MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 2402, 15 March 1900, Page 52

MULTUM IN PARVO.

— The great meat packers of Chicago, called the "Big Five," composed of Armour and Co., Nelson, Morris, and Co., Swift and Co., Cardahy, and Sclvwarzchild and Sulzberger, do ..an aggregate business of £70,000,000, the annual income being said to be close on £4,000,000. 1 — The German Army has the healthiest troops in the world. ' — " The Society of the Big Knife " is the name of an oath-bound organisation in China, formed for the purpose of exterminating all foreigners.

— Telephonic communication between St. Petersburg and Moscow is obtained by a line 412 miles long. It is said to be the ,longest single line in Europe.

— According to tradition, Arabic figures 'were derived from Solomon's seal, upon which they can all be traced with a little care.

— Many animals in desert regions never ihave any water except the dew on vegetation.

— Plastering on the walls, it has been found, seriously affects the acoustic properties of a room. The best results are said to be obtained by using pure p-ypsum that has been heated to a white heat. >' — Mormonism is to-day the predominating religion in five of the "Western States.

: — Half of the world's product of quinine is used in the United States.

— People may describe literature as an overcrowded profession as much as they will, fouir there can never be too many good storytellers.- Stories we must have, and the v/riter •who can tell them will alwaj's have it his own way in spite of competition. — Globe. — Chinese scholars claim that iron swords were in use in their country 4000 years ago. — Clever boys at school in the time of Xenophon had to learn the whole of the Iliad and Odyssey by heart. — Max Muller. — Twenty-five years ago France was able to .put as many soldiers in the field as Germany. To-day France's number falls short by about •1,000,000 men.

— While Great Britain is pushing a railway through Equatorial Africa, Sweden is building one far north of the Arctic Circle. Thus are the once '" waste spaces " of the globe conquered for usefulness to man.

- —It is neither blood nor language nor conquest which makes people. Nations rear themselves. Rome conquered GauMn civilising it, in association wtih it, less than 100 fears after Augustus. — Ferdinand Brunetiere.

- — The first formal and written treaty made hi England with any foreign natioii was wntered into at Kingston between Henry 111 tVnd the Dauphin of France on September 11, J217. i* — The carelessness of the public compels an -<-xpenditure of £17,000 a year at the Returned Letter Office DeparLment of the General Post Office.

— The cultivation of fruit trees along the .highways of France is .being extended each iyear, the . Government having adopted this -practice 'as a soui'ce of revenue, so that now •roadside fruit cultivation, has become an important branch of national industry.

— The ' official report of the Government Inspector of Factories for Coburg-Gotha. gives details as to the labour of children under 14srears engaged in their homes in making but,tohs, toys, etc. It appears that in this district 5455 such, children are employed. They work from four and one-quarter to six hours per 'day, and earn in button-making from four ■to 30 pfennigs (say, to 3id) ; in making dolls, 1 l-16dsto 9^d ; in work on toys, Id to 7d.

I—Projectilesi — Projectiles for modern big and rapidfire guns require about half their weight in powder to fire them. • — Proposals are being entertained by the French military authorities for a new weapon . called the pistol-sabre. It is an ordinary sabre provided with a small firearm lodged in the hilt. On encountering a resisting surface the blade recedes, and discharges the pistol, a recoil of about 1-16 of an inch being all that is necessary. The shot will penetrate a steel breastplate. The new weapon will weigh only a third more than the ordinary sabre, w,hich, of course, when the pistol is not loaded,* can be employed in the usual way.

4 — Many of the students at Russian universities are mendicants who solicit alms and wear cast-off garments.

— When ladies go to buy a dress in Japan they tell tho shopkeeper their age, and whether they are married, because there are 'special designs for the single and double relations of life, as well as for ages. The consequence of this custom is that you can tell the age of every Tady you meet, and know whether she is married, precisely as though she were labelled. ' — M. Berthelot has been making some investigations into the phenomena of hydration •and oxidation at the expense of organic sub- - stances under the free influence of oxygen and light, and he concludes that such substances as the sugars, carbohydrates, glycerides, are affected by simultaneous hydration and oxidation — in nature. M. Berthelot's experiments were carried out on the slow oxidation of ether in the presence of air and water.

— Among the Burmese football is as popular as it is in English-speaking countries. But the Burman scorns to M r ear boots. He kicks and shoots goals with his bare feet.

— A hard rubber steam acid pump is made by a New York firm. It is designed specially for conveying acids, chemicals or any volatile liquid. All parts which come in eon•fcact with 'such substance are of hard rubbei'. These parts are held by and mounted on iron, which takes up all the strain incident to the work performed. These pumps are ■operated by steam like the ordinary steam pump or by electric motor. . — There are in the world about 90 establishments devoted to spinning silk waste. • — The tooth of a mastodon, in an almost complete state of preservation, has been recently unearthed. It weighed 141b 12oz, measured lOin by 6in, and is pure ivory. — In gome towns of Germany the telephone is introduced by tobacconists as an additional attraction to customers. Anyone who buys a cigar may, if he desires, speak over the tobacconist's instrument.

— There are said to be no fewer than 800 millionaires in New York.

— The >Sou]anges Canal, which has recently been opened for traffic, completes the scheme ?or providing a 14-ft water-way from the Great Jjakes to Montreal, in place of 9ft, which previously had been the ruling depth for the .navigation. It is considered that owing to ' the increased size of the vessels which will *io\v be able to reach Montreal from the Great Lakes, the price of conveyance of wheat and other .products of the North-west will be bo reduced as to lead to the diversion of the part of the traffic which now finds • ats way to this country through America by the Erie Canal and New York. The St. 3jawrence has been dredged and deepened ibelow Montreal, so that large ocean-going .yesselß navigate the river up to that city, which has become the head bpth. of the ocean and inland navigation.