Curious Matters. A wonderful Well. Some two years since, Mr. Gray, proprietor of the Aurora (La.) Hotel, sank an artesian well upon his premises to the depth of seventy-nine feet, finding a copious supply of water. About eight months since, sounds of roaring, as of the fall of a distant cascade, were heard in the well. These sounds continue to be heard at regular intervals, and are at times very loud and boisterous. Every other day, about midnight, the sounds commence, and continue for twelve hours, and have been known to be so violent as to awaken persons sleeping in the house. A person, who has recently visited this well, tells us that the roaring resembles the troubled, boiling, foaming sounds, to be heard at a little distance from Niagara Falls. It would seem that this singular phenomenon is worthy of a scientific investigation, that its cause may, if possible, be fully discovered. It is now the opinion of some that the sounds are caused by a subterranean cascade, but why they are intermittent seems mysterious. A singular feature connected with the matter is, that at the time the roaring is heard, the water from the well is warmer than when all is quiet. The Effects of Tobacco. There is now living in the county jail in Morgantown, Va., a young female, who is a singular instance of the evil effect of tobacco. She was brought to the jail for safe keeping, somewhat more than a year ago, hopelessly crazed by the inordinate use of tobacco in all its forms, and was for a long time closely confined and prevented from using the weed." She, however, became so much more wild and unmanageable, that after a time it was determined to allow her, as an experiment, a limited quantity of tobacco. Under this treatment she became speedily quite docile and easily managed, and has now for some time been engaged in doing house-work at the jail and in the family of the jailor, being looked upon as quite harmless, though it is understood that there is no hope of her ultimate recovery. She is only twenty-one, and by no means repulsive in personal appearance-or would not be, if she were to let tobacco alone. She chews a considerable amount of tobacco daily, and smokes cigars whenever she can get them, as they are not furnished to her. A conjugal Helper. The Milwaukee Press tells the following:-Hon Charles Caverno, the representative of Milwaukee, is constantly attended by his lady in all his legislative labors. She sits by his side at his desk during all the sessions and recesses of the assembly, busily engaged in writing, etc., never leaving him for a moment. We learn that she also meets with him in his labors on the different committees-the judiciary and the committee on banks-of which he is a member. Upon inquiry we are told that he is compelled to have an assistant to both read and write for him, on account of the personal injuries he received a few weeks before the session. A strange Coincidence. Lately, at Hempstead, L. I., a valued canary died, belonging to a lady, whose eldest child soon sickened and died, too; a second canary was bought, which soon died as the first, and the remaining child followed the other to the grave; again a third canary was purchased, it died like the two others, and soon the childless mother had to mourn the death of her husband. Small Creatures. Among the papers published in costly style by the Smithsonian Institute at Washington, is one on the mieroscopic plants and animals, which live on and in the human body. It describes quite a number of insects. The animal which produces the disease called itch, is illustrated by an engraving half an inch in diameter, which shows not only the ugly little fellow's body and legs, but his very toes, although the animal himself is entirely invisible to the naked eye. When Lieutenant Berryman was sounding the ocean preparatory to laying the Atlantic telegraph, the quill at the end of the sounding line brought up mud, which on being dried, became a powder so fine that on rubbing it between the thumb and finger it disappeared in the crevices of the skin. On placing this dust under the microscope, it was discovered to consist of millions of perfect shells, each of which had a living animal. A Sparrow caught by an Oyster. The Birmingham Daily Post narrates the following incident which occurred on the premises of Mr. Potter, fishmonger, Dale-end, Birmingham, England:-" A neighbor passing through the yard, observed a sparrow fluttering in a frantic manner on the top of a heap of oyster shells, as though struggling to release himself from the unpleasant detention. He found that the leg of the poor bird had been caught firmly in the grip of a young oyster which was attached to the outside of one of the discarded shells. He at once took his prisoner into Mr Potter's shop, where the singular bird-trap was opened with a knife, and the bird released. It is supposed that the oyster had opened its pearly jaw for air, and that the feathered wanderer, whilst