from top to bottom, and it is a mistake to imagine the snake .s undulating in vertical curves similar to the J-ioyli l span of the inchworm. Tho curves are horizontal, parallel with tliv ground, or whatever surface the animal is traversing. Of course, this may be oblique or a perpendicular line. Locomotion is affected by a contraction of the ribs on one side of the body with a corresponding widening out on the other. This forms one curve. Another contraction takes place at the end of the expanding side, heading the body in the opposite direction. Thus there is a series of alternate constrictions and spreadings of the numerous ribs throughout the length of the reptile as it lies on the ground. When tho snake is in motion some part of the hody must securo itself against a rough or projecting surface from which the forward part takes hold and the higher length is dragged to a new position. The row of shields along the snake's belly is very quick in seizing upon tho slightest projection, so that any rough surface affords a good track. In climbing a tree the same principle is employed. The snake must find points of vantage from its curves. Winding itself spirally around a tree is an impossibility. If tho animal is long enough to project its serpentine way from the ground to the first branch the remainder of the ascent is easy. Repose among the branches frequently blings about many foldings and loops of the long body, sometimes in what is seemingly a hopeless tangle. Tie anatomy of the snake in some instances bears tho rudimentary posterior legs from a remote era. The minutest vestiges remain of these limbs. So there must have been in Scriptural days some inklings of the fact that the snake, like other reptiles, had possessed the ordinary means of progression and did not previously (according to the interpretation of the scoffer), hop along on the tip of its tail.