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A6ULTAN\S HOUSEKEEPING tVHAT IT COSTS TO RUN THE TURK ISH RULERS PALACE An Army of Servants and Officers— Over Six Thousand Persons Fed Three Times a Day. There are over six thousand persons fed three times a day at IJolma-Bacchee Palace while the sultan of Turkey is there, which makes housekeeping rather a serious affair, particularly as these deals are served iu nearly half as many places, there being no regular dining room nor place which could ren ler the labor a little lighter. Though there are .tables in some of the apartments, says the New York Herald , the majority prefer to eat from their knees, and thus their meals are handed around, which makes an enormous amount of unnecessary work. Aside from the serving of three regu lar meals in courses, cotfee aud sweet meats are always ready, aud at every iti etiut slaves are seen going aud coming •with trays of the tiny cups of thatsubli- j mated essence of coffee the Turks drink, and in the harem the women and childten \ eat candies, nuts aud fruits all the time, while not smoking or taking their regu iar meals. That there is good executive ability in the ipanagement of this enormous house hold is cl ear, for there is scarcely ever a jar or a hitch, even under the impulse of the most untimely demands. Every different department is under the con trol of a person who is directly responsi ble for that, and he has a corps of ser vants and slaves under his order who obey him only, aud he is subject to the Treasurer of the Household. Women have no voice whatever in the manage ment of anything in any department. Their sole occupation is to wait upon their tespective mistresses or to serve the Sultan in some specified capacity, and the labor is so subdivided that no one about the whole palace works very hard except the Lord High Chamberlain and Treasurer of the Household. J t>ne man is charged with the duty of Supplying all the fish, aud as to furnish fish for certainly six thousand persons is no light undertaking in a place wllere there are no great markets, as there are in all other large cities, he has to have about twenty men to scour the various •mall markets and buy of the fishermen, and each of these men has two others to carry the fish they buy. It requires about ten tons of ti-h a week. There are nearly eighteen thousand pounds of bread eaten daily, for the Turks are large bread eaters, and this is all baked in the enormous ovens situated at some distance from the palace. The kitchens are detached from all the palaces 1 and kiosks. It requires a large force of bakers to make the bread and another to bring it to the palace and another force of buyers who purchase the Hour and fuel. The bringing of the most of the wood and charcoal is done by the un happy camels, who carry it on their backs. The rest comes in large caiques. The Turkish bread is baked in large loaves, &na is light, moist and sweet, delicious bread in e.ery way, particularly that Which is made of rye. There is a cook for each separate course, and he has his assistants and j scullions, so that theie are in all nearly four hundred men working in the kitch ens. In addition to the aids each chief cook lias a body servant. . The Lord High Chamberlain chooses his corps of buyers smd the chiefs of different departments to suit himself, Usually making such choice more from some occult reasoning than fitness for the position. He then trusts the de partments to those persons and transmits Ills imperative orders through the second Chamberlain. The Lord High Chamberlain is called Mambinge in Turkish. After him iu .importance is the Treasurer of the Household, who re ceives all the bills, looks them over and then forwards them to the Sublime Porte, where they are paid—in time. The providing for the material wants »f all these persons, then, really falls upon the Chamberlain. He appoints a Chibouk-kiassi who provides all the pipes used in and about the palace, both for the men and the women, including the narghiles. Then there is a Tutun kiassi, who sees that the whole palace is liberally supplied with tobacco. The fispap-kiassi furnishes the clothes for the Sultan’s wear—that is, he buys them. Another buys the Sultan’s shoes and slippers. Those who buy the per sonal eltects of the Sultan have by no means a sinecure, as he never wears the tame garment or pair of shoes twice, nor does lie ever sleep iu the same sheets or bedding a second time. It is supposed that ad clothing and bedding which have touched the sacred person of the Sultan are destroyed immediately he has discarded them. The quilts are always of satin quilted with eiderdown and the sheets of white Brotiasa silk with woven brown border. The food for the Sultan is cookecftby one man and his aids, and none others touch it. It is cooked in silver vessels, and when done each kettle is sealed by a slip of paper and a stamp, and this is broken iu the presence of the Sultan by Ihe High Chamberlain, who takes one spoonful of each separate kettle before the Sultan tastes it. This is to prevent the Sultan’s being poisoned. The food is almost