hopping merrily past, accidentally, but too surely, put his foot in it."" Singular Case of Disease. Emma Jane Cooper, who died at Dover, Vt., lately, at the age of fourteen years, was at the age of eleven as large as girls usually are for her years. About that time the growth of her body was arrested from deficient nutrition, but the development of her mental powers continued until her decease. What occasioned this lack of sufficient nutrition was more than her physicians were able to discover. The amount of food she was able to consume gradually diminished, until for nearly a year she had been unable to take any solid food, and for three months previous to her death she lived on two spoonsful of buttermilk or whey per day. She died of emaciation-and so reduced was her body, that it weighed only thirty-nine pounds. Rats with Bills. Mr. Carl Kleinman, of St. Louis, lately deposited $300 in Missouri bank bills in his cellar. This he thought would be safer than a bank, and he let the money rest until the other day, when he proceeded to examine it. His astonishment was great when he found the rag in which he had wrapped it empty—and it was still greater when he found his money in fragments, and used to adorn some rat nests near by. After gazing mournfully at the remnants for a few minutes, he procured assistance and caught every rat in the cellar. A mute Family, There is said to be a family at Halifax Centre, Vermont, consisting of a father 86 years of age, two sons and two daughters, all of the children being deaf, dumb and blind, and yet they manage to carry on their farm, gaining a respectable living therefrom. Life in frozen Fish. It is well known that several species of fish may be frozen quite stiff, carried several miles, and when put into cold water they will revive. Several artificial ponds have been stocked with fish carried from a distance in a frozen state; and yet it is stated that the celebrated Dr. John Hunter, having tried several experiments to restore frozen fish, always failed to do so. A recent French experimenter in this line states that he has discovered the reason of this. He asserts that the tissue of fish and frogs may be frozen and the creatures may be restored to activity; but if the hearts become ice-chilled, they never can be re-animated. A hard Customer. Rarey had a tough time with a little iron-gray horse in New York, recently. Instead of his usual twenty minutes veni, vidi, vici, he was compelled to fight more than an hour for victory. Some twenty or thirty times did Rarey attempt to strap up his left foreleg, but the exceedingly potent objections made by the iron-gray to his completing the operation were vigorously effective. After an hour and a quarter's continuance of the struggle, Rarey finally conquered, having given the audience the finest exhibition of his power and resolution. Shirts highly natural. The highest trees in South America produce shirts! "We saw on the slope of the Cerra Daida," says M. Humboldt, "shirt-trees fifty feet high. The Indians cut off cylindrical pieces two feet in diameter, from which they peel the red and fibrous bark, without making any longitudinal incision. This bark affords them a sort of garment, which resembles a sack of a very coarse texture, and without a seam. The upper opening serves for the head, and two lateral holes are cut to admit the arms. The natives wear these shirts in the rainy season; they have the form of a poncho." Colored Rain. The savans are puzzling themselves about several showers of rain of a reddish hue at Siena, in Tuscany, three of which occurred on the 28th of December last, and others on the 31st of the same month and the 1st of January. The fall of this rain was confined to a limited portion of the town, and fell every time in the same locality. Its color was at no time deeper than weak wine and water. An analysis showed that the color must be owing to some solution, as no sediment was deposited by the water. A queer Law. In 1767, the town of Eastham, in Massachusetts, voted that every housekeeper should kill twelve blackbirds and three crows, which did damage to the corn-a vote which was annually renewed for some years. And in 1795, it was further voted that every unmarried man in the township should kill six black birds and three crows while he remained single; and, as a penalty for not doing it, he should not be married until he obeyed the order. Curious Custom, In the canton of Basle, in Switzerland, there is a law which compels every newly-married couple to plant six trees immediately after the ceremony, and two more on the birth of every child. They are planted on commons, frequently near the high road, and the greater part of them being fruit trees, are at once both useful and ornamental. The number planted is said to amount to ten thousand annually. Wonderful Escape from Death. Jub. N. Sherman, third mate of the whaler Mary Ann, of Fairhaven, Mass., relates the following escape from death, which