MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 1970, 22 August 1889, Page 37

MULTUM IN PARVO.

— United States .Consul Mason of Marseilles writes' to the State Department that the effects of general and unrestrained ab-sinthe-drinking in France are now recognised as forming a basis of one of the gravest dangers which threaten the physical and moral welfare of the French people. — A French scientist claims to have found nine forms of microbes in the juices of a healthy stomach, and concludes that they play an important part in digestion. Every stomach seems to be a little inhabited world in itself. —It is said that 300,000 Frenchmen reside abroad, 450,000 Spaniards and Portuguese, 795,000 Scandinavians, more than 1,100,000 Italians, 2,600,000 Germans, and 4,200,000 Englishmen. — A new industry has been invented by a clever English girl. She calls herself an accountant and auditor for large households* She finds plenty of employment in looking after the business of a few families of large expenditure whose heads have no taste for fche work. — The most remarkable instances of the various spelling of names in the olden time are the surnames of Lindsay, Stirling, and Montgomery. These appear to have respectively presented themselves in no fewer than 88, 64, and 44 different forms. —Up to 1884 the English Post Office had issued 31,302,000,000 postage stamps. That would cover 3761 square miles and would reach to the moon and back if placed end to end. — The camel is the only animal that cannot swim. It is an extraordinary fact that the moment it loses its footing in a stream it turns over, and makes no effort to itself from drowning. — One of the latest discoveries in dynamos and motors is that the simpler they are made the better they work, This is a happy dis>. coyery, for the earlier forms of these machines suggested a maze of parts and details which promised to rival the modern printing press in complexity. — The latest grievance of the French Reactionaries is that the Exhibition is too successful, especially at night, and that the shops, theatres and restaurants of Paris are consequently deserted. — There are nine vernacular papers in Wales, returning handsomer profits, in proportion to the population, than in any country in the world. • — Italy is one of the most richly endowed t)f countries in the fertility of its soil ; but through the ignorance' and antiquated methods of the peasantry, the average yield of wheat is only 12 bushels per acre, Gornpared with 18 bushels, the average of France, and 40 bushels for England. — Consumption in the German army is greatly dreaded by the authorities* since the recent Parisian Medical Congress pronounced that the disease was contagious. — It is stated that there are now 21,000,000 horses in Eus'sia, not including those of Finland and the Caucasus. — An Englishman has made a toy containing 400 animals and men. They are all put in motion by a windmill turned by the our^ rent from burning candles. —The large-calibred, quick-firing guns are so satisfactory that fche 4.7 in guns of that class are rapidly superseding the 6-in rifles in the British navy, —The number of public-houses of all kinds in the London police district is 13,995. The number of coffee-stalls placed in the street by night is 359. — A scientist of New York on hearing about the alleged corner in sugar, spoke thus t "Let* these corners beware. We are now operating in the domain of chemistry to procure various articles of food from inorganic substances, and a substitute foi sugar, known as bcasoic sulphinide, is now attracting the notice of chemists. Its sweetness is 300 times that of sugar, and it is a purely inorganic compound. The discoveries of modern chemistry will hereafter be utilised more than they have been in the way of providing food for mankind. — The keeper of a Berlin beershop or Brasserie has hit upon a novel way of increasing Shis business, or, at all events, of temporarily agumenting his ready-money takings. He has announced his readiness to issue toanycustomerwitlingandabletopay down 600 marks (say £30 sterling) a ticket entitling him to call at his bi&'-h-alle whenever he likes, and to drink just as much as he plea3es whenever he pays it a visit. To encourage subscribers to come forward, this enterprising publican has' also consented to issue season tickets entitling the holder to unlimited drinks for the space of a calendar month for the sum of 60 marks, or about £3. — In the great scramble for the vast continent of Africa England is getting her share, or even, if the precise truth is to be spoken, just a little more. The French are hungry, the Germans are thirsty, and the Portuguese are voracious, swallowing, indeed, so much that they will by and bye be sick ; but, nevertheless, the British Foreign Office is ruling Egypt and Zanzibar, and the British Colonial Office has silently stretched its territory right up to the Zambesi — that old dream of Sir Bartle Frere — thus possessing itself of a territory which, including the Dutch Republics, now becoming British under the influx of settlers brought, by gold antl diamonds, is equal to five times the area of France, and may be the seat in another century of a powerful empire. A British company has seated itself with sovereign powers on the upper valley of the Niger, a second association is mistress from Mombas3a to Lake Tanganyika, and now % third, with the approval of Lord Salisbury, is about to possess itself of " Livingstonia," a magnificent kingdom as large as Spain, stretching from the middle of the Zambesi, and the terminus of the projected South African arterial railway, right up to the corner of Lake Tanganyika. — The Lord Mayor of York is a total abstainer of 30 years' standing. The Mayor of Birmingham is a life abstainer, as also is the Mayor of Ripon. The Mayor of Stafford has a teetotal experience of 53 years, and the Mayer of Sheffield one of 49 years. —At the top of the Eiffel Towdr, for a fee, specially prepared notepaper, dated from the summit of the tower, is provided, and the writer can have the letter posted on the spot. *

