Miscellaneous.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1918, 21 October 1884, Page 2

Miscellaneous.

At Moscow a mob attacked the gendarmes who were taking Nihilists to St. Petersburg. At Dus^eldoif recently tho Emperor of Germany renewed the troop?. He was in the saddlo two hours. Southwestern Missouri is excited over the discovery of largf deposits of guano in the many caves in that part of the State. These deposits are. due to the colonies oii bats which frequent the caves, and in sonia cases they amount to as much as 100 tons. The uses of the bit were never discovered before, but now this uncanny cross between bird and reptile will have a diiect influence in making good corn and cotton for the Pike*. The Panama Canal Company has signed a contract with the New York Dredging Company for the cutting of the last section of the Canal. The contract provides thai tho work shall be finished in 1887. De Lesseps will visit Panama early in 1805. A Shanghai despatch, published in tho London Times of September 22nd, says the Franco-Russian alliance means tho disintegration of China, and its partition between those two countries, France taking the three southern provinces, and Russia having China as a reconnoitring ground for her armies, the two countries being connected by railways. The alliance alfso means Franco-Russian preponderance in Europe, and is therefore fraught with danger to Germany. It also means the extinction of China tr.ide, and imperils all English possessions in the East. The death ot the Attorney-General of Liberia points the moral of the danger of an old man marrying an extremely muscular woman of half his age, with a violent temper and a great desire to get possession,, of his coin. This Liberian official was Q native of New York, a man of large attain" ments and beloved by a large circle of friends. The woman whom he married proved untrue to him, and while chiding her for her infidelity she fell upon him and beat him so badly that he died. The only r«ieeming feature of the case was that the* courts promptly convicted and sentenced! her to life imprisonment. A machine has been invented by a Philadelphia man which it is claimed can bo made to write 200 words a minute in phonographic characters* At the trial of it, when manipulated by a expert, a speed of only 100 words was attained, and the chance 3 are that fifty or seventy-five words would be all that the ordinary operator could reproduce. It is said, however, to be much easier to acquire skill on this machine than to learn stenography and to be less exhausting, just as writing with a type-writer is less tiresome than with a pen or pencil. There is no immediate prospect that the stenographer will be rendered obsolute, but the machine shows what may be accomplished in the next century. It appears to be a great fact that the problem of steering balloons has been bolved. Two French engineer officers hav^ been making experiments at Meudon. A report has been communicated to the Academy of Science that these two officers, on August 9th, mounted their balloon, and steered it against the wind, and then returned to the point of departure. t The paper read to the Acidemy was furnished by the.Minister of War, who is aaid to have made the discovery, which is at present kept secret. It is alleged that the force is obtained by a series of electric accumula* tors of 10-horse power, which will be operative during four hours. The carrying power of the balloon increases rapidly«| proportion to its size, and it might be niacn^j to convey a hundred soldiers or more, and thus become a formidable engine of war.— j London and China Express. I

The Auckland Plumpton Park Coursing Com- " pany offer 15s earb fcr Yin h. rjs delivered at the Papatoitoi Station. Sec advertisement. ._ Mr J. S. Buckland will sell at ' Cambridge, -i on Thursday next, 40 three-year-old bullocks, -, fat steers, and oxen, prime quality. On Saturday next, he will sell at the Cambridge Horse ■ Bazaar, good horse, spring cart and harness,. ' large Auckland made tip dray, heavy sprinff , cart, set new harness, sundries, and a number of -■