Stray Bits

Two-thirds oí the university studente of Austria are Jews. The Bank of France has at present $250,000,000 in gold in its cellars. A carat of gold received its name from the carat seed of the Abyssiniau coral flowei-. Italy has a debt of Í4,362,800,000, the largest of any nation in the civilized world. The surest test of a frozen orange is its weight. If it is heavy in the hand it has not been frozen. According to the United States coast survey reports, the polar axis is twenty-six miles shorter than the equatorial axis. Some rernarkable caves have been discovered in West Australia. Two of them would afford accommodation for 300,000 men each. It is said that the highest priced book ever sold was the vellum missal presented to King Henry VIII by Pope Leo X, which brought $50,000. A perfect pentaife, which measures threesixteenths of an inch in length, has been made by Dr. John Temple, of Marshallton, Chester county, Pa. There are fifty manufactorie3 of imitation butter in Germany. A factory in Mannheim produces daily 6,000 pounds from a preparation of cocoanuts. The mineral called turfa, or brazolina, lately discovered in Bahia, furnishes an oil akin to petroleum, a páraffine suitable Lor the manufacture of candles, and a good lubricating oil. The last season of the pearl flshing at Ceylon was exceptioually suooessf ui. In twentytwo days fifty divers brought 11,000,000 oysters to the surf ace. The divers mada about $32,000, and the government $100,000. Atelegraph message costing $2.37 a word was recently sent from Portland to Hong Kong, and an answer received in twelr hours. It was fii-st sent to New York, thenc to London, aeróse the continent to Yokohama. At a ball given in St. Petersburg recently, one of the ladies personated influenza. She called herself Miss Grippe, and was dressed in an Oriental costume, whose high head dress bore upon it the naraes of the physicians who have written on the sickness. The name "porcelain" was given to chinaware f rom a supposed resemblanco of its surface to that of the univalvo shell called porcellana. Th shell was so named from th Bhape of its outer surface, which was thought to resemble the back of a pig (porcella). The richest man in Russia, Count Scheremtjew, is about to produce Puschkin's play, "Boris Godunow," in his own house, and has spent 30,000 roubles on scenery and costumes. The performei-s will be noble amateurs, and the royal opera will supply the music and choruses.