—Bret Harte, the author, will live in London. He justifies his tJh'oice of a place of residenoe by Baying that he can enjoy there ( -a metropolitan freedom from surveillance as to his number of drinks a day which he can find nowhere else, except in San Francisco, to whioh he does not desire to return. — The immense globe for the Paris Exhibition represents the earch on the scale of one-millionth, and is nearly 100 ft in diameter » Retails are given true proportions, Paris occupying about one-third of an inch. All the great lines of communication by land and sea are shown in detail. The earth's daily rotation may be precisely imitated by clockwork, a point on the globe's equator moving an eighth of an inch per second. — It requires Just double the power to propel a steamship 20 miles an hour that it does to propel the 3ame Vessel IB miles an hour. —Natural gas Was first used for fuel only about 15 years ago. Within that comparatively, short time it has become so extensively employed that to-day there are required to pipe it 27,350 miles of mains. In Pittsburg alone 500 miles supply 4268 private houses, 40 iron mills, 37 glass works, 83 foundries and machine shops, and 42 miscellaneous industrial establishments. An idea of its value as fuel can best be obtained when it is realised that the value of 7,000,000 tons of coal is annually dipplaced by natural gas. —If things were divided equally, your exact share of some of the commodities yearly consumed in this country would come out as follows ; — 30 oranges A gallon of spirits 4201b of iron $Blb of sugar BO bricks 230z of tobacco JOlbofsoap 131b of butter 85 egrs 621b of beef 351b of cheese. —It is not often v cVfen in Wales, that such a startling instance of narrow-minded, blasphemous bigotry comes under notice as that of the Yen. D. B. Thomas, the Archdeacon of Montgomery. This gentleman stated solemnly in his charge that many of the persons who took part in the Tithe Rent agitation have since been visited with punishment for their impious wickedness, the punishment in some Cases assuming the form of sickness, loss of property, and sudden death. Could clerical audacity go further than that 1 ---India is not a nation. There is not, and never Was, an India, or even any country of India possessing any sort of unity— physical, social, or religious. No Indian nationalities, to say nothing of a nationality, have ever existed. Even the native States are ruled by princes who are almost as much foreigners to the subjects as we ourselves are to ours. Scotland is more like Spain than Bengal is ,like the Punjaub. An educated Mahornmedah gentleman of Upper India has more in common with Englishmen than with Bengalee graduates, to whose precocious ambition and spurious patriotism, assisted by the insidious counsels of one or two disappointed and denationalised Anglo-Indians, may be traced the origin of the Indian Congress.— St. James' Gazette. —There has been discovered in Belgium the existence of ah association of " Endormeurs," They enter a railway carriage occupied by a solitary traveller, start a conversation With him, and offer him a ' cigar. The passenger smokes it-, goe3 to sleep, and is relieved of all his valuables. The cigars used for this purpose are* prepared by the introduction of chloroform or morphia, in such a way that the smoker undergoes the effect of the drug without perceiving any unpleasant smell. The discovery was made in oonsequence of the deep sleep which befell a prison warder having charge of a prisoner, who, as soon as the two were left alone together, offered him a cigat and tried to escape. — One, and only one, of the very populous centres of the world's population still remains shut up from travel — that is the capital of Thibet. The peculiar religion of that country has had force enough to absolutely inclose Lhassa, the capital of the Dalai Lama, from all approach. Only six or seven Europeans ever set foot in the city, and none of them are alive. But the famous Russian traveller, Prejevalsky, has made three attempts, and is now about to make a fourth. On the third he was obliged to turn back after reaching within 25 miles of the city. From one alone of his expeditions he brought back 5000 specimens of plants, besides enormous collections of fish, insects, and animals— one-fifth of the whole being new to science ; so that his failures are in the highest degree successes. Fifty years ago one-half of the world was unknown ground, _ —According to Act of Parliament of the time of James 1, those who were married "otherwise than in some open church or chapel, and otherwise than according to the orders of the Church of England, by a minister lawfully authorised," were unable to hold any freehold ; and that " every Popish recusant" was liable to a fine of £100 if he did not have his child baptised "in an open j parish church " within one month of its birth. i — A mine of scientific material has been opened in Spain by the excavations of Belgian engineers along the coast from Carthagena to Almeria. Abundant remains of the stone age | are found in which is no trace of metal ; i polished axes, perforated shells, pottery, grinding-stones, chipped flints, and primitive stone-walls are the features of the prehistoric neolithic period. In some places bronze and copper implements are found. Evidences that cremation was practised and smelling of ores understood are albo apparent. —It is said that Mr Young, a telegraph operator of Charles City, lowa, has invented a square-hole boring machine. His patent has been granted in 15 countries, and he is backedby two manufacturers of that town. An exhibition of the machine was recently given before prominent mechanics, and it was pronounced a perfect success, the machine boring an even square hole of any desired dimension.

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