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TIMELY TOPICS. Botton’s swimming olothea are a SUO- 06S8. The only difficulty is that they cost about as much aa a trip to Europe by stumer, so that nobody will want to puddle across, after a!L The jtfruie Sioux have commenced hostilities in Nebraska. They attacked the MgJ<Nrsqn"the Niobrara river, and a large war party are now on their way toward the Ponca Indian agency. Troops are in pursuit. , The design for the new postal card has been agreed upon, and is now being engraved at the printing bureau of the treasury department. It is very plain, and will differ from the card now in ubo, in that the border is left off, and it is to be made of better material. war teasels are now in process of con struction. ; Th> Galveston News thinks alligator skins should begin to figure among Texan exports. Florida and t<ouiaian* contrive to eatch and skin 20,000 alliga tors a year, and the News is satisfied that the Texan crop is folly as great as both of those states. The skins are exported to England and France, but chiefly to the latter, country, which fur nishes the best tanners in the world. The question of taxing the property of masonio and other lodges has been sprung in Georgia as well as Ohio. The state comptroller is of opinion that it hinges on the question whether such bodies are charitable institutions within the meaning of the code of Georgia. A letter from Sir Edward Thornton, British minister at Washington, to a gentleman in Indiana, is said to contain a prophecy that the governments of England and the United States will eventually be alike in their main fea tures, that of England becoming assim ilated to ours. Kura Kalakapa has consented to send his feather ooat to the Philadelphia oentenniaL His coat or eloak is over one hundred years old, and the feathers are of a bright golden color. Doubtless they will have a fine display of old clothes at Philadelphia if this thing keeps on. The star of Don Oarlos seems to be in the ascendant. He is accredited with several recent and important vic tories. There are also rumors of dis satisfaction with the rule of King Al- phonso, and the prediction is ventured that another revolution will soon fol low. The court of appeals of Maryland re- cently decided, in the oase of a man who killed himself and who had his life in sured, that when the act of self-destruo- tion is done during insanity it is death by accident, and the insurance company is bound to pay the amonnt of t£e pol icy, when insanity, temporary or other wise, is proven. Since the terrible Holyoke (Mass.) church burning, a bill has been intro- duoed into the Gonneoticut legislature providing that the doors of all churches and pnblio places of assembly Bhall open outwardly. This is a wise meas ure. In ease of a panic there would, with outward opening doors, be no chance for the ohoking of the vestibules. A reward of $6,000 has been offered by General Spinner for the recovery of the stolen $47,600 package. The five- hundred-dollar bills are about one.fifth of tbs whole amount of five-Jmndred- dollar notes in circulation, and the de partment has no record of the numbers of the stolen bills, which will jgive the thief a better opportunity to escape detection. . The Prussian government is making great efforts to seenre an efficient navy, and expects in two years to have one which will be a fair match for the navies of the lesser powers. During this month a large frigate is to be launched, and the whole German squadron will assemble at Wilhelmshaven. Fifteen The postmaster general has been aroused, by the sharp comments of . the press and the complaints of the public, to the consideration of the iniquitous imposition which a blundering senator , caused to be levied upon the people. He has expressed hiB purpose of calling the attention of congress, in December next, to the law which governs the postage upon transient papers, with the view of securing a modification of the rates. After expending $1,300,000 in fruit less efforts to discover a process for utilising silk rags, Mr. Lister, a wealthy English manufacturer, has succeeded in converting such refuse into the finest velvet. He now carries on this indus try in an establishment which employs some 4,000 workmen, and hundreds of travelers are also employed whose sole basiness is to bny the silk waste, and this they do in all parts of the globe. The faotory is said to have cost nearly $3,000,000. The annual reports on India, issued from the India Office, states that a great quantity of cotton is now worked up in Indio. The report speaks of eighteen steam-spinning and weaving mills at work in the Bombay Presi dency alone, employing 4,500 looms, 405,000 spindles, and 10,000 hands, turning out daily 100,000 pounds of yarn. The weekly consumption of cotton is described as 1,500 bales, and likely to increase largely. There are also many cotton