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About Haralson banner. (Buchanan, Ga.) 1884-1891 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 9, 1889)
- THE SCORPION. - L — A Hot-Tempered and Belligerent " Mexican Reptile. He Will Commit Suicide on the Slightest Provocation. “If you should ever happen to go down into lower Mexico,” said L. T.’ Stanley, the electrician, *‘and should notice that your bed wus set up on in ‘verted tin pans, as you have scen the four corners of corn cribs fixed to keep out the rats, and that the bed had a| sheet stretched above if, running toa peak at the top like the roof of a house, don’t say a word but go right in and go to sleep. 1f you shouldn’t go to sleep a 8 soon as you get in, and should hear something drop on the sheet roof above you and roll down and tumble on the floor at the side of the bed, lie still. By and by you will hear the same drop and roll and tumble, and it won’t be long before it’ll be drop, drop, drop, and roll, roll, roll, and plink, plink, plink on the floor. Don’t get up. If you do you might think you were struck by lightning as soon as you put your foot on the floor, for the chances are that you would step on a scorpion the first thing, and the scorpion has a stinger that he carries for instant and effective use. Scorpions are just about as plenty there as flies are up home. They hide by day and attend to business at night. The scorpion isa crab with a snake’s tail, with a spur on the end of it. It likes to get in bed with folks, and if it wasn’t for the fin pans on the bedposts it would climb up and get in with you that way, and if the bed wasn't roofed with the sheet it would drop on you from the ceiling. ‘When you get up in the morning you will be apt to find a few quarts of dead scorpions lying on the floor in front of the bed. They all committed suicide. After trying to get into the bed with you a few times, and being tumbled off the sheet every time, or stopped by the tin pans, they got mad, and stuck their stingers in their heads and killed them gelves. A scorpion will commit suicide on the slightest provocation. It has a temper as hot and as quick as kerosene Jon a kitchen fire. If one scorpion is passing by another one and happens to touch it there’s a fight at once, and two dead scorpions are the result. Put a ‘l‘lundrcd scorpions in an enclosure, and throw a stick or piece of dirt among them, and the sgorpion that is nearest to where the stick or dirt falls will turn and dip his spur into his nearest neigh bor, and in less than two seconds the entire hundred will be mixed up in the fight. The way their stingers and claws and legs will fly is a sight to see. As long as there is one scorpion alive the fight goes on, for if one happens to survive the other ninety-nine he will pitch in and have it out with himself, and the first thing he knows he is dead. «Itisa fact that scorpions, or al-' carans, as the Mexicans call them, arel at certain seasons of the year as numerous, almost, as flies. They are within the cracks of the walls, between the bricks of the tiles on the floor, hid ing inside your garments, darting every where with inconceivable rapidity, their tails, which hold the sting, ready to fly up with dangerous effect upon the slightest provocation. Turn a corner of a rug or table spread and you disturb a flourishing colony of them. Shake you shoes in the morning and out they flop. Throw your bath sponge into the water and half a dozen of them dart out of its cool depths, into which they had lain themselves away during the night. It is not often that you see one of the mahogany-hued reptiles that is more than two inches long, but they sometimes show wup with the formidable proportions of a five-inch length and all that it implies. There is a smaller variety than the mahogany scorpion. This one is yellow, and he is ten times more vicious and dangerous, 1t is at midday that the bite or sting of these venomous little pests ismost feared a 5 the natives say itis then the most _poisonous. The deserted old mines of ~ Durango are simply scerpion hives, they - having bred and increased there undis. b for sefrien. ;A Loy gears ue ety o gWi pressed over the wound, on which it acts hke the bleeding eup of the surgeon and draws the poisoned blood .out. A hollow key has been used suocessfully in the same way., Victims of the yellow scorpion’s bite have been known to lie for days in convulsions, foaming at the mouth, and with stom ach and limbs swollen as in dropsy. Others suffer no worse consequences than they might from an ordinary bee sting. Brandy taken until stupefaction follows is a favorite remedy for scorpion bites in Mexico, and ammonia is also given with good wesults. ' There is nothing the Mexican or Texan fears more than the yellow or black scorpion of Duran go except the bloating rattlesnake of the Staked Plains, and that is probably the most deadly reptile of the American oontinent. Annimals That Sleep all Summer. The winter sleepers