Page 4 Advertisements Column 1

Manawatu Herald, 11 February 1897, Page 4

THE ARMADILLO. A Beaat Odd and Wild Which Ftrrnlahefl » Toothsome Bepast. With other strange forma of life found in far Patagonia la the armadillo, an animal -with habits that cannot fail to interest funatour nuturnlista. There are two forme of the armadillo. Roughly speaking, one is like a hairy guinea pig with a pointed turtle sholl over its baok and head, while tho other la like a thick turtle without any breastplate. The former is very raro oven In its haunts in the Andes. Tho latter is evorywhore abundant. As described by BABE AEMADILLO— HAIRY AlWf ADttLO. all who have seen it, tho latter will eat and get fat— very fat— on anything from grass roots to docnyed flsh or cattle, from an ant to n poisonous serpent, from strawberries to rats and mice. In tho wilderness it roatns about by day because tho cats of tho desert persecute it most at night. Near tho settlements, whoro, by the way, it thrives best, it is abroad at night because man persecutes it in tho day. Slow moving as it seems to bo when the traveler eeca it at sunset, it overtakes the serpenta of the region in a fair race and kills them by squatting on them and sawing its body to and fro so that the edgo3 of its protective aboil cut the snake to pieces. It captures mioe by sneaking on them cat fashion and throwing its body over them like a trap. It grubs for worms. It roba nests of eggs and fledgelings. Now, although it eats a great many things that are repulsive to civilized tastes, tho armadillo is itself a most delicious nrtlcle of food for any human taste, civilized or uncivilized. Tho variety in its bill of fare seems but to add delicacy to its flesh. A writer in the New York Sun, who has in bis journeyings eaten nearly every kind of flsh, flesh and fowl served between Ivigtut, Greenland, and Ushuaia, Terra del Fuego, claims to hate found nothing quite bo much to his taste as- an armadillo baked in the embers of an outdoor fire on the desert of Patagonia. Effects of Temperature. Experiments of Plctel, tbo French chemist, show that animals and insects oppose a wonderful resistance to Intense cold obtained from liquefied atmospheric air. A dog placed in a copper receiver at a temperature of —60 to — 90 dogreos C. showed a rise of bodily temperature of .5 in ten ralnutos, and after 1% hours bad only lost 1 degree. A little later, however, nature gave up tbo struggle, the temperature fell rapidly, and the animal died euddoaly. Insects resist a tomporature of — 28 degrees, but not — 05 degrees.' Birds' eggs lose tholr vitality at —3 to <— 8 degrees, ants' eggs at 0. Infusoria dio at — 90 degrees, while bacteria are still virulentot— 213 degrece. This las 6 foot is perhaps the most significant of aIL Feeding Boiler Sires at the Eottoio. According to Tho Manufacturers' Gazette, not only can 6motco be suppressed but a saving of 20 per cent on fuel bills can bo effected by feeding boiler fires from underneath instead of from the top, ns has been the oustoin over since coal teenme a fuel. A mechanical stoker intToduccs a uniform quantity of fuel nt regular intervals under the boiler, and the combustion thoroughly consumes all of tho gases and smoke from tho green coal, as it paeeos through the bed of incandescent coke above it. t A. Kemarkable Performance. Place in the middle of your band, stretched out flat, a piece of money— say a 8 owl piece. Take a brush — a olothesVHB COIN THAT CANNOT BE BEHOVED. tenth will do — pat it into the band of one of your friends and tell him he may have Ihtfooin if he succeed in brushing it off your hand. Your friend tries his best, but his efforts •re all in vain, for the coin atloks to your band at if it were glued there. Of course he is forbidden to strike your hand violently with the brush, whioh would oauae 'the cola to fall instantly to .the ground. He must be content to try to brush it off at If he were brushing off a spot from a mat. There will be many who will listen With inoredullty to tbe statement of thia experiment. However, let them try it and «cc for themselves. SeteoUOe Brevttfe*. ; The weight of the sea water of tbe globe ,1s esthasted at 660,000,000,000,000,000 tons. : Aooording to 6ome recently published gfcattsUos, the United States produces nearly as muoh copper as all of tbe rest of the i«mrld together. la Germany aluminium is used for nails In the boots of the soldiery. Professor Gibson, in tests as to tho value jfrf coveting for steam pipes, ooncluded that (With ooai at 94 per ton and 8,000 working [hours per year, tbe loss from a naked 8 'Inch pipe was 64 X cents per linear foot. , The regions of tbe world whioh have the greatest rainfall seem to be the regions [where tbe largest number of thunderstorms ooour. Thus along tbe equator 50 to 100 (or over) thunderstorms occur annually.