always served up to the Sultan in the same vessels in which it was cooked, and the-e are often of gold, but when of baser metal the kettle is set into a rich golden bell-shaped holder, the handle of which is held by a slave “while the Sultan eats, j ach kettle is a course, and is served with bread and a ' kind of pancake, which is held on a golden tray by another slave. The food being cooked outside of the | palace makes it necessary to have bell shaped felt covers to clap down tightly over each kettle, which lias been placed on a tray. For the Sultan and royal family there are magnificent velvet cov ers which go over the outside of these, embroidered with gold and silver threads and pearl, coral or turquoise* beads. Those for others are not so handsome. The .Sultan is served first, and he ai rways eats entirely alone, never under any circumstance deigning to eat with any one, and as soon as he has begun to' eat the harem is served. The Sultan never uses a plate. He takes all his lood direct from the li' :le kettles, and never uses a table, and rarely a knife or fork. A spoon, his bread or pancake or fingers are far handier. The whole household Ja art liberty to take meals where it suits I him or her best, and thus every one la served with a small tray, with a spoon, ' a great chunk of bread, and the higher ones only get the pancakes. After the j harem the o.ticers of the imperial body i guard, the eunuchs, the chamberlains | and other high functionaries are fed, ! they usually being seated around a table, I and the kettles are offered each one, who j helps himself to two 6r three spoonfuls jof the contents of /ea'h. it is not eti i quette to take more, no matter how nice the dish, nor how hungry, but as the number of dishes is always so great no one need go hungry. After all the officers and others of high degree are fed the soldiers ana servants get their food, and at the same time all the men employed in the imperial stables have theirs, and during the progress of the meals any stranger, whoever it may be, is at liberty to cojne in and seat him self and eat. As a general rule three hundred persons are fed every day who have no earthly right, except, what the laws of hospitality give. It is a sort of perpetual free lunch, and beggars as well as rich men avail themselves of this royal bounty. The estimate is that it costs per year to supply the Sultan’s household, horses and animals, aside from the value of the product of the vast farms: Food £5,000,000 Cost of furniture, bedding and carpets 3,000,000 Drugs, women’s clothes, .jewels, cosmetics 111,000,000 Caprices of all kinds 15,000,000 Sultan's clothes an l lied ling ‘d,000,000 Sundries, presents and servants’ wages 4,000,000 Plate, gold and silver dishes k',500,000 Carriages, 474 of them 474,000 Total £41,474,000 WISE WOUDS. Denying a fault doubles it. Boasters are cousins to bars. Knavery is the worst of trades. Foolish fear doubles one’s danger. He has hard work who has noth'ng to do. Fnvy shooteth at others and woundeth herself. Confession of a fault makes half amends. Learning makes a man fit company for himself. A grain of produce is worth a pound of craft. It costs more to revenge wrongs than to bear them. Contentment does not demand condi tions, it makes them. Now is always the very best time if we will only make it so. Whistling don’t make the locomotive go, it is the silent steam. The ups and downs of life are better than being down all the time. To be really yourself you must be dif ferent from those aronnd you. A little knowledge wisely used is bet ter than all knowledge disused. Man may growl, grumble and fight, but it has no effect upon natural right. The lightning is vivid against a dark cloud, so the bravest lives sometimes are amid trials. We build barriers agaiust the fiood tide, we should place some restraints to all prosperity. Flags, brass bands and fireworks may influence weak minds, but they are not real arguments. The nearer we get to the ocean the grander and greater it appears! The same is true of truth. Don’t, depend on borrowed ideas any more than you would be second-hand clothes. A Bankrupt Who Kept His Vow. J. H. Swoyer, who recently died in Wilkesbarre, Penn., was in his way quite a remarkable man. He went to that city in 1857 and accumulMed a large fortune iu the coal business, which was all swept away iu a stiike. He borrowed s2ol\ooo from a banking firm, which caused the institution in the end to close its doors. Jlany poor depositors lost all they had. Swoyer came out iu a card and said if God would spare his health he would pay every dollar back to the bank and the depositors would lose nothing. Accordingly, after the strike ended, he went to work. lie sold his horses and carriages and dismissed his servants. Ilfs palatial mansion was va cated, and he went to live in a small house on aback street. He also labored himself daily in the mines. In live years he paid every dollar back to the bank and the depositors got all their money back with interest. When Swoyer made the last payment the'depositors in mass meeting eulogized him. Swoyer con tinued to prosper, and