manufactories iu other parts of India. At a convention of ear builders held in New Tork, last week, it was shown that the proportion of foul air in the ordinary railroad car is greater than in a crowded church or theater. Muc discussion ensued, and it seemed gene rally agreed on that none of the man ifold devices for ventilation hitherto se d, will meet the oase. Several spoke hopefully of the Tobin system, now being applied to public halls in England, which introduces fresh air by means of pipes rising through the floor and terminating above the heads of the auditory. The theory is that currents thus introduced are thrown upward like so many jets of water, and are distributed without draft or discomfort in a sort of at mospheric spra Keceot experiments tend to show hat forests increase atmospheric humid ity by the action of their roots rather than by any attraction exerted on rain clouds. The moisture, in other words, comes from below, and not from above. The roots seem to serve os outlets through which water drawn from the earth is conducted to the leaves and passes thence into the atmosphere. An oak tree, experimented npon by Prof, Pettenkofer, was estimated to have between seven and eight hundred thou sand leaves, and the total amonnt of evaporation in a year was computed to be eight and one-third times more than that of the rainfall on an area equal to that covered by the tree, the moisture exhaled by theJeavea being equal to some two hundred and eleven inches, while that from the rainfall was but twenty-five inches, m wswapw - e Napoleons Second Marriage. , 4 WtUer reviewing Lanfrey’s “His- toire de Napoleon L” says : The cir- divorce of Josephine and her husband's marriage with Xarie Lottiee ate detailed at con siderable length by the author. On the 23th of Deoember, 1809, before the Metropolitan Tribunal bad confirmed the dissolution of the religious marriage with Josephine, Caulaincourt, the French Ambassador at St. Petersburg, . opened negotiations for the hand of the : Gruzin Duchess Arne, sister of the Cy*n\ 1 A project Of convention between the two powers in respect of the affairs of Poland was then under discussion. Its principal articles were: 1. A reciprocal engagement not to suffer the re-estab lishment of the kingdom of Poland. 2. The suppression of the names “Poland" and “Polish” in all public and private documents. 3. The suppression of the old orders of Polish chivalry, and of all autonomy of the duohy of Warsaw, Alexander, the sincerity of whose ad miration for Napoleon is questioned by M. Lanfrey, was adverse to the match, but would probably have consented to it as the price of the French adhesion to the project of convention. He there fore returned a courteous answer to Canlainconrt’s proposal, professing, nevertheless, that the decision did not rest with him alone, a ukase of the Em peror Paul, his father, havirg, left to the empress mother the disposal of her daughters in marriage. He wonld en deavor, however, to obtain her consent. A fortnight later the ambassador re ceived instructions to demand a cate gorical answer from the czar in ten days. The reason of this singular ulti matum-unexampled in the annals of official courtship—was that Napoleon had already ehanged his mind. He had no liking for the Polish convention, which would have deprived him of a useful weapon against Russia; more over, the grand duchess was but six teen, and her relations asked for a delay of one or two years. Napoleon, with his habitual impatienoe, would not hear of this condition, and Austria hav ing spontaneously suggested an alliance between the courts of Vienna and the Toileries, the marriage with the Arch duchess Maria Louisa had been vir tually deoided upon before an answer from St. Petersburg could possibly have arrived. It is fortunate that the invention of the electrio telegraph and the steam-engine was postponed till after the fall of a man who would have made such terrible use of them. Even the sncceses of Wellington might have been arrested could the Emperor have communicated daily and hourly with his lieutenants. Very Neatly and Aptly Put. The Phiiadelphe Times, commenting upon the celerity with which the peo ple of the northwest betook themselves to fasting and praying, because of the grasshopper visitation, pertinently says: It would be better, however, if the people would make some effort to find out and to respect the laws which, whether we call them laws of God or laws of nature, do not rule and govern on this earth, before habitual contempt for them has broupht disaster. We cut down alt the trees in the land, then, when we are consequently scourged with alternate drouth and flood, we think we are doing a rather commend able thing if we aik Providence to in terpose in our bebalf. We build tinder- box houses and rotten reservoirs, and when they barn down or ourst, as they must, ana we find ourselves destitute, we piouslyeonseiit to appoint a day of prayer. We have killed off all the wild fowls from the western prairies, the most effective enemy that nature E rovidea for grasshoppers and potato ngs, and when the insects increase, Atui we find we cannot do what the ...... PACTS AND FANCIES, —After » bulk of .England' dark serves for forty years he gets $120 per month. : r . - Jr- —A husband at Cairo refused to let his wife throw dioe, and Anna Dickinson rose at midnight and left the town. —Tbe gibbet is a species of flattery to the human race. Three or four per sons are hnng from time to time for sake of making the rest believe they are vir tuous.