ALL KINDS OF THINGS.

Great Fortunes of To-day Compared With the Wealth of France Under the Bourbons—The Dangers of Dust, and the Eccentricities of Electricity—The World's Babel of Languages—Amusing Anachronisms Perpetrated By Authors and Artists—A Pin Scratch That Helped Nelson—With Other Interesting Items Gathered From Various Sources.

FRENCH MILLIONAIRES OF OTHER CENTURIES.

GREATER EXTRAVAGANCE TO-DAY.

Prior to the Seventeenth Century No Frenchman Had an Income That Touched the Seven-Figure Mark.

Tales of the magnificent extravagances of France under the Bourbons have led a wondering later age to think that never since has gold been lavished upon luxury with so free a hand. But a French writer, the Vicomte Georges d'Avenel, has taken the trouble to make comparisons, and he has found that the incomes of to-day are relatively much larger than they were one, two, and three hundred years ago. The New York World has summarized from the Revue des Deux Mondes M. d'Avenel's discoveries:

For purposes of exact comparison M. d'Avenel estimates all fortunes and incomes of bygone times in terms of their equivalent value to-day, not as mere nominal sums. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, he shows, no one had an income of $1,000,000.

Louis IX in the exceptional year of the crusade of 1251 spent $775,000. After the Hundred Years' War, in 1450, Charles VII's budget was $212,000. In 1516 Francis I, who was noted for his taste for luxury, had only $259,000 for his person and his court.

Napoleon III's civil list amounted to $5,000,000, but Louis XIV had less than $4,000,000 for all expenses of an extravagant court.

Richelieu and Mazarin derived tremendous incomes from their privileges, Mazarin leaving by will nearly $40,000,000 to the king, who refused it and let it pass to Mazarin's eight nephews and nieces.

Except these three no person up to the time of the Revolution enjoyed an income of $1,000,000, and the revenues of Richelieu and Mazarin were subject in fact to charges really connected with the state.

The conclusion of this investigator is that the very rich of to-day are six times as rich, or those of equal fortune are twelve times as many, as the richest men of the old régime; and they are ten times as rich, or twenty times as many, as the rich princes of the feudal period.

SERIOUS EXPLOSIONS ARE CAUSED BY DUST.

GRAVE DANGER LURKS IN SUGAR.

Particles of Cork Floating in the Atmosphere of Linoleum Factories Must Be Kept from Unprotected Lights.

Almost every kind of dust which is composed of inflammable material will explode when touched by a flame. For instance, the house-maid who uses the contents of the sugar bowl to light the fire knows that nothing burns more easily than powdered sugar. Proprietors of large sweetmeat factories have learned that there is danger from this source.

Some years ago an English inspector of mines conducted a number of experiments on the explosive power of coal dust. A disused shaft one hundred and fifty feet deep was chosen for the purpose. Samples of dust from different collieries were collected for the purpose. When two hundredweight of dust was emptied down a shaft and a charge of gunpowder fired, the result was startling.

Huge tongues of flame, sixty feet in height, shot up from the mouth of the shaft, and enormous columns of smoke rose high in the air, forming a great black pall over the scene of the explosion.

Coal is the carbonized remains of tree mosses. Oddly enough, these mosses were the big forefathers of the moss we know as lycopodium, which in a powdered state is used to produce flash signals. This will help to give an idea of the intensely inflammable nature of coal dust.

In the manufacture of linoleum no unprotected lights are allowed in the mixing department. This is on account of the great danger of exploding the cork dust floating in the air. An additional danger in linoleum making is that the mixture of cement and cork dust has the unpleasant property of spontaneously igniting if left in a warm place. It is, therefore, customary to mix the material a sackful at a time in order to reduce the risks of an explosion.

SOME ECCENTRICITIES OF LIGHTNING BOLTS.

TARGETS OF HEAVEN'S ARTILLERY.

Belief That the Electric Fluid Never Strikes Twice in the Same Place Is Shown to Be Wrong.