are all pretty well known. But owing to the estivators being, for the most part, inhabitants of tropical countries far removed from the path of trained observers, we are less acquainted with the species practicing that means of shunning the heat and drought of summer. Indeed, at pres ent only one mammal is known which does so, This is the tenrec, a hedge hog-like beast of Madagascar, which re tires to its burrow and sleeps during the three hottest months of the year—these months, it must be remembered, corre sponding to the northern winter. How ever, it i 3 believed that a West African dormouse is a summer sleeper, though this species, when brought to England, hibernates, like its northern cousin. No doubt, also, some of the sub-Antar tic mammals sleep during the coldest portion of winter, though as yet the tuco-tuco of Patagonia and a gray rat native to the Kermedec Islandsare about the only two species of which this can be affirmed with certainty. In not a few respects, the suspended animation of these creatures during the intense heat of summer is even more re markable than that which obtains when frost dulls every function of life. Some 1 m'croscopical animals—the wheel ani : | malcules for example—can be dried up into a dust-like substance, and yet re- : vive as soon as they get access to water, the germ on which their vitality de- ; pends being evidently protected in some manner, not yet clearly understood. In South America and Africa various rep tiles mstivate, if not in the manner de scribed, at least so perfectly that their summer somnolence is quite comparable with the winter sleep of the northern | forms. In the llanos or plains of Ve nezuela, the alligator, the land and fresh water tortoise, the huge boa con trictor, and several of the smaller kind of serpents lie motionless in the indu rated mud during the hottest period of the tropical summer. But their dor mancy is by no means so perfect as that of some hibernators. A marmot or a hedgehog when in the depth of its win ter torpidity, may be kicked about like a ball, and yet, except for a few feeble respirations, exhibit scarcely any sign that it is conscious of being despitefully used. In Brazil, Australia and the Cape Colony, lizards, frogs, tortoises and in sects pass months of the rainless season enclosed in hard earth, and in India, many species of fishes, during the dry season and long-continued droughts, live in a torpid condition, embedded in the indurated clay. Dr. Day has, indeed, put on record instances in which fishes have survived in this condition for more than one season, ponds known to have been dry for several months having swarmed with scaly inhabitants as soon as the accumulation of water released them from their hardened beds.—2 New York Sun. : e i Housetops as ‘Summer Resorts. In a paper entitled ¢‘Wasted Sun beams,” some >ne asks why the all-year residents of our large cities do not take a hint from an Oriental eustom and transform their housetops into summer resorts. Roofing suitable to our climate can be made as enduring as pavement. Flowers and shrubs would make a house top a summer garden, and awnings would afford shelter from the direct rays of the sun or from showers. o e ks 1 Dleiis ey FOR FARM AND GARDEN, CURE FOR POTATO ROT. ‘ The following formula is the best known preventative of potato rot, ac cording to Professor Peck, State Botan ist of New York: Dissolve four pounds of sulphate of copper in sixteen gallons -of water; in another vessel slack four pounds of lime in six gallons of water. ‘When the latter solution is cool pour it into. the copper solution, stir thorough ly, apply to the potato plants when in bloom by means of a spraying apparatus, 80 as to moisten thoroughly, but not drench them, CUTTING AND CURING CLOVER. Clover hay should also be cut early, or when the last sets are in blossom and the first ones a little turned. As to the best mode for curing clover hay, an ex perienced farmer says there are two ex tremes to be avoided, viz.—drying rap idly and too longin the sun, and at. tempting to cure wholly in the shade. It should be cut while dry and free | from the dew and exposed to the sun long enough to dry it partly. Then place it in small cocks, where some ad ditional drying will take place, and it becomes fit for the barn or stack. Some experience and judgment are required to know just how dry it must be to keep without heating or molding. If made too dry it loses part of its value. The relative amount of drying in the sun and in shade will vary with weather, ripeness and other influences; but as an average about two-thirds of the drying should be performed in the sun and one third in the shade, although practical men differ on this point.