MISCELLANEOUS.

North Otago Times, 29 November 1907, Page 1

MISCELLANEOUS.

'•'Are you still courting the •girl?' a lawyer asked a native witness at the N a tal Criminal Sessions. " No, she already loves me," was the reI'lyt * * * Hundreds of people are searching on the Great South Beach, Loag Island, New 'York, for toftsuiia supposed to havq been buried there by Captain Kidd, the 'famous pira'te. * * » Thq human heart is the most'eiliocnt engine in the world for its size. * * * A clvimncy 115*1) high will, without danger, sway lOin. in the wind, * *■ ♦ A child should speak perfectly at the a go of three and a half years, * * * Doctors can, now detect various neir vous disorders from the handwriting of a patient. * * * Wall paper has not hitherto been used in Chinese- houses, but it is now being introduced. * * ♦ Scientists assure us thai the flounder l a ys n 0 fewer 'than seven million eggs in iho course cf a single year. * * * Tho Servians have a disliko (or (air hair, and even dye the white locks of ago to 'the iavored shade. ' * * ♦ * » * Mr Robert J. White, a Morncll medical student shot and killed himself in New York with a revolver with whioh, his 'father and his grandfather had taken their own lives. * ♦ *■ A doctor, who nave, evidence in the St, Pancras Court (London) at the inquest on tto> hotly of an, old man, said that on one occasion he attended the man when he dislocated Ims jaw by yawning. * ♦ * By the completion! of wafer troughs . whioh arc now in coursj of construction between Settle Hawcs Junction, on the Midland railway, the running of expresses with but one stop betwen London and Carlisle will bo practicable. * » ♦ Bathing, 'teas, says tho East Raivl Express,' are the latest novelty in Dclagoa Bay. Ladies give teas on the beach', and, to appear in tfc latest fashion, so far as bathing costume is concerned, is considered nioro important than the actual dip. * * • Men exposed to tlio rigors- of an Alaskan winter never wear moustaches Full hoards are useful io protect the throat and chin, hut the upper lip I is kept clean shaven. The moisture from tho breath congeals so emlcklv that a moustache becomes embedded in a solid cafe of ice in a short time, * * *

Nearly every Japanese follows the profession of'his father. ♦ « * Men are more liable to grow stout in mkldlo age ■than women. No satisfactory explanation of ill's fact is offered. ♦ ♦ ♦ Tlio most remarkable gold frcc-tles in tlio world am found in Central America, Iho heart, and wing cases being brilliantly polished with a lustre as of gold itsell. To si«?hfc and toucli thby havo all the appearance of that metal. Oddly enough, another species from the samo region looks Mo solid silver, freshly burnished. ♦ ♦ * A ohoauo for £1 written on an oyster shell has been presented and cashed'by a flank, at Atlantic City, New Jersey. $ * * The Rev. W. J. Thompson!, of resignation 'because members of his hresignaticn because members oi his congregation cowkmnod his attendance at race meetings. Mrs Kathcrino Hodson, 74 years oi age, of Denver, Colorado, who has been engaged nine ■times, married twice, and divorced once,'is suing a local publican for 'breach of promise ♦ * ♦ An agitation has boon started in East Anglia to remove growing ivy from churches, on the ground that it not only hides much beautiful architecture, but endangers testability of tho structure » « » The Schmidt family held a reunion at Hanover last month. It took six •trains to bring thorn from other parts of Germany, a nd they were obliged to Wre Jour halls in order to listen to the eulogies,of the Schmidts.

* * * Cartridges are used as current coin in Abyssinia;

'* ♦ » Flour thrown upon burning parafin will quickly extinguish it.. » ♦ »

' There arc 61 blind persons in ever million of the world's population.

♦ * » Germany sends twenty million leathers every year to, London lor military purposes. Railways r.so up,over two million tons of steel a year, almost half the world's produce.

* * * It -is" estimated that ninety tiwusand pianofortes are manufactured in London every year. ♦ «.♦■•

In tho New York Zco £ls is spent every year in providing rats and mice for the reptiles, ■ ! ' ■♦♦«■■•■...

On an avcrago, the coldest,, p a rl of .tho wlnlo day'isMween tow and five o'clock in the morning.