died worth $500,- 000. l'Lues-Democrat. A Village Destroyed by lee. Advices from the fishing village of Kerschkaranza, in Kola, a peninsula on the White Sea, describe a wonderful phenomenon, new m Arctic annals. At 4 o’cloc x in the morning the inhabitants were awakened by a series of heavy, dull detou itions, like heavy artillery. Shortly afterward a great ice wall to the north west, several hundred feet high, was seen to be moving toward the village, doubtless in consequence of the pressure of the ocean of ice outside. The ice hills came slowly but irresistibly onward, and passed over the village, which it completely erased, and kept onward for a mile inland. The ice traveled a mile and a half in four hours. The villagers saved their lives, but little else. — Phila delph in Dress. Opening a Senatorial Session, Captain Bassett, the venerable door keeper of the United States Senate, al ways goes through a ceremony at the opening of the session which few visit ors are fortunate enough to see. Trimly accoutred, he proceeds at precisely five minutes before the hour of meeting to the room of the presiding officer. He halts in the doorway with military abruptness, makes a very stiff but defer ential bow, and says: “Sir, the hour of the meeting of the Senate has arrived.” Then he bows again, escorts the presid ! mg officer into the chamber, delivers the gavel head into his hands, and retires to his post at the ieft of the President’s desk. Alfred H. Love, of Philadelphia, has again refused to run for Vice-President with Belva A. Lockwood. HOUSEHOLD AFFAIRS. A Pineapple Purlfllng. Cut a fine ripe pineapple in slices and boil it iortjen minutes in a pint of white sugar syrup, then remove the fruit and press it through a sieve. Add to the syrup in which the pineapple was boiled an ounce of gelatine which has been soaked In cold water for twenty minutes, and stir over the fire until the gelatine is entirely dissolved, then strain the syrup through a piece of muslin, and when rather cool stir it into the fruit pulp. Y’ou can decorate the iuside of a mold with fruit if you desire. The fruit used for decoration should be dipped into melted gelatine, then it will adhere firmly to the mold. Pour in the pine - apple, etc., and imbed the mold in ice until required, if the decorating is done tastefully the pudding will form pm elegant-looking dish. When more convenient, canned pineapple may 1 e Used instead of fresh, and will answer the purpose very nicely.—iYe:o York Neics. Sauer Kraut. If our readers, says the Prairie Farmer will follow these dire tions they will have excellent kraut: Select good solid heads, trim off the outside leaves, get a sharp cutter, with the knives set fine. Cut, and fill a washtub, sprinkle over the cabbage just enough salt to season for cooking; with the hand’s work the salt through the mass, until all is salted. Have a barrel ready aud when a tubfull is salted, turn in; with a fiat pounder, pound carefully until the juice rises over the top. .Make a depression in the center and with a cup dip out all the juice. It is this juice that emits the odor so offensive to many persons: Proceed in this way until the barrel is full. Cover the top with large cabbage leaves and set in the cellar. It will be necessary to put a light stoue weight on top of the leaves. In a week it will fer ment, then remove the leaves, spread a cloth over the cabbage under the weight, which should be removed once i week, washed and replaced. This will keep mould from collecting. The brine must always cover the cabbage; if it any time it does not, water ruuot be added. The Perils of Damp Reds. A respectable proportion of the death* that occur during the winter season are cither directly or indirectly due to sleeping in damp beds. As a matter of fact, this peril is of thegreatest, and it is ever present with us. The experienced traveler rarely hazards the risk of sleep ing between sheets which are nearly sure to be damp, until they have been lired under liis personal supervision at a fire in his bedroom. If this be impracti cable, he wraps his cloak around him, or pulls out the sheets and sleeps between the blankets, a disagreeable, but often prudent, expedient. The direct mis chief may result from the contact of an imperfectly boated body with* sheets which retain moisture. The body heat is not sufficient to raise the temperature of the sheets to a sale point, and the result must be disastrous in the extreme, if, as is sure to happen, the skin is cooled by contact with a surface colder than itself, and steadily abstracting heat all the night through. Country people in particular are specially culpable in this matter. A “spare” room is reserved for guests. For weeks it may remain un occupied, unaired and unwarmed. A visi tor arrives. Unconscious of the fate that awaits him he calmly passes the evening in social enjoyment. Later he is shown to the “spare” room for the night. The atmosphere of the apartment has the chill and damp of the tomb, and the sheets of the bed are veritable winding sheets—shrouds, Jg, fact. He is fortunate if he escapes wm nothing more than a “cold.” There is no excuse for the neglect of prqper precaution to insure dry beds. Culticator. Recipes. Muffins.