—New York Observer, | SUNLIGHT AND TREES. ~ The latest report of the United States Forestry Department gives some inter esting particulars as to the influence of light on trees. Light is necessary for the development of the chlorophyll, or green coloring matter, and for the life of all- green plants, especially trees. Trees nearly always develop best in the full enjoyment of light, but their capacity for growing in shade varies considerably. Yew will thrive in the densest shade, whereas a few years of overtopping Wwill kill larch. The beech | will grow in partial shade where the oak would languish and the birch die. ‘When planted in moist places all species are less sensitive to the withdrawal of light. Inthe open maples, elms and sycamores grow well and make a good shade, while in a dense forest they thin out and show a scanty foliage. Conifers, such as spruces and firs, have the greatest capacity for growing in the shade, and preserve their foliage in spite of the withdrawal of light. It has been found that those leaves which ; develop under the full influence of sun light are larger and tougher, besides “having a larger number of stomata, or breathing pores, than those less exposed to light. Experiments are to be carried “out on this subject in the United States. “We may also mention here a novel way ~of studying timber, which has been in - troduced by Mr. R. B. Hough of Low ville, N. Y. He employs frames of cardboard containing three thin slices of ~wood, each two inches wide by five “inches long and from one-eightieth to ~one two-hundredth inch thick. These show the wood along the grain, across it to the heart and tangentially. The effect of light coming through the thin slip is to show the structure and quality of the timber, even better than if one were looking at a mass of it.— Cassell’s Magazine. ! 80-CALLED BUTTER AROMA. ' There seems to be a great deal of mis i understanding in regard to matters per | taining to dairy work, even among ' experts, and these misunderstandings ' produce confusion and uncertainty among the practical dairymen who look to these experts as guides and counsel ors. One of the leading Western dairy writers, in an article recently published, gives as a rteason why butter should be packed as soon as possible that other ~ wise “the aroma will escape.” This shows an entire ignorance of the nature of the flavor and odor—the so-called | aroma—of butter. This is not a volatile G e e il A e e f%fl%"%fi% ‘ e ‘ g \\ aroma of butter is seveloped by time, and gradually increases by an interna change and decompuosition by which the volatile acids—chicfly butyric acid—are produced. And as this acid rapidly be comes too pungent to be pleasant, it is necessary to protect the butter from change by immediate packing and se clusion from the atmosphere. TOMATOES BY THE ACRE. Tomatoes yield the best cropsin heavy loam that will not pack or bake. The plants, except for early planting, can be rased better out-of-doors, in garden beds. Theground should have a dress ing broadcast of 800 bushels to the acre of good, well-rotted barn-yard or hog pen manure, well and thoroughly ploughed in and harrowed down. When the season is well settled, harrow the ground and furrow out five feet each ~way and put in plenty of fine, well-rot ted manure at the crossing of the fur rows, using about 800 bushels to the acre in the hills. Tread down well and cover with soil about three inches deep. Set the plants well down in the ground, pressing the soil well up to them. It is best to wet the roots when setting, as the soil adheres better. Keep the ground clean and loose with the cultivator and the hoe drawing the soil or hilling them at each dressing. Tomatoes are marketed by packing in crates holding a strick or Winchester bushel, made of two ends and one mid dle piece, each three-quarters of an inch thick, eight inches wide and fourteen inches long; with slats nailed on three inches wide, twenty-two inches long, and three-quarters of an inch thick. Good heavy masons’ lath will answer for slats, leaving a space of ‘one inch for ventillation between them. For a long distance from market they should be picked just as they begin to show a red tinge at the blossom end; but for near by they must be riper or so they will be well ripened when they arrive in market. Care should be taken not to pack any cracked or wormy ones, as they spoil the rest and injure the sale of the whole. For Philadelphia market they are usu. ally shipped in five—eighths stave peach baskets, covered with cloth, which are returned to the shipper. —American Agriculturist. . FARM AXD GARDEN NOTES. b Raise plenty of roots this season. ‘Haste makes waste” in securing Crops. Guard fowls against hawks, owls, rats, ete. Keep a sharp lookout for vermin on the young chicks at this season. It is much better to plant a seasonable crop than to plant what we have planned to plant out of season. A practical way of destroying the cur rant borer, isto cut off the infected wood in the Spring and burn it. An experienced foreign horticulturist claims that canker in fruit trees always arises from defective nourishment. Every farmer ought to plant a small acreage of millet for the variety it affords in the winter feeding of stock. If the weather is dry