recently happened to him. The whale struck the boat and threw him right across the monster's mouth, so that both legs were in its mouth, and then went down with him. Fortunately the whale soon came up so the man could breathe-in the meantime he had extricated one of his legs-but the whale immediately went down again, carrying Mr. Sherman down the second time. Mr. Sherman then thought of his sheath-knife, which he used upon the whale's under jaw, causing it to let go its hold, when Mr. Sherman arose to the surface of the water, about a ship's length from the boat, and he was rescued, nearly exhausted, by seizing him by the hair of the head as he was sinking. On examination he found himself minus his pants, and with a hole in one leg large enough to receive an egg. Editor's Table. MATURIN M. BALLOU, EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR. THE LATE DUKE OF NORFOLK. " The courtship and marriage of this English nobleman belong to the 'Romance of the Peerage." Travelling in Greece, when a young man, he was attacked by a dangerous fever. Sir E. Lyons, then British minister at Athens, had the young nobleman removed to the embassy, where he found an affectionate and devoted nurse in Sir Edmund's youngest daughter, then in her seventeenth year. With returning health and strength the young patient drank in delicious draughts of a potion prepared by the cunning “archer-god." When the young heir to the ducal house sought an interview with Sir Edmund, that highminded and honorable papa refused to sanction his suit. Sir Edmund did more—he immediately wrote the parents of his guest, expressing his regret at what had occurred, and his conviction that the heir of the great house of Norfolk ought to find a consort in a nobler and older family than his own. He added that the young traveller was now well enough to be removed from Athens, and suggested that arrangements should be immediately made for his return home. The parents of the young man highly approved of Sir Edmund's conduct, the patient returned to England, and it was hoped that time and absence would do the rest. But the lover displayed a noble constancy, and found means to overcome the objections of his family to the marriage, which was accordingly solemnized in 1839, the bridegroom being then in his twenty-fourth year, and the bride only eighteen. The union has been a happy one, has been blessed by offspring, and the eldest son, now in his thirteenth year, is Duke of Norfolk. SENSIBLE TREATMENT.-Nursing, diet and good care are the rules in the Paris hospitals, instead of the drenching, bleeding and cupping so long used as remedies. PRODIGIOUS.-A Cincinnati editor says that he has many a time seen a man on skates jump twenty-four feet. Lucky he didn't say yards, for then we would not have believed him! EFFECT OF FRIGHT. A correspondent of the Medical Times, having asked for authentic instances of the hair becoming gray in one night, Dr. D. P. Parry, Staff Surgeon at Aldershott, writes the following very remarkable account of a case which he says he made a memorandum of shortly after the occurrence: "On Friday, February 19th, 1859, the column under General Franks, in the south of Oude, was engaged with a rebel force at the village of Chamba, and several prisoners were taken. One of them, a sepoy of the Bengal army, was brought before the authorities for examination, and I, being present, had an opportunity of watching from the commencement the fact I am about to record. Divested of his uniform, and stripped completely naked, he was surrounded by the soldiers, and then first apparently became alive to the danger of his position; he trembled violently, intense horror and despair were depicted on his countenance, and although he answered questions addressed to him, he seemed almost stupefied with fear; while actually under observation, within the space of half an hour, his hair became gray on every portion of his head, it having been, when first seen by us, the glossy jet black of the Bengalee-aged about fifty-four. The attention of the bystanders was first attracted by the sergeant, whose prisoner he was, exclaiming: 'He is turning gray!' and I, with several other persons, watched its progress. Gradually but decidedly the change went on, and a uniform grayish color was completed within the period above named." RELIGION.-Religion is not a thing which spends itself. It is like a river which widens continually, and is never so broad or so deep as at its mouth, where it rolls in to the ocean of eternity. MARRIAGE. The bridegroom and bride give each other their hands at the altar, as prize-fighters in England shake hands before they begin to fight. UNFOUNDED FEARS.-False fears bring true PLAYING CARDS.