MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 2006, 4 August 1892, Page 36

MULTUM IN PARVO.

— Queen Victoria during her reign has only Bigned one death warrant, which was for an execution in the Isle of Man — the act passed for relieviug her Majesty of the signing of death warrants having, by an oversight, not included that part of her Majesty's dominions. — Fig trees and cedars are rarely struck by lightning. — There is a falling off in the product of the African diamond mines as compared with that of last spring. — It is worthy of notice that when or if the Duke of York succeeds to the Crown, the dukedoms of Lancaster and York will again be united. The Queen is Duchess of Lancaster, and the Prince of Wales will in the ordinary course of things, become the duke. —In Paymago, Spain, a band of women robbers has been discovered by the police. They had their den in a cave on the outskirts of the town, where they met on the first night of every month to plan burglaries. They had in the cave a full stock of. burglars' tools and also 15,000fr worth of plunder. — The Josephine caves in Oregon have been explored for about 10 miles, and they seem to extend far into California.

— Mr Glaisher, when in a balloon, at two miles from the earth heard a musket shot and a dog bark, and at four miles a railway train. — An infant grows eight inches during the first year. — On all the railways in the United Kingdom put together only five passengers were killed last year. But in the streets of London alone no less than 147 peox>le were run over and killed, while 5784 were injured in various ways. — Sir William Hunter mentions a ipaiieater in India who was known to have killed 108 people in three years, and another which killed an average of 80 persons a year for the same period. A third caused 13 villages to be abandoned, and 250 square miles of land to be thrown out of cultivation. A fourth killed 167 persons in a year, and stopped a publis road for many weeks. — On the side door of a room in Dunlewey House, Seymour road, Mannamead, Plymouth, was a lock which had giveu considerable trouble. Lately, on being taken off for repairs, it wa3 found to bear the following inscription :—": — " This ,lock was on the chamber door at St. Helena wherein he breathed his last who made princes bow and kings to tremble on their thrones — Napoleon." The words " who " and " Napoleon " were in German text.

— In France the death rate is about keei>ing up with the births. The increase of population in France during the last five years has amounted to only one-half of 1 per cent. The population of the great cities is increasing and that of the rural districts decreasing.

— The thickness of the human hair varies from the 250 th to the 600 th part of an inch. Blonde hair is the finest, and red the coarsest.

— It is a common belief at the present time among the lower classes in South Germany that if children play soldiers very often in the street there is a war coming, and if they play "fuiieral" an epidemic will come over the laud and many deaths will result. — The Bombay officer of health protests against the decision of that corporation to adopt means for the utter destruction of the crocodiles. He says they are the best and only scavengers possible of the water reservoirs in which they dwell ; that they clear away all decomposing animal and vegetable matter, all obnoxious substances which there are no human means of removing. — The ruby was considered good for derangement of the liver as well as for bad eyes. The sapphire and emerald were also credited with properties which rendered them capable of influencing ophthalmic disorders, and there is a superstitious belief that serpents are blinded by looking at the latter stone. — A single bee will not collect more than a teaspoouful of honey in a season, yet a goodsized hive produces from 601b to 801b. — The Electrician has been endeavouring to discover which is the best language for the purposes of the telephone, and, curiously enough, has arrived at the conclusion that the Chinese language must be awarded the palm. The Celestials speak principally in monosyllables, with simple rising and falling inflections, and the telephone wires take kindly to this form of conversation.

— Man's antipathy to snakes forms one of many arguments in favour of the belief that man had his origin in one of the warmer regions of the earth, where alone animals of this kind abound.

— Lord Abergavenny has signalised his appointment to the Lord Lieutenancy of Sussex by announcing at a county function that — " It is certain that whenever the love of the noble sport of fox-hunting begins to decrease Englishmen will also more or less go down in the world."

— In Sicily there are a number of families of American origin, who, though now Italian for three generations, have kept up a knowledge of English, and have not forgotten old American customs, including that of hanging out the Starry Banner on the 4th of July. — Edison firmly believes a perfect flying machine, will some day be invented, and he also believes the wing of a fly is the model upon which that machine will be constructed.

— There is more than one wax figure factory in England. The best known, perhaps, is the famous establishment in Waterloo Bridge road. A rather curious fact about wax figures is (observed a maker recently) that age improves the beauty of their complexions. Look at the cheeks of this individual, made 15 years ago. You will notice the colour is positively life-like, and so clear.

— The University of Oxford has appliances for printing in 150 different languages. — Five hundred and eighty-seven different languages are spoken in Europe. — The horse, like the dog, did not at first find its true vocation. Man was enabled by his superior intelligence to make it his prey, but had not yet reached the higher point of enlisting its matchless qualities in his service. Horses were neither ridden nor driven, but hunted and eaten.