—iSanial Dubay. —Whatever our place allotted to ns by Providence, that, for us, ib the post of honor and duty. God estimates us, not by ths position we are in, but by the way in which we fill it.—2^ Ed wards. —Trichinae have lately been found for the fitst time in the flesh of a wild boar, killed in the Hartz mountains, Ger many. Hitherto this parasite has beep supposed to be confined to the domesti cated animal. —The average American boy will make a great fuss and complain bitterly that it will spoil bis clothes, if asked to bring in an armful of wood for his mother; but give him a gun, and he will crawl half a mile on his stomach, through a ditch with four inches of water in it, to get a shot at some ducks. —A London journal complains that “low, dirty, blear-eyed, beery news- venders run after us in the streets to sell Moody and Sankey lives and hymn books, insulting their superiors with such questions as these : ‘ Haven’t yet got a soul to save ? Don’t yer want to find Jesus ?’ And all they want to find is the penny profit." V; —A man bought a horse. It was the first one he ever owned. He saw in ft newspaper that a side window in a stable makes a horse’s eye weak on that side; a window in front hurts his eyes by the glare; a window behind makes him squint-eyed; a window on a diagonal line makes him shy when he travels; a table without a window mokes him s lmd. He sold the horse. —In one place we read that Julia Ward Howe says women need rest, and in another it is asserted that sixty- thousand women are exhibiting their spring bonnets on Chestnut street, Philadelphia. Such contradictions as this are always turning up just as tbe searcher after truth has come to a eon elusion, and he has to begin all over again. —The people of Greece have raised by private subscription a considerable sum for the ereetion of a monument in honor of Loql Byron, as a recognition of his services in the cause of .Greek liberation. It will be placed at Mis- solonghi, where Byron died, and where, out of his own means, he almost wholly fed, clothed and armed the garrison during the seige which made .them famous. —The sale of soda water is falling off all over the country, and oostly foun tains, manufactured in the eastern cities for from $800 to $2,500, would be dead stock in the drug stores but for the sale of mineral waters. If lager beer were to be had in the private cafes and bought for ladies, it would finish the soda altogether. Thousands of men, now, are in the habit of sending bottled lager home to their wiveB, particularly nursing wives, whereas, a glass of beer from the keg is equal in freshness to a gross of bottles. Tartaric acid is the principal and generally the only adul teration of beer. . - Glad Tidings for the Slaves of King Alcohol.—How many a manly form is palsied; how many a noble mind is destroyed ; how many a price less soul lost through the curse ef strong drink ! To the despairing victims of the Satanic tyrant, Alcohol, whose shattered nerves, and trembling limbB, and racking headaches, seem to find no birds did, we begin to talk of the mvs- relief except in the renewed use of the tenons dispensation ©f Providence, "or fatal poison winch brings Him every of nature’s inscrutable ways. Let us go down on our hne>s. by all means ; we have sins enough and follies enough to repent. But let us not suppose that the stupid carelessness which has char acterized every step of civilization on this magnificent continent can fail to bring its punishment.” —Washing the trunks or limbs of fruit trees with the following prepara tion will exclude all kinds of borers or prevent their entrance : One part I fis green, two parts whale oil soap, six parts water. fatal poison whinb brings ilium day miuie? to their miserable cad, wc announce glad tidings of great joy! Dr. Walker’s Vinegar Bitters contain not a single drop of Alcohol in any form, but are a sovereign remedy for the ills of drunkenness. They restore tone and strength to the system, and entirely eradicate the pernicious appetite for liquor. Try a few bottles of Vinegar Bit ters, and you will never crave strong spirits again, but find your health re paired, your mind restored, and be once more a man in the best sense. Health is cheap when Vinegar Bitters are $1 a’bottle,