—One egg, one cup of sugar, one-third cup butter, one-half cup milk, salt, spices, one teaspoonful baking powder aud Hour to make batter. Bake in a hot oven. Bread Pudding. Take one pint of bread crumbs soaked in one quart of sweet milk, one-half cup white sugar, two eggs beaten thoroughly, one cup of raisins, heaping teaspooniul of butter, salt to suit the taste, stir well together aud bake. Indian Pr.irxr Pudding.—Three-quar ters of a pound of bread crumbs, six ounces of Indian meal, three or four apples (chopped small), hair pound of raisins, quarter pound of sugar, three ounces of candied peel, a little nutmeg (gratedq and finely shred lemon peel; mix with just enough water to keep it together. Boil three or four hours. Codfish with Eggs.—Put one cup of picked fDh into one quart of cold water, heat slowly, when hot (not boiling) pour off water, remo. e fish to another dish, put into skillet one pint of rich milk, thicken with one tablespoon ful of flour, add fish, piece of butter size of a walnut, when gravy again boils add one or two eggs, stir briskly, and serve at once. SriruD Beef.—For a round weighing twenty pounds rub with a dessertspoon ful of saltpeter ou both sides and let it remain over night. Then take a soup plateful of salt, a t»blespoon#ul of ground cloves, one of allspice and one of cayenne pepper. Hub the beef every day with a tablespoonful of it until it is used, and turn it each day. Boil in nearly enough water to cover it. Parsnip Fritters.—Three large nips, boiled till soft, which will require about two hours; scrape and mash fine, picking out all strings aud lumps; add two beaten eggs two tablespoonfuls of new milk and two of sifted flour, an even teaspoonful of salt and quarter of a teaspoonful of pepper; mix thoroughly; make into small cakes, flour them and fry brown in butter or oil; eat with butter. Potato Gems.—A good way to make potato gems is to work one cup of cold mashed potato smooth into one cupful of sweet milk. Stir in one cupful of corn meal, or enough to make a batter which will drop easily from a spoon, with a pinch of salt, and add one well beaten egg. Beat briskly three or four minutes, then put into well buttered gem pans and bake twenty minutes to half an hour with a steady but not too hot fire. , Mme. E. Gerard, the author, is a Scotch woman born of French parents, and is married to an Austrian officer. ALL KINDS OF COURTING. QUAINT CUSTOMS OF SOME AN CIENT AND MODERN PEOPLE. Sold at Auction —The Esquimaux and Native Australian Way—A Battle for a Bride. Among the native Assyrians all mar riageable young girls were assembled at one place, and the public crier put them up for sale one after the other. The money which was received for those who were handsome, and consequently sold well, was bestowed as a wedding portion on those who were plain. When the most beautiful had been disposed of the more ordinary-looking ones were offered for a certain sum, and allotted to those willing to take them. In ancient Greece the lover was seldom favored with an opportunity of telling his passion to his mistress, and he used to publish it by inscribing her name on the walls, on the bark of the trees in the public walks and upon the leaves of books. He would decorate the door of her house with garlands, and make liba tions of wine before it, in the manner that was practised in the Temple of Cupid. According to Dr. Hayes, courtship 'among the Esquimaux has not much tenderness about it. The match is made by the parents of the couple. The lover must go out and capture a Polar bear as an evidence of his courage and strength. That accomplished, he sneaks behind the door of his sweetheart’s house, and when she comes out he pounces upon her and tries to carry her to his dog sledge, She screams, bites, kicks and breaks away from him. He gives chase, whereupon all the old women of the settlement rush out and beat her with frozen strips of sealskin. She falls down exhausted, the lover lashes her to his sledge, whips up his dogs, dashes swiftly over the frosen snow, and the wedding is consummated. The Australian lover is still more lack ing in tenderness, if the statement made by Myers Deley is true. The makes up his mind as to which woman shall be his bride, and then hides in the bushes in the vicinity of her dwelling. As soon as she comes near the spot wherp he is concealed he knocks her with a club, and carries her off before she comes to. If lie does not get her to his hut before she recovers there is likely to be a lively fight in the bush, for the Australian damsel is generally a vigorous one, and may have reasons of her own for objecting to his attentions. The lover may then be obliged to club her again, and as that is considered to be somewhat of a re lection on the ardor with which his earlier effort was made, he is apt to put as much soul and muscle into his first love tap as he can summon. In some parts of Asia the question of a man’s title to a bride must be settled by a fierce fight between the friends