Among the duties assigned to the students of the Agricultural College at Guelph, Ontario, is that of gathering statistics concerning loss and damage from lightning in the province. The results thus obtained seem to show the value of lightning-rods, if properly adjusted, and the desirability of having trees standing near buildings. Summarizing the last annual report from the college, the Free Press, of London, Ontario, gives out the following novel facts:

As to the question does lightning strike twice in the same place, the report says that there may be warrant for the idea in the fact that where lightning ever strikes there is very little left to be struck a second time; but where a barn has once been struck and another barn has been erected on the same site, that second barn is just as likely to be struck as the first, and, in some instances, more likely.

The statistics compiled by the college show that in the five years since 1901 ninety-four trees were struck by lightning, as follows: Elm, 28; pine, 17; oak, 9; basswood, 7; maple, 7; ash, 4; poplar, 4; cedar, 3; apple, 3; hemlock, 2; willow, 2; spruce, beech, chestnut, balsam, hickory, butternut, and fir, 1 each.

The number of cattle killed in the same period was 114; sheep, 64; horses, 46; pigs, 4. Total, 228.

Barns struck, 179; other buildings, 66.

LIVING LANGUAGES ARE STILL A BABEL.

MODERN CONFUSION OF TONGUES.

Linguists Attempt an Impossible Task if They Try to Master the Hundreds of Languages Still Spoken.

Language is, of course, a wonderful telegraph system between minds; but what a multiplicity of codes! The living languages to-day number eight hundred and sixty, to say nothing of five thousand dialects. This is a Babel indeed.

Europe has eighty-nine languages; Asia, one hundred and twenty-three; Africa, one hundred and fourteen; America, one hundred and seventeen; and the islands of the Pacific and Indian oceans have four hundred and seventeen.

Probably the most remarkable linguist the world has ever known was Giuseppe Caspar Mezzofanti, who was born at Bologna in 1774, created cardinal in 1838, and died at Rome in 1849. The list of languages and dialects which he acquired reached the astounding total of one hundred and fourteen.

It would be interesting to know what system was pursued by Cardinal Mezzofanti in the study of languages, but little light is now obtainable on this subject.

The most famous linguists of antiquity were Mithridates, King of Pontus, who is said to have been thoroughly conversant with the languages of the twenty-five nations over which his rule extended; and Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, of whom Plutarch says that "she spoke most languages," and that "there were but few of the foreign ambassadors to whom she gave audience through an interpreter."

THE FLIGHT OF TIME CAUSES MANY ERRORS.

PAINTERS AND WRITERS MIX DATES.

Artists Have Portrayed Abraham Threatening Isaac with a Blunderbuss, and Romans Smoking Pipes.

Whether it be due to ignorance or careless impatience, it is true that many of the greatest writers and painters have been guilty of the most surprising anachronisms. Thus Shakespeare introduces cannon into the play of "Hamlet," and in "Julius Cæsar" reference is made to the striking of the clock, though striking clocks were not invented until fourteen hundred years after Cæsar's death. Schiller, in his "Piccolomini," refers to lightning-conductors—at least one hundred and fifty years before they were invented. Instances might be added almost indefinitely.

The anachronisms of painters are more noticeable, as a rule, than those of writers. In "The Fancies of Fact" is the following compilation of blunders by artists:

Tintoretto, in a picture of the Children of Israel gathering manna, has taken the precaution to arm them with the modern invention of guns. Cigoli painted the aged Simeon at the circumcision of the Infant Saviour; and, as aged men in these days wear spectacles, the artist has shown his sagacity by placing them on Simeon's nose.

In a picture by Verrio of Christ healing the sick, the lookers-on are represented as standing with periwigs on their heads. To match, or rather to exceed, this ludicrous representation, Dürer has painted the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden by an angel in a dress fashionably trimmed with flounces.

The same painter, in his scene of Peter denying Christ, represents a Roman soldier very comfortably smoking a pipe of tobacco.

A Dutch painter, in a picture of the Wise Men worshiping the Holy Child, has drawn one of them in a large white surplice, and in boots and spurs, and he is in the act of presenting to the child a model of a Dutch man-of-war.

