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THE FRENCH MITRAILLEUR

Used in the French and German War.

THE SALT TRADE.

The following table taken for the compendium of the ninth census, gives the production of salt in the several states as follows:

California

1870. bu. 1860. bu.
174,855

44,050

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7,800

Florida.

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Louisiana..

Massachusetts

Michigan..
New York..

Ohio....

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Oregon

Pennsylvania..

Texas...

Utah

Virginia and West Virginia..

Total....

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The above shows an increase of production during the ten years of 4.888,907 bushels. The increase during the last five years has been much greater. The production in Michigan or 1875 was 4,408,324 bushels, an increase over the production of 1870 of 1.428,000 bushels. In the other principal producing states the increase on the average is fully up to this ratio. Assuming the above to be true, we are warranted in placing the total production of the country for 1875 at fully 30,000,000 bushels, an increase of more than 12,000,000 bushels over the production of 1870. In spite of this enormous increase in production, the importations for the past five years have steadily increased, as shown by the following table:

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The importations for 1870 nearly equalled the home production, being 17,436,082 bushels, an increase over that for 1869 by more than 6,000,000 bushels. With the steady increase of home manufacture and improving the quality of the product, it is quite probable that within a few years the United States will be enabled to supply the domestic trade, and have a surplus for export.

DRUGGING LIQUOR.

In 1866 four houses in New York city palmed off two millions of gallons of these deadly compounds. They buy the meanest whisky or spoiled cider, and "drug" it into the rarest wines in a few hours. It not unfrequently happens that a country seller drives in a few barrels of his spoiled slop, sells it to a manufacturer, does his shopping, and in a few hours drives back with a part of the same stuff "drugged" into wine or brandy, for which he paid an advance of four or five gallons. A Frenchman pointing to a barrel said, "Tell me what kind of wine or brandy you want and give me three hours, and I will draw it out of that barrell."

The more costly the liquor, the more certain the fraud. The whole champaign district is only twenty thousand acres, and produces only about 800,000 baskets per annum. Of this Russia consumes 160,000 baskets, France 162,000, England 220,000, Germany 146,000; leaving for America and the rest of the world only 112,000. Yet Yankees consume more than 1,000,000 baskets yearly. How dull it is in England, and Germany, and France, and Russia to imagine that they get any champaign when they consume twenty-five per cent. more than is produced.

Only 30,000 barrels of wine are produced on the Island of Maderia. America buys 50,000 barrels, and the rest of the world has a full share.

Port wine is manufactured in Douro Valley in Portugal. The valley is narrow and only sixty miles long. Yet all the world drinks from these vineyards. London alone drinks more than twice as much port wine as is produced, both good and bad. There is consumed annually more than one hundred times as much as is produced. Follow a gallon of pure juice from the press on the banks of the Douro. In the warehouse in Oporto, by the aid of beet whisky, elderberry juice, and water, it is made into five gallons. In the London Dock warehouse by the aid of potato-whisky, red saunders, and the like, it swells up into twenty gallons. In New York it takes a dose of strychnine, balladonna, and spoiled cider, and puffs up into thirty gallons. In the wholesale house in Chicago bad whisky, stramonium, and drugs, enlarge it to forty gallons. In the retailer's back room it gets another dose and comes out eighty gallons. We receive one drop in eighty, and that is twenty-five per cent, better than the average,

A BEER-DRINKING COUNTRY.

This country is getting to be emphatically a beer-drinking country. For the year ending July 1, 1875, the internal revenue reports show that there were 8.880 629 barrels of that beverage produced here. The number of breweries now in operation in the principal brewing States is as follows: New York 203; Pennsylvania, 235; Wisconsin, 232; Ohio, 210 California, 202; Illinois, 165; Michigan, 149. Massachusetts does not make much beer, but she drank last year 609,923 barrels, or more than any one of the fifty-one other States and. Territories. THE METALS.

Bronze is a compound of copper and tin.
Pewter is a compound of lead and tin.
Brass is a compound of copper and zinc.

German silver is a compound of copper, zinc and nickel.
Britannia is a compound of tin, antimony and copper.

STRENGTH OF VARIOUS SUBSTANCES.

With fifty-four inches between supports, a rod of cast iron, one inch square, will break under a load of 550 pounds.

A cube of cast iron, one inch each way, will be crushed under a pressure of ninety tons. A bar of cast iron, one inch square, will break under a tensile strain of 9 tons.

These figures show the capacity of best material. Very inferior iron would probably have not over one-half the above resisting power.

The actual cohesive force of different substances is as below. The size of the rod tested. being in each case, one inch square, and the number of pounds show the actual breaking

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There are 3,064 known languages on the earth, and nearly 1,000 different forms of religion.

BRIDGES.

Bridges are of unknown antiquity. The Chinese invented suspension bridges, and onebuilt in A. D. 65, is still in use. The Persians built the first stone bridges.

Caissons were first used in bridge building on the Westminister bridge, London, which is 1,250 feet in length, and has 15 arches or spans.

