SCRAPS.

Western Star, Issue 1349, 27 April 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

SCRAPS.

A Herman newspaper published in Palestine states that the city of Jerusalem is growing in size and population at a remarkable rate. New buildings are_ rising daily ; churches, gardens, and institutes of various kinds are filling up the formerly desolate neighbourhood tn the distance of half-an-hour's walk beyond the old limits of the city.The Jaws are to the front as builders. Hood manners must have a solid foundation in kindness and self control. To be genuine, they must be the fruit of sincerity and good feeling, and their exercise must be iu conformity with the working of these qualities in the heart. No art can suoceastullycounterfeit true elegance of manners and deportment. To the real they must have roots deep below the surface in the soul and heart. The oat’s-eye stone is found in Ceylon. It is always cut in a highly convex form, and has a remarkable play of light in a certain direction, resembling a drop of water or the pupil of an eye moving about inside of it, like a restless spirit, from side to side, as the stone is turned. The people regard id with awe and wonder, and, believing it to be the abode of some genie, dedicate it to their gods as a sacred stone. The relative hardness of woods is calculated by the hickory, which is the toughest. Estimating this at 100, we get for pignut hickory 96, white oak 84, white ash 77, dogwood 75, scrub oak 73, white hazel 72, apple tree 70, rad oak 69, white beech 65, black walnut 65, black birch 62, yellow and black oak hard maple 59, white elm 58, red cedar' 56, cherry 55, yellow pine, 54, chestnut 52, yellow poplar 51, butternut and white biroh 43, and, white pine 35. Suppose a person takes an even number of coins or counters or anything else in one hand, and an odd number in the other, there is a simple method by which to tell in which hand the even number is. Ask her to multiply the number in her right hand by an odd number, and the number in her left hand by an even; then let her add the two products together and tell you it the total sum be odd or even; If it be even, the even number is m the right hand, and if it be odd the even number is iu the left hand, , Seta pitcher of water in the apartment, and in a few hours it will have absorbed nearly all the respired gases in the room, the air of which will have become purer, the water utterly filthy. The colder the water the greater the capacity to contain these gases. 4t the ordinary temperature a pail of water will absorb a pint of carbonic acid gas and several pints of ammonia. The cap icity is nearly doubled by reducing the water to the temperature of ice. Hence the water kept in a room a w-iile is unfit for use. Sleep is the brain’s method of repair. The brain cells 3,105 e more and more of their substance during waking hours, and if sleep does not come, mere loss is supplemented by absolute disintegration. When this takes place, the cells not only fail to perform their part in the work of the mind ; they lose their capability for repair, and cause permanent disorder or enfeeblement of the intellect. In the old days, when criminals were kept from sleeping between their condemnation and their execution, they almost invariably became mad. Rice is the richest in carbon of; all the grains, and it is a well-known fact that races of men depend almost entirely foi their subsistence on, rice, like the Japanese; and while they may not be large physieally, they are strong and compact, agile and enduring. Potatoes, parsnips, and turnips are mostly water. All the grains contain practically the same elements, and except iu individual cases, one is as good as the other. Certainly no one who is deprived of flesh food need fear starvation if he can have a plentiful supply of the grains. All the elements of nutrition are contained in the grains, fruits, and vego. tables.