In a Dutch picture of Abraham offering up his son, instead of the patriarch's "stretching forth his hand and taking the knife," as the Scriptures inform us, he is represented as using a more effectual and modern instrument; he is holding to Isaac's head a blunderbuss.

A French artist has drawn, with true French taste, the Lord's Supper, with the table ornamented with tumblers filled with cigar-lighters; and, as if to crown the list of these absurd and ludicrous anachronisms, the Garden of Eden has been drawn with Adam and Eve in all their primeval simplicity and virtue, while near them, in full costume, is seen a hunter with a gun, shooting ducks.

Another famous mixture of periods occurs in a picture of the Crucifixion, by Fra Angelico. In the foreground are a Dominican monk, a bishop with a crozier, a mitered abbot, and a man holding up a crucifix.

A PIN SCRATCH LED TO NELSON'S VICTORY.

DISCOVERY OF THE FRENCH FLEET.

The Noting of the Distress of a French Maid by Sir John Acton Had a Strange Result.

The good points of pins have been generally appreciated, but never did a pin point to a greater result than the one that made possible Nelson's great victory of the Nile on August 1 and 2, 1798.

It was at this fight that Nelson, with his usual intrepidity, forced a passage with half of his fleet of fifteen vessels between a small island, near Aboukir in Egypt, and the French line of battle, while the other half attacked the enemy in front, completely defeating the French fleet and capturing or sinking thirteen of its seventeen ships.

The part that the pin played in the story came about in this way:

Sir John Acton, then commander-in-chief of the land and sea forces of Naples, happened to be in his wife's dressing-room at the moment she was preparing for dinner.

Lady Acton's French maid was also in the room, and was so startled at receiving a letter from her brother, a sailor in the French navy, whom she had believed to be dead, that she ran a pin into her mistress's flesh.

Apologizing for her carelessness, the maid stated the cause of her surprise. With carefully suppressed eagerness Sir John Acton offered to read the letter while the maid continued her duties. The maid gladly consented.

Having read the letter, the commander-in-chief left the house in search of Lord Nelson, who had in vain been seeking the French fleet. He found him and imparted to him the contents of the letter. It gave all the information the admiral had so long endeavored to obtain.

Setting sail immediately, Nelson came up with the French, and the victory of the Nile was the result.

HOW COLUMBUS WAS MISLED BY PARROTS.

MISSED DISCOVERY OF MAINLAND.

The Fate of the Most Important Exploring Expedition in History Was Decided by a Flight of Birds.

A flight of birds, coupled with a sailor's superstition, robbed Columbus of the honor of discovering the continent.

When the great Italian navigator sailed westward over the unknown Atlantic, he expected to reach Zipangu (Japan). After several days' sail from Gomera, one of the Canary Islands, he became uneasy at not discovering Zipangu, which, according to his reckonings, should have been two hundred and sixteen nautical miles more to the east.

After a long discussion he yielded to the opinion of Martin Alonzo Pinzon, the commander of the Pinta, and steered to the southwest.

Pinzon was guided in his opinion solely by a flight of parrots, which took wing in that direction. It was good luck to follow in the wake of a flock of birds when engaged upon a voyage of discovery—a widespread superstition among Spanish seamen of that day—and this change in the great navigator's course curiously exemplifies the influence of small and apparently trivial events in the world's history.

If Columbus had held to his course he would have entered the Gulf Stream, have reached Florida, and then probably have been carried to Cape Hatteras and Virginia.

MORE NUTRITION IN GRASS THAN POTATOES.

VALUES OF STOCK-RAISING FOODS.

One Hundred Pounds of Hay Produce a Better Effect Than Six Times That Weight of Beets.

The relative values of different foods in stock-raising are shown by the following table, in which the given number of pounds of the various articles named produces the same effect as one hundred pounds of hay:

Beets, white669pounds

Turnips469"

Rye Straw429"

Clover, red, uncured373"

Clover, red, dry88"

Potatoes350"

Oat Straw317"

Alfalfa89"

Buckwheat78.5"

Corn62.5"

Oats59"

Barley58"

Rye53.5"

Wheat44.5"

Oilcake, linseed43"

Hay, it will be seen, is rated as being more nutritious than potatoes or beets.