-Half a million packs of vexations; the imaginary grievances of our life cards are made annually in London. are more than the real ones. . GOING AHEAD. "Go ahead!" is our national motto. There s no such forcible mode of expression in any other language. The French "En avant!" and the German "Vorwarts !" have not half the significance. Like Squeer's pupils, the Yankee learns the phrase and then " goes and does it." The reluctant are pushed on by the crowd behind them, on pain of being trampled under foot, and the whole column moves resistless. It is one incessant tramp! tramp! tramp! A forest stands in the path-it is levelled by the living mass as by a tornado. A river intervenesit is bridged in the twinkling of an eye. A mountain rears its granite mass against the sky -it is tunnelled. Is it desirable to obtain a correct bird's eye representation of a city? A couple of Yankees go up in a balloon, hang out a camera from the basket, and the work is done. If human hands cannot accomplish a job, human heads invent the machines that will do it. Is a Mexican fortress to be stormed? The volunteers are mustered, the magic "Go ahead!" is uttered, down goes the Mexican eagle, and up flies the "Bar-tangled Spanner" in its place. ing up the illusion that he was still a tradesman, tending counter in his pantry, and retailing sugar, butter, molasses, flour,ginger bread, honey, walnuts, raisins, lamp oil and sugar candy to his wife and children. An English half-pay officer had his servant wake him every morning to tell him it was time to dress for parade, that he might have the luxury of replying, "You scoundrel! I've retired from the service and can sleep as long as I please." This would be no luxury to a retired American officer. It would fill him with anguish to reflect that he had no longer to don his regimentals and exercise the "awkward squad" in the "goose step." Every now and then we read in the newspapers of some respectable old gentleman rising half an hour before breakfast, retiring to his barn and suspending himself from a beam in the hayloft by a pair of reins until life is extinct. The Bunsby of an editor who records the fact invariably adds, "No cause can be assigned for such an act, as the deceased was in easy circumstances." That was the cause, stupid!-"easy circumstances !"-can't you see it? Nothing makes a Yankee so uneasy as easy circumstances. How can a man go ahead when he has gone ahead? American convicts are very apt to die in prison. They can't pediments. Not always, however there are more escapes from prison in America than in any other country. Not that the prisons are any weaker-we build them of granite and iron-but "where there's a will there's a way," and even in spite of the shackles of guilt, the go-ahead-ativeness of the Yankee drives him in some cases through stone walls, even. We all know the legend of the Dutchman who was carried round the world by his cork leg, the movement of which was "a compound of clockwork and steam." That was a fatal invention to Mynheer Von Clam. A Yankee would have rejoiced. It would have saved him coach fares, and railroad and steamboat expenses, and he would have contrived some kind of a brake to stop his course long enough to trade notions, where he circumnavigated the globe, and made money into the bargain. In short, in spite of its abuses, "Go ahead!" is a talisman by which the greatest marvels are accomplished. Are we going ahead too fast? There are millions of acres of public lands to be occupied and tilled, and it will be long before the watch-"go ahead"—the four walls are insuperable imword is unnecessary. There are yet remote regions to be opened to trade, and the merchant catches his inspiration from "Go ahead!" It sounds in the ear of the American student as he glances over the long array of volumes he must master before he can claim the palm of scholarship. It is heard by the architect who has to pile stone upon stone till the cornice crowns the ninth story of the commercial palace he has designed. Old Croesus hears it when he has reached his original stint of a million, and pushes on in the hope of doubling his stakes. And here lies a fatal mistake, not knowing when to stop. Human machinery was never designed to exhibit the phenomenon of perpetual motion. There comes a time when the levers will not act, when the springs are rusty, when the boiler plates are worn thin, and steam must be shut off or an explosion will follow. There is a time when "superfluous lags the veteran on the stage," and it is time for him to "lay up in lavender." We Americans are always striving to obtain and never waiting to enjoy. Very few men will give London papers state that this edifice is nearly finup till they are about to take leave of the world altogether. They cannot conceive of happiness as associated with the suspension of business and repose. We imagine a retired grocer to be the Too BAD.- -Why is a hungry brown dog like most uncomfortable of human beings. We a man who bakes bread? Because he is a bayknew one who could only be sustained by keep- | cur, and kneads something to eat. MR. SPURGEON'S NEW TABERNACLE.