MISCELLANEOUS

Dunstan Times, Issue 376, 2 July 1869, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS

A little boy, only eight years old, playing with a younger brother, feel down a mine shaft, and struck upon the head and back of a Cornish man who was at work at the bottom of ths shaft, and bounded off into a tub of water, without injury. The boy gathered himself up, wet as he was, and ran up the ladder, the miner in full chase behind, threatening to whip him; “for” said ho, “anyone could see the brat did it a purpose.” Strange as this may appear, it is nevertheless true. The Prairie du Chien “Union" contains a notice of the death by consumption of Judson Hurd, a printer. About a week before he died lie was ordered by his physicians to quit work, and ho did his last type-setting on a notice of his own death, containing his history, &o. The “Union’’ finishes the notice with a high complement to the deceased as a printer and a man. This is the latest instance of smartness in America. What next? Maybe the now patent coffin will be used for a man to bury himself in.

It is said in an American paper that in North Carolina there is a weekly paper, the “Patriot,” which is owned by a woman, edited by a woman, and set up by female compositors. It it added “ that the press“man” employed on it is a stout “woman” of color.”

A Sheriff was once asked to execute a writ against a Quaker. On arriving at the house ho saw the Quaker’s wife, who in reply to the inquiry whether her husband was at home, said he Was, at the same time requesting him to he seated, and her husband would speedily Sec him. The officer waited patiently for some time, when the fair Quakeress coming into the room, he reminded her of her promise that he might see her'husband. “Nay, friend,” said she; “I promised that he would see thee. He has seen thee. He did not like thy looks; therefore he avoided thee, and hath departed from the house by another path.” In connexion with quartz mining operations in Victoria, the “Mining Record” says:—“ The Total number of steam-engines employed is 602, with an aggregate horsepower of 11,045. The total number of crushing machines employed, driven by power other than steam, is 60. The total number of stamp-heads in use is 5,297; 1,37S of which belong to Sandhurst; 1,071 to Castlemain; 1,006 to Beechworth; 652 to Maryborough; 434 to Gipps Land; and 386 to (Ararat.

Fish in streams and rivers are frequently to all appearance drowned, strange as the idea of a drowned fish may be. When a stream is suddenly swollen with water that has fallen upoji and drained from a surround-

ing soil which has been exposed for some time previously to the sun’s rays, the water is warmed and deprived of its power of holding a proper complement of oxygen; the vivifying gas in consequence escapes, and the’fish, deprived of the air necessary for respiration, faint and, die, as they would if placed in tepid water.