GREAT FORCE USED TO WRITE LETTERS.

ENERGY SPENT IN LITTLE WAYS.

Every Time the Typewriter Key Is Pressed, Several Ounces of Manual Power Are Used.

If a man realized at the end of the day how much energy he had expended in normal and almost unconscious physical activities, he would be thankful for the chance to sleep. The writer who pushes his pen over the paper for several hours at a stretch would doubtless think he had worked hard if he had excavated a well in the same time; yet it is believed that the sum of the energy he uses daily in writing would be enough easily to dig a well. The following figures are quoted from Answers:

Our daily expenditure of force is simply enormous, but it seldom strikes us that we keep on expending force without noticing it. The stoker of a locomotive, when on duty, is said to shovel coal at the rate of about one ton an hour. Presuming that he works at this rate forty hours per week, it is obvious that in the course of a single year he lifts over two thousand tons of coal.

Typewriting is not hard work, yet let us see how much energy it takes to write forty letters on a machine. Every time a key is pressed to print a letter a few ounces of force is used, and every time the carriage is returned to begin a new line between one and four pounds of force is requisitioned. Forty letters, averaging twenty-six lines each, would mean about twenty thousand pounds of force expended. Perhaps this never occurred to you before.

TRIALS OF AN EDITOR IN OLD CALIFORNIA.

SPANISH TYPE HAS ITS FAILINGS.

Publishers of the State's First Newspaper Found It Difficult to Express Themselves Typographically.

Makeshifts of pioneer journalism have taxed the ingenuity of many a great mind. Writing for the Bookman, J.M. Scanland tells the story of early California newspapers. The first paper, the Californian, was published at Monterey by Robert Semple, a Kentuckian, who acted as editor, and the Rev. Walter Colton, a navy chaplain, who was then stationed at Monterey, as typesetter and pressman. These two men brought out their first issue on August 15, 1846. Semple went to the village of Yerba Buena (now called San Francisco) a short time later, and during his absence Colton printed the following paragraph:

Our Alphabet.—Our type is a Spanish font picked up here in a cloister, and has no vv's [w] in it, as there is none in the Spanish alphabet. I have sent to the Sandvvich Islands for this letter; in the mean time vve must use tvvo v's. Our paper at present is that used for vvrapping cigars; in due time vve will have something better. Our object is to establish a press in California, and this vve shall in all probability be able to accomplish. The absence of my partner for the last three months and my duties as alcalde here have deprived our little paper of some of those attentions vvhich I hope it vvill hereafter receive.

VValter Colton.

ODDEST JAIL IN THE UNITED STATES.

IT IS CUT FROM THE SOLID ROCK.

Eternal Cliffs Form the Safe Walls That Confine Convicts at Clifton, County Seat of Graham County, Arizona.

Troglodytes of history have lived in their caves from choice. At Clifton, Graham County, Arizona, are a number of unwilling troglodytes who are kept within their rocky home by officers of the law. Clifton is one of the centers of copper mining in Arizona. In one sense it may be inferred that the queer jail has its advantages, for the temperature of that part of Arizona frequently rises in summer as high as one hundred and twenty degrees in the shade.

It comprises four large apartments, hewn in the side of a hill of solid quartz rock. The entrance to the jail is through a box-like vestibule, built of heavy masonry, and having three sets of gates of steel bars.

Here and there, in the rocky walls, holes have been blasted for windows, and in these apertures a series of massive bars of steel have been fitted firmly in the rock.

The floor of the rock-bound jail is of cement, and the prisoners are confined wholly in the larger apartments. In some places the wall of quartz about the jail is fifteen feet thick.

Some of the most desperate criminals on the southwest border have been confined in the Clifton jail, and so solid and heavy are the barriers to escape that no one there has ever attempted a break of freedom. The notorious "Black Jack" was there for months.