GENERAL ITEMS.

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 655, 2 August 1921, Page 9

GENERAL ITEMS.

•Jans eat three bushels of rice a head a year, costing 3s. a bushel.

Sweden and Norway export 30,000 tons of wooden matches a year.

In 133-5 Indian elephants fetched £45; now they run up to £BOO apiece.

A horse eats nine times its weight in food in a year; a sheep six times.

The number of languages and dialects spoken in the world amounts to 3054.

Cats were domesticated in Egypt a* early as 1600 8.0.

Two-thirds of the earth’s surface i# covered with water.

Alsace-Lorraine has a population of nearly two millions.

Words are like spectacles: they dark - en whatever they do not help us to aee. About 6000 stars are visible to the naked eve. A powerful telescope reveals 5,000,000 of them. The value of the British ships and cargoes lost every'year tit sea is, about £20,000,000. Fifty-one metals are now known to exist. Four hundred years ago only seven were known. \ A Turkish turban of the largest size contains from ten to twenty yards of the finest and softest muslin.

A fine yellow dye is produced from the roots of nettles boiled in alum. The juice of the stalk and leaves :s used to dye‘woollen stuffs a brilliant and permanent green.

One of the uses fpt aluminium is its employment in making the-soles of .shoes to be used by workmen employed in wet and damp places. The aluminium-soled shoe lasts much longer than an ordinary shoe ar.d to be impervious to damp.

It is a matter of inicrest to note that' the balance-wheel of an average watch makes tiree hundred vibrations every minute, eighteen. thousand each hour, four hundred and thirty-two thousand fn a day, or one hundred -sand fiftyseven millions seven hundred -and eighty-eight thousand per year.

The Sandwich I -lands deserve the title, “Flowery Kingdom,” better than Japan, since dowers bloom on the islands ail tho year round, and. are peculiarly beloved by all the inhabitants. The foreign residents, arc! even transient visitors, catch the native fond-

ness for flowers, and' at times people of all sorts go about garlanded with abundant blossoms.

A curious planf, known as ITnis-faa-tom-chcn, is to be found in Chinn. The name means that during summer it is a vegetable, but that in winter it becomes a worm. If it is observed at the latter end of , September, nothin'? simulates better to the eye -a yellow worm about four inches in length. As

the apparent transformation takes place, one can sec head. eyes, body, etc., in course of formation. It is said to furnish a capital strengthening medicine.

The sacred fires of India have not all been extinguished. Ibe most ancient, which still exists, was consecrated twelve centuries ago in commemoration of the voyage made by the Parsecs when they* emigrated from Persia to Ind.a. Ihe arc is fed live times every twenty-four hours wit a sandal-woo:! and other fragrant materials, combined with very dry fuel. This lire, in the village of Oedwada, near I3uisar, is visited by the Parsecs in large numbers during certain specified months in the year.

It may sound astonishing, but it s

a fact, that in America a number of young fellows get a living, and are paid well, simply for booming wine. We have heard of a youth who used to get as much as £1 a week for going to parties, and simply talking about a particular brand of champagne which the manufacturers wanted introduced into the country. The feliow went to various entertainments in the role of a guest, and whenever he could he dilated on the merits of the particular wine and on its great qualities.

In these days of steel and concrete

construction structural engineers are frequently asked what the fate of the buildings will be when the steel beams have rusted away. The best answer to that is found in the report of the surveyor of St. Paul's Cathedral. London, who recently caused an opening to be made in the concrete of the dome in order that the condition of the great ! chain which binds it at its base might j be disclosed. This chain lias been im- : bedded in concrete for more than 200 .years, and it was found to be as bright jand perfect as when new. The reason iwhy steel encased in concrete is prej vented from rusting is that the oxide jof iron chemically combines with the (cement, forming a covering of ferrite tef calcium, which is a good protectiv*