keep the culti vator going in the corn. Weeds will draw moisture that ought to go to the corn. Don't cultivate too deep; the time is past when ‘‘root pruning” is considered the best way to help corn make a good crop. But few farmers have their ground in proper order to plant corn. Many of them wonder why they havea “poor stand.”” How was yours put in? Millet will be mature enough for hay in about ninety days after sowing, so that the soil it occupies can be seeded ‘to winter wheat or rye in the fall. The cherry and pear slug can be de stroyed by the exterminator or by pyre thrum powder, an ounce to three gal lons of water, applied with a force pump. ' Brine salting is strongly advocated by Mr. Nuttall, a noted English maker of butter. He claims that grinding dry salt into butter and leaving it to dis solve is a direct injury. A California fruit-grower is quoted as authority for the statement that the to mato, in proximity to fruit trees or other plants affected with insects, will overcome tho pedte. =ll o 0 Creameries are only valusblo to the | daleymen whomthiey sarve when, they | Bolug ke e b b Hphdls el Pt e s e e e ! SCIEKTIFIC SCRAPS. ' Men are usually one-twelfth larger than women. : Steam firo engines operated by elec tricity are suggested. : A novel use of electricity is about to be tested in sharpening the shoes of car horses in icy weather. The piercings of the new Cabres tun nel met with remarkable precision, the: length being 12, 350 feet. Bronze cents are most numerous and are made of an alloy of copper and tin, but those of earlier date contain a small proportion of nickel, which gives them a whiter, silvery color. It has been determinel that the North sea contains two distinct kinds of sea water. The re ation between chlo rine and density is not in either case due to river water flowing into the sea. From calculations made by the coal department of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company it 1s found that the weight per cubic foot of coal varies according to the size to which it is broken. . Dr. William A. Hammond says that some maniacs retain possession of their reasoning powers, and thatitis a com mon thing to find a reasoning maniac setting himself up as a reformer. Nine times out of ten a reformer is a crank. M. Lombard supports the theory ad vanced by Signor Sporta that vegetable forms which now cover our continents. have spread slowly and continuously from north to south, receat species fore ing back or obliterating those of more ancient origin. M. Beauregard, an eminent Egyptolo list, believes that Egypt at the time of the Pharaohs exhibited the mixed con dition of combining the use of flint implements with acquaintance with the means of extracting copper and blend ing it with other metals. The evil effects of an atmosphere sur charged with dust in factories have been attracting so much attention in England that the factory acts are about to be amended, and a bill is to be brought before the House of Commons compassing an effectual means of pre venting injury from the inhalation of dust. ~ Professor E. Wollny, of Munich, Germany, has experimented on the effect of electric currents of different in tensities and characters on the growth of plants. Specimens of grain, pota toes, carrots, &c., were planted and subjected to the action of electric cur rents until they reached maturity. Com pared with plants grown under ordinary circumstances, the result showed that the electric, current exerted no influ ence. In M. Berthelot’s paper, read before the Paris Academy of Sciences, he speaks of a statuette and a portion of the sceptre of the Egyptian King Pepi 1., both dating 4000 B. C. Portions were analyzed and found to be pure copper. From this he argues that, as in the New World, the stone age was followed by the copper in the Eastern Hemisphere and that the bronze period cannot be more than fifty or sixty centu ries old. The Vienna News says: ‘The practi cal stamping out of small pox in Ger many, according to Dr. Heryieux of the Paris academy of medicine, has only peen accomplished through re-vaccina tion. Vaccination lessens the frequency and severity of epidemics, and re-vacei nation tends to make them disappear completely. Re-vaccination should be | practiced every ten years, and should be performed at once when an epidemic ig threatened, even though but a short time has elapsed since the last opera tion. Human or heifer vaccine nay be used.” . e e ) An Accomplished Millionaire, v Eckley Brinnto Coxe, of Philadel phia, is the most accomplished million~ aire in America. He climbs to the top of his highest breakers and descends ta. the lowest depths of his numerous mines. He is a graduate of half a domwl, leges and universities and converses fre quently in English, German French and | Italian. His fad is bibliomanis, aud he possemos Khe taint *ejuable sollsellE | 40inss and, Eiiavies s 6 oERRE |da jochatof Bem By & e | Xork. A ‘monograph on Gerome's | atiting, ePotine Yot il PR i e B S