of the contracting parties. If his forces are victorious his sweetheart becomes his trophy. If her friends are victorious he must pay such price as the victors demand. All over that country some ceremony of violence or exhibition of physical power must precede a wedding. Some native tribes insist upon a foot race between the bride and bridegroom to decide the question of marriage, and others require a long chase on horseback. In some sections of Asia the lover must carry off his bride on his back. If he reaches his hut with her there can be no protest against the marriage. Failing in that, he must pay her parents for her in cattle. The willing bride makes no outcry; the unwilling bride arouses the whole* village, the residents of which try to rescue her. Iu the Isthmus of Darien either sex can do the courting, while in the Ur kraine the girl generally attends to it. When she falls in love with a man, she goes to his house and declares her pas sion. If he declines to accept her, she remains there, and his case becomes rather distressing. To turn her out would provoke her kindred to avenge the insult, The young fellow has no re sort left him but to run away from home until the damsel is otherwise disposed of. A curious custom prevails in Oud Beierland, Holland. October is the aus picious month, and on the first Sunday (known as review day) the lads and lasses, attired in their best, promenade the village separately, stare each other out of countenance, and then retire to make up their minds on the second Sunday, which is called decision day. The yourtg men go up and pay their compliments to the fair ones of their choice, to learn if* they are regarded with favor. On the third Sunday, or day of purchase, the swain is expected to snatch the pocket handkerchief of his adored one, and if she submits to it with good grace he undeestands that his chances of winning her are flattering. The captured pledge is restored to the fair owner on the fourth Suuday, -the “Sunday of Taking Possession,” and it rarely happens that the damsel refuses the lover for whom she has indicated a preference. On the Sunday following, the suitor, according t© custom, calls at the house of his inamorata, where he is asked to tea. If a piece of the crust of a gingerbread loaf is handed to him, there is nothing left for him but to retire. If, on the other hand, the parents offer the young man a piece of the crumb, lie is allowed to come again and is admitted into the family. On the Island of Himla, opposite Rhodes, a girl is not allowed to have a lover until she has brought up a certain number of sponges and given proof of her ability to take them from a certain depth. On the Island of Nicarus the girl is not consulted. Her father gives her to the best diver among her suitors. He who can stay longest under the water and gather the most sponges marries the maid. — Epoch. * Mistletoe on Telegraph Wires. A traveller in Braz.il writes to a horti cultural paper telling of the crop of mis tletoe that he found growing on tele graph wires near Rio Janeiro. When he first saw it he thought that floods had ! left weeds hanging to the wires, but a nearer inspection and the height of the wires convinced him that the apparent weeds were thousands of little mistletoes firmly fixed to the wires. Many species of this plant grow in Brazil, and some, called “bird weeds,” bear berries which are eaten by birds. The seeds are de posited on the telograph wires, and take root. They are short lived, of course, but the constant deposit of seed clothes the wires with this curious fringe. SELECT SIFTINGS. The first steel pen was made in 1830. The first air pump was made in 1654. Paper car wheels were first made in 186!'. The first lucifer match was made in 1798. Bagdad, in Turkey, is the City of Caliphs. Decimal arithmetic was invented at Bruges in 1602. Calcutta, India,and Versailles, France, are called the cities of palaces. Eighteen yards of gros grain silk go make Chief .Pfistice fuller’s new robe. Philip Beaubien, who was the first white child born in Chicago, lately died there. A New York publishing house dis plays the sign: “Literature 10 cents a pound.” It is stated that over 103 hand organs are ruined every year in New York city, by sudden changes of temperature. Cariara in Italy may tie called the White Stone City. It has the largest, purest and whitest marble in the world. A Chicago man advertises an auto matic dresser—“A mnehine that puts your coat on for you and saves you no end of trouble.” The kitchen and dining room of the new Midland Hotel at Kansas City, are located on the eighth floor and reached by six elevators. A standard dictionary of the Chinese language, containing about 40,000 char acters, was perfected by Pa-out-she, who lived about 1100 B. C. The coldest town in the world is Mer chojansk, in Siberia, where the mercury has sometimes recorded a temperature of eighty-nine degrees below zero. The Indian mutiny began with the disbandonmeut of several Bengal regi ments in March, 1857. Pacification celebrated in England, May 1, 1859. In Guiana, in South America, it rains for months without