-The ished. Its cost will be $150,000, of which $100,000 was gained by subscription. THE CHINESE THEATRE. The Chinese are passionately fond of theatrical amusements. The imperial government encourages this species of exhibition in every possible way, though its generosity does not, as with the Romans, go to the extent of paying the expenses of free performance. They do not build a theatre, but allow one to be erected anywhere, on the squares or in the streets by means of subscriptions collected among the people. Theatres (sing song) rise as if by magic. They are commenced in the morning and are ready by night. The bamboo cane is admirably fitted for this sort of structure; it bends, but does not break. The profession of an actor is considered degrading-players are beyond the pale of the law. They form companies of ten or twelve each, and wander from town to town, stopping wherever there is a demand for their services. They make an engagement, for such money paid in advance, for a certain number of days or weeks, with the people of certain quarters or streets, as well as with mandarins, or private individuals, who on some great occasion, such as a festival, a fine harvest, the success of a commercial speculation, the birth of a son, the cessation of wind and rain, wish to regale their fellow-citizens and acquire a reputation for generosity. The Chinese get along very well without scenery. The actor supplies it, after having his rame and quality announced, by stating that he is in a palace, a garden or a wood. The spectator is satisfied, and his imagination completes the illusion. In a certain play a general receives an order to go and fight the rebels; immediately he goes through the movements of a cavalier mounting a horse, runs three or four times round the stage, tucking up his long robe which interferes with his motions, then stops, all out of breath, and announces, in the midst of a terrible crash of gongs and trumpets, that the enemy has yielded without daring to encounter him. satisfied, they go away. They do not applaud, and they never manifest their displeasure by hissing. They must be a hard audience to play to. ANECDOTE OF TAMBERLIK. The following is stated to be the origin of Mr. Tamberlik's famous "ut sharp," which was worth so much to him. He is by birth a Roman, but his family is of Polish origin. He stuttered badly when he was a child, and his family destined him to slumber in the stalls of the church. He ran away from the theological seminary and entered the army. Discovering one day that he had a splendid tenor's voice, he quitted the army and took Guglielmi (a son of the celebrated Guglielmi) for his singing-master, under whom he made such progress that he was soon engaged at the San Carlo; he and Fraschina (who was several years older) sharing between them the tenor's parts-Fraschini singing the forte, and Tamberlik the tenorino. Being wretchedly paid at this opera house, he quitted Italy for Spain, where he obtained an excellent engagement at Barcelona. One day, while rehearsing a new part in which he was to appear that evening, he lost his voice. Nevertheless, there was no such thing as closing the opera-house or changing the piece; for the court had commanded the opera and the performance. "Then, if you can't sing, bawl," exclaimed the orchestra, upon Tamberlik's saying, "By Jove! I cannot sing!" 'Bawl," continued the leader of the orchestra; "I'll give you the pitch!" and he knocked the piano as hard as he could. All at once, Tamberlik, the tenorino, who never sang anything but the softest, sweetest melodies, thundered "do sharp," in clear, bell-tongued tones. His fortune was made; a new "star" rose above the lyre horizon. " QUALIFICATIONS.-In China a man must become a poet before he is eligible to any office. What a bore it must be to the appointing powers! It is bad enough to have to read an office-seeker's "papers," but to have to read his verses, and decide on their merit must be excruciating. SPECULATION.-A countryman was seen star The plot of the piece is no more complicated than the accessories. But, on the other hand, the dresses are of rare splendor, and are particularly interesting to Europeans, because they are historical, and show fashions which only exist in old engravings. The spectacle goes on withouting at the signs in Albany, when a pert clerk interruption day and night; when one play is ended another begins. As for the spectators, they are always in open air, and very numerous. Each one takes up the most comfortable place he can find; some place themselves in trees, others bestride a wall, others cling to the foremost part of the stage. They eat, drink, smoke and gossip. If they are pleased, they remain; if dis asked him if he wished to buy some gape-seed. "No, I don't want none," was the reply; "I am looking at this little town-I talk of buying it." PARISIAN COURAGE.-As an old woman was lately walking through one of the streets of Paris at midnight, a patrol called out, "Who's there?" "It is I, patrol," said she, "don't be afraid." |