— Ten thousand lead toy soldiers are turned out in Nuremberg every day. — A curious effect of M. Naquet's Divorce Law in France is just now amusing the good people of Brest. The Civil Tribunal of that city has before it an application for a divorce entered by an aged couple, whose united ages are over 150 years — the husband beiDg 74- and his spouse 77. They have been married for 38 years, and now wish to be parted for ever on the ground of incompatibility of temper. — Over 70,000,000 of sewing needles are made weekly in the town of Redditch, in Worcestershire, where the most extensive needle manufactories in the world are situated.

— Great Britain is the only country in Europe, except Portugal, which can neither restrict the entrance of nor expel foreign paupers. A recent report of the Leeds Chief Constable 6tateß that destitute Jews are brought to that town from Russia and Poland by means of adTitnces made by money-lenders.

— The Glasgow United Evangelistic Association Mizpah Band has a rescue wing, the duty of whose members ib is to rescue inebriates before they fall into the hands of the police. There are at present 19 workers, and during the year 130 persons were taken home or cared for iv other ways. In one case a suicide was prevented.

— There are 200 baptised Christians in Uganda in connection with the Church Missionary Society, and about 2000 adherents under instruction. The Gospel of Matthew has beeu translated into the native tongue. The arrival of 100 copies from England was attended with the wildest joy.

— The Bachelors' Club, a London institution, in 1891 suffered no fewer than 23 defections in the shape of members who married ; but the club gained L 575 in fines at the rate of L 25 a wedding. The club is flourishing, and seems on the whole to encourage rather than deprecate matrimony as a fine art. There are still 839 bachelors in the list of members.

— Leonardo da Vinci thus foreshadowed the telephone :: — •• When one is upon a lake, if ho puts the opening of a trumpet into the water and holds the point of the tube to his ear, he can perceire whether ships are moving at a remote distance. The same thing occurs if he thrusts the tube into the ground, for then, also, he will hear what is going on far away."

— Most mysterious reports are current as to the death of an American author and journalist, whose death recently occurred whilst he was alone in a boat off Long Island. It is alleged that the deceased has for some time past been kept; under hypnotic influence, by a lady with whom he was in love, his friends declaring that he has been under her hypnotic spells for months past. — The people of Belgium number over 5,500,000, and yet, with such a population, there were only 123,050 electors in the entire kingdom. — The Japanese are unsusceptible to scarlet fever, aad smallpox, which was at one time rife among them, has been checked and almost exterminated by voluntary vaccination.

— There is nothing iv the law of England, btatute or customary, which prevents an English peer, or a peer of the United Kingdom, sittiug in the House of Commons, save only the fact of membership of the other House of Parliament. An English peer, or peer of the United Kingdom, who never has had conferred upon him by the royal summons such membership of the Lords House of Parliament, may therefore become or continue a member of the Commous House.

— There is no missionary in Afghanistan, with her 6,000,000 people. Annam with 5,000,000, has only Roman Catholic missionaries. India bus one missionary to 275,000 people ; Persia, one to 300,000 ; Thibet, one to 2,000,000.

— A fire broke out during the night at a hotel on the banks of the Thames at Hampton, the lives of the landlady and the family being placed in jeopardy. The husband being from home, the wife, unaided, lowered her four children, one by one, from the window of her bedroom by means of a rope, which was kept in the apartment in view of such a contiugency, and made her own escape in the same manner. The premises were completely destroyed. — At first porpoises were caught for the skin and blubber alone. Now the flesh is considered a delicacy. The juicy red meat, which is taken from beneath a layer of fat next the skin, is pronounced by epicures to be more paltable than any porter-house steak ever cooked. In appearance it resembles beef, but is more solid, of finer grain and exceedingly tender. Some persons say that there is not the slightest vestige of a fishy taste about it.

— Public executions in Paris' prove very profitable to the owners of houses commanding the scene. Windows are leb out for the occasion, the landlords watching for the first sign of the execution, and then at once sending word to the persons who have hired the room. If an ordinary criminal is executed the charge is usually about 15s per place, but should the offender have committed any remarkable crime the price runs up to L 6. For Anastay the charge was L 4 a seat.

— The following is told me as a true story :—: — "A rich man recently died and left his money to three people, with a proviso in the will that each of them should pub LIOO in the coffin of the deceased, to be buried with him. The legatees grumbled, but could not, of course, decline to fulfil the condition. Two of them having deposited LIOO each in gold in the coffin, the third wrote out a cheque for L3OO, and calmly took possession of ' the change.' "

— It is computed on authentic data that for the last 10 years the average annual expenditure in Italy of American citizens has been about L 7,000,000 sterling. Mr Dering, secretary to the British Embassy iv Rome, thinks it would scarcely be an exaggeration to place the collective expenditure of British, French, Austrian, German, and other foreign travellers at double this amount. This is irrespective of the money spent in the country by the 50,000 to 60,000 pilgrims who annually visit the Eternal City, and of the amount of which they are the bearers in the shape of donations to the Holy See.