cessation. Darwin says at Chiloe it rains for six days of the week, and is cloudy on the seventh. Charlie Cliatt, of Columbia county, Ga., killed a bald eagle several days ago, near the twelve-mile post on the Georgia railroad. He was a monster, measuring seven feet eight inches from tip to tip. Richard Fielding, a blacksmith of Ramsgate, England, is in jail charged with murder on his own confession,that, twenty-four years ago, he had a quarrel in a boat with a woman named Hannah White, and pushed her overboard. During the hard times of the Confed eracy, in 1964, Southern people had to pay $230 for the material alone of a coat and vest of homespun. A dress that would ordinarily cost $lO could not be bought at that time for less than SBOO. A woman deaf mute who goes among down town offices in New York selling deaf and dumb alphabets has printed on her cards this peculiar request: “If any person thinks I am not what I represent to be, please have me arrested at once.” A man who died at Flint, Mich., a few days ago, wrote his own funeral sermon, the hymns to be sung at his funeral, the words of consolation to his friends, and the epitaph for his tombstone. He be lieved that if a man wanted a thing done well he should do it himself. The disappearance Of the white moss rose is noticed in England. One florist claims that a rose which for more than thirty years has blossomed white in his garden has suddenly put out red roses. The only cause of this surprising change was enrichment of the earth. A little girl named Sallie McAdams has been astonishing the people of Craw ford, Neb., by the plucky manner in which she tames vicious horses. No mat ter how wild the horse may be, she sticks to him until he is conquered, and the most expert cowboys in the region ac knowledge that they cannot beat her. Dr. J. W. Porter, of Kansas City, Mo., claims to be the originator of the stand ard time system. He says the subject was first brought to his mind in 1878, when he was in the coast survey, by noting the variation of clocks * and watches. He finally marked off a standard time map, and his system was adopted. Method of Painting Cyclornmas. The popular idea of how the war cy cloramas, like the Battle of Gettysburg, Battie of Shiloh, Battle of Chickamauga, &c., are painted, said an artist to a Globe-Demo rat reporter, appears very laughable to a person who knows bow the work is accomplished. The Battle of Gettysburg and the Siege of Paris have been shown for several years on opposite sides of Hubbard court, iu Chicago, and the stock paid large divi dends, Each was advertised as the work of French artists, father and son, and the popular idea is that these gentlemen painted them. The fact is that, beyond a general outlining of the work, which was probably faithfully biade after maps procured from authentic sources, and a general direction of the plan of the work, the artist-in chief had very little to do with it. No man engaged in a battle sees it, and an accurate painting of two armies in combat - is impossible. The general features only are known. For instance, in the Gettysburg paint ing there are accurately defined the roads, Crown Hill, little Crown llill, the wheat field in which a memorable charge was made; one or two buildings, which were headquarters of the leading generals, and with reasonable aepuracy the topog raphy of the country is depipted with excellentqierspective. But the details of the battle, the actual clash of arms be tween this and that division or brigade, is left a good deal to the imagination. The artist-in-chief hires some men to put in the sky, other men to put in the trees and foliage, other men to put in the men in action. Attention is paid to developing this or that memorable incident, as in the Get tysburg painting the death of the can noneer, the amputation of the soldier’s limb beside the haystack. Take it all together it makes up a picture that is thrilling enough to arouse the most in tense siuterest, on the part of the old soldier. I remember standing by the side of a veteran at the Chicago picture of Gettysburg. He was explaining to a companion the details of the fight, in which he had borne an honorable part. “Say, Bill,” said lie, “at that stone wall there I lost my hat; and, by gosh! if there ain’t the old hat lying there yet!” In painting pictures of battles shrewd artists never fail to bestrew the field with lost hats, muskets aud canteens. SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL. ' Luminous paint is a compound of lime and sulphur. ’E Pittsburgh man has made a steel water tower in Memphis, Penn., 165 leet high and 16 feet in diameter. A company has been formed in Chili for manufacturing soap out of a peculiar kind of earth found near Chilian. Statistics show that there is a larger per cent, of farmers’ wives go insane yearly than any other class of people. Pyrethrum is a preparation of the flower heads of a well known plant. It may be applied as a powder or in solu tion. It might be used as an argument for vegetariauism that where custom has not hardened him man feels a deep repug nance to animal food. An “inch of rain” means a gallon of water spread over a surface of nearly two square feet, or a fall of about one hun dred tons on an acre of ground. Omaha expects t(* be supplied with oil from the Wyoming field before two years, just as the stuff is now being piped from Lima, Ohio, to Chicago nearly 600 miles. Eighteen years ago, when the air brake was tried, it required eighteen seconds to apply it to a train kOOO feet long. Four years later the time was reduced to four seconds. A Frenchman claims to have invented a thermometer so sensitive that its index needle will deflect two inches upon the entrance of ajrersou into the room where it has been placed. It has been computed that during a life-time of three score years and ten the blood of a human being travels 4,292,- 400 miles, that bis heart beats 2,538,- 848,000 times. According to Mr. Keldyche, who has just published the results of a series of experiments on the air drawn from hos pital wards, air which has been saturated with eucalyptol will no longer permit the propagation of colonies of bacilli. Attention lias lately been called to an acid extracted nem Gymnemasylvestris, a climbing plant from India. This acid deprives the tongue for the time being of distinguishing sweet from bitter sub stances. It does not interfere with the taste of saline substances. After experiments on the relative merits of castor oil and of olive oil as lubricants, the Italian Admiralty has ordered that the exposed parts of ships’ machinery be lubricated exclusively with castor oil,-and that mineral oils be used for cylinder and similar lubrication. An electro-magnet with a carrying capacity of 800 pounds is attached to a crano in the Cleveland (Ohio) Steel Works, which readily picks up billets and other masses of iron without the aid of any other device. A boy is thus en abled to do the work of a dozen mfen. There are between 40,000,000 and 50,- 000,000 stars of which the inhabitants of this world are able to gain some knowl edge with the aid of optical instruments now in existence. Of these only about 6000 are visible to the naked eye—3ooo in the northern hemisphere and an equal number in the southern. A dealer in watches says that Amer ican watches only arc called for nowa days, and that he sells a great many watches, but don't sell six foreign-made watches in a year. Our watches are so simple in construction that they are easily repaired; they keep excellent time, und are cheaper than the European watch. Tobacco blindness, it is said, is be coming a common affliction. At present there are several persons under treat ment for it at one London hospital. It first takes the form of color blindness, the sufferers, who have smoked them selves into this condition, being quite un able to distinguish the color of a piece of red cloth held up before them. Some times the victim loses his eyesight alto gether. “Oil on Troubled Waters.” The origin of the phrase “Pouring oil on troubled waters,” is thus de scribed: The old legend says that the Priest Utta, who was sent to Kent to fetch Faudede, King Edwin’s daughter, to be married to King Oswin, besought the blessing of Bishop Aida. The Bishop blessed him, anl gave him hallowed oil, directing him, ’in case of a storm, to pour it on the waves, which would be at once stilled. Thi he did with complete success. The expression is also used by Erasmus, and in our owu day Captain Wilkes noticed the efficacy of oil, which had leaked from a whaling vessel during a storm off .< ape Horn, in smoothing tfie waters. Since his time it has come into common use, and saved hundreds of vessels from foundering. Bags of oil are suspended from the vessels side, and the oil is permitted to leak out slowly. A few gallons will prevent the wave 3 from breaking. For Life. Little Bobby, whose mother believes in cautioning her children against the consequences of foolish acts, has often said to him: “If you get before the train, or fall into the water, you may be killed; and when one is dead it is fora lontj time. One day Bobby, while wyilking with his uncle, took pains to keep at a safe distance from tho river. “If I should fall in, I should be droxvned,” he exclaimed; “and when you drowned you’re dead; and when you’re dead, it’s for life!” A New Reform. In this error of endeavor, To apply the social lever, For the elevation of the human race, We should work a reformatien In our themes for conversation And some antiquated “chestnuts'’ soon efface. I There’s the talk about the weather, If ’twill soon clear off, or whether It will thunder, lightning:, rain or snow or shine. If the atmospheric pressure Will with ultra-fiendish pleasure Cause the mercury to suddenly decline. There’s the chat of politicians, Of all classes and conditions, Who most positively know who will win, Who make sure prognostications On results of machinations Of the candidate whom they are getting in. But the bore who makes us wildest, To speak in language mildest. Is the man who talks of nothing but himselt He appears to be too far gone To repress his senseless jargon, Till he's laid away forever on the shelf. — Manden, in tha liostrum.