The first iron bridge ever erected, was over the Severn at Coalbridgedale, in Shropshire, England. It has a span of 100 feet, the arch being nearly semi-circular.

Among the most noted bridges are the Southwark bridge, London. It is of iron, having one span of 240 feet, and two of 210 feet each. There were 5.780 tons iron used in its con-

struction.

The new London bridge which was finished in 1831, is of stone, 928 feet long, on five elliptical arches, the center one having a span of 152 feet.

High Bridge, of New York, is of stone, 1.460 feet long, on 15 arches, those over the river being 80 feet open, and 100 feet above the water. The parapet is 114 feet above high water. The bridge across Menai Straits (Wales) is of wrought iron, 103 feet above high water, has two spans of 230 feet each, and two of 459 feet each.

The Victoria Bridge at Montreal, is 10,284 feet from bank to bank, and rests on 24 piers. The roadway over the river is a tube of iron 6,660 feet long, 16 feet wide, and 22 feet high.

The St. Louis bridge is of chrome steel, on three arches, the center one having a span of 520 feet, and being at the greatest 55 feet above high water, the side spans being each 502 feet, 50 feet above high water. The total length of the bridge proper is 2.045 feet, and of the approaches, 4,175 feet. The tunnel leading to the bridge on the St. Louis side, is 4.900 feet in length

The Schuylkill bridge, Philadelphia (suspension,) has a span of 340 feet.

The suspension bridge at Fribourg, Switzerland, has a span of 870 feet, 175 feet above the river. The railway suspension bridge at Niagara Falls, has a span of 821 feet, 245 feet above the river. The suspension bridge at Cincinnati, has a span of 1,057 feet, 103 feet above low water mark.

The proposed suspension bridge between Brooklyn and New York, is to have a clear span of 1,595 feet, and be 135 feet above the water.

THE CHASSEPOT.

Used by the French in the great war with Germany.

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Fig. 1.-Chassepôt. Rifle: breech closed. Fig. 2.-Ready for reception of cartridge: 1. Lever for opening and locking breech; 2. Head of the
plunger, containing needle for exploding cartridge; 3. Chamber for cartridge. Fig. 3.-Rifle loaded and closed: 1. Plunger drawn out ready
for explosion of cartridge; 2. Sight raised for long range.

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ASTRONOMICAL FACTS.

Jupiter has four moons; Saturn has eight moons and a ring; Uranus has six moons; Neptune has one moon.

Our moon is 2,160 miles in diameter, and is distant 238,650 miles from our earth.
The sun is about 8-5,000 miles in diameter.

The planets known to the ancients were Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. The nearest fixed star to our solar system is Cygni No. 61, and this is 210,000,000 times more distant from the sun than we are, or about 20,000,000,000,000,000 miles.

NICKNAMES.

The United States are called Brother Jonathan and Uncle Sam.

Great Britain, more especially England, is personified as Johnny Bull.

France as Johnny Crapaud, and Germany is "der Faderland.'

Fanueil Hall, in Boston, is called the Cradle of Liberty.

Maine is known as the Lumber, or Pine Tree State, and its inhabitants are called Foxes.
New Hampshire, the Granite State, is peopled by the Granite Boys.

Vermont is nearly translated when called the Green Mountain State.
Massachusetts is the Bay State, from the bay of the same name.

The pet name for Rhode Island, is Little Rhody.

Connecticut rejoices in several nicknames, being known as the Land of Steady Habits, the Nutmeg State, and the Freestone State.

The Knickerbockers who dwell therein, call New York the Empire State.

New Jersey is known to all the world as the State of Camden and Amboy, and her sons are known as the Jersey Blues.

Pennsylvania is the Keystone State, and its inhabitants are profanely called Leatherheads. Delaware is the Blue Hen, and Muskrats inhabit it.

Maryland is the Mason and Dixon State, and its inhabitants were formerly called Crawthumpers.

Virginia is the old Dominion.

North Carolina is the Old North, or Turpentine State, while its people are called indifferently Tuckors or Tarboilers.

South Carolina is the Palmetto State.

Florida, the Peninsular State.

Mississippi, the Bayou State.

Louisiana, the Creole State.

Arkansas, the Bear State.

Kentucky the Dark and Bloody Ground, and its inhabitants are Corn Crackers.

Tennessee is the Big Bend State.

Ohio, the Buckeye State.

Indiana, the Hoosier State.

Illinois, the Sucker State, but the Suckers endeavor to give it the more poetical name of the Prairie State, or the Garden of the West.

Michigan is the Wolverine State.

Wisconsin, the Badger State.

Iowa, the Hawkeye State.

Minnesota, the North Star State; for its motto, "L'etoile du nord."

Gophers.

Texas is the Lone Star State.

California, the Golden State.

Its inhabitants are

The inhabitants of Missouri are called Pukes; of Georgia, Buzzards; of Alabama, Lizards; of Nebraska, Bug Eaters; of Kansas, Jay Hawkