GENERAL NEWS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume III, Issue 60, 29 March 1881, Page 3

GENERAL NEWS.

The Rodan'ow Watch SwrM^s. — During the last few months a number of om contemporaries have . been advertising wonderful watuhc-s su^oscd t > !>o made by theHodanow Watch ('oMiiifuiy, ]!)ston. It turns out the whole iifl',iir Jiua been a gigantic swindle. The man Kodanow h;\s been arrested, and when the last mail left was awaiting trial, Any persons who read the advertisements should therefore be careful not to fall into the snare. The PiiuifßKS.s of Chicago. — Chicago continues to increase with the same wonderful rapidity which won for her ia early yonth the proud title of the Lightning City of the West. Statistics compiled at the close of last yoar show that trade in all its branches in the great food emporium of the middle States has never been so prosperous. The grain received in ISSO was 161 millions. In ISSO it was thought a great thing to have received sixty millions 0,373,000 hogs were slaughtered in Chicago last year, as against G,059,000 in 1879. The hog trade in Chicago began in 18o(5, with a slaughter of 22,000 fov the twelve months. Now tho packing houses can make away with 100,000 in a single day. In addition to the five million odd swine which met with their death in Chicago, 1,300,000 passed through the city en route for slaugh-ter-houses elsewheie. A Skvkke Joke. — There w;.a a gentleman named Gunibottle living near Timaru a few years back who was entirely bald, with the exception of a sinal« lock, which he always combed over the side of hia head. He would never have his photo, taken if he could possibly avoid it. On one occasion, however, some young ladies so captivated the old man's heart that he at last consented, in fun, to have a picture taken of the top of his head. It was taken, and about a week afterwards, while passing the photographer's shop- window, he noticed quite a crowd of people examining intently a picture therein. He stopped and looked at the picture, which was labelled "Eclipse of the moon, the phenomenon as it appeared at midnight." Imagine his disgust when he found that the picture was nothing more than an enlarged photo, of his own bald head, with the black lock running round the edge ! Of course the young ladies knew nothing of the matter!— Ashburton Guardian. The Winter Palace at St. Petersburg. — About three thousand persons live iv the Winter Palace at Sfc. Petersburg, some of whom have been born, baptised, confirmed, and married within its walls. There- are families which have even had the honor of dying out in it ; and in St. Petersburg, a contemporary states, the story finds common acceptance that there is a meadow somewhere on its roof, where cows are put out to graze. Certain it is that there are huge cisterns on the roof which in winter have to be kept from freezing by heating furnaces in the lofts below. it is said that before the Russian architectural mind thought of these furnaces the water iv the cisterns was kept in a liquid state during winter by red-hot caunonballs, which after being heated on the roof were dropped into the water. When one of these forced its way through the lead into a lady's apartment, nearly setting fire to tho Palace, the system of he»timr was changed.