SCISSORS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 4180, 13 December 1884, Page 4

SCISSORS.

Tom Russell, of Bailarat, a converted reporter, the eighth wonder of the world. Nearly 400 sugar estates in Cuba have been returned as abandoned. An important meeting has been held at ToAvnsville in favor of territorial separation . Tho police barracks at Adelong Avere completely unroofed by a terrific duststorm lately. The national debt of the United States is only 12 times as large as that of the city of New York. The export duties on all products from the Republic have been aoblished in San Domingo. A snake has been killed in a music room at Mudgee. It was allured to its fate by the strains of a piano. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica. the best colonial beer is made in Tasmania, Avhencc it is shipped in frozen blocks to Australia and India. In Calcutta, on the hottest day, the residents now suck (no sip) their frozen pale ale.

A curious accident recently happened in the Victoria Theatre, Parramatta, during a performance. A lady was resting on tho railings round the dress circle, when a section weighing about 701b gave away, fell with a crash, and just missed one of tho audience. Ready-made wooden houses, imported from America, are selling as a novelty at Buenos Ayres. Several shipments on a 1-irge scale have already been received there, and are in course of erection in the embyt'o city of La Plata, the new capital of the province of Buenos Ayres. The American petroleum market became almost in a state vf panic on tho Mth of October, owing to the Christie well in Butler County, Pennsylvania, suddenly commencing to produce 100 barrels daily. The present daily yield is 000 barrels, being the largest ever known.

A wood carpet- has lately been patented by Tlerren Kuny and Marx, of Munich. This consists of prepared wood fibre, felted by the aid of oxydised linseed oil and coloring matter on to a jute fabric, tlio back of which latter is covered with a coat of varnish.

The Russian Govcuiiinent, in view of its relations with Asiatic nations, has decided to open early iv 18S.*i two linguistic schools expressly for training interpreters. The languages to be taught are Chinese, Mauchprian, Calmuk, Tartar, and other Mongolian and Central Asian tongue:'. The readers of Adam Bcde are about to be appealed to for subscriptions to a Bode memorial chapel, tin edifice that will be erected "to the glory of God, and in memory of Elizabeth Evans, immortalised as Dinah Morris by George Eliot in her novel of Adam Bcde."

It is said lhal about 18,000 men ride into London on bicycles from tho suburbs lo work every morning. The Times says that there arc in England over ;j!)0,000 cyclisls, and that the capital invested in the maniii'actui'e of bicycles and tricycles is about .£.3,000,000, employing from GOOO to 10,000 men.

Th'j prize of forty thousand francs offered by the Frencli Academy for some certain test, of death, to prevent people from being buried alive, was given to a physician who 'announced ihal. on holding (he hand of ibf supposed dead person to a strong light, ii' living a seailel. tinge is ''con where Ihe liii'/'fi's touch, showing a continuous eirculalion of flic blood-—no scarlet being seen if dead.

A notable instance of devotion lo business has been shown in England by Dr. Samuel Rabbeth, senior medical oilicer of tho Royal Free Hospital in Cray's Inn road. The operation of tracheotomy had been performed upon a child siiil'eiing from diph-

theria, and Dr. Rabbeth, in order to remove the matter that had accumulated in the patient's Avindpipe, sucked the obstruction through a tube. The doctor's efforts were unavailing, and the child died. A few days afterwards the doctor himself fell ill, and died of diphtheria, undoubtedly caught in his effort to save the child.

The rabbits about the Werribee are increasing so rapidly in numbers that the settlers are at their Avits' ends how to overcome the difficulty. They have poisoned and dug out, introduced the mongoose, stoat, and Aveasel, and the cry is " Still they come." Amid the perplexity, hoAVeA*er, there is a slight ray of sunshine. Reynard, like the rabbits, has also increased his generation, and the hen-roost robber makes rabbit-feasting one of his special delights. Recently Mr S. T. Staughton, president of the Shire of AA r yndham, came on a female fox Avith a litter of cubs, and round their camp were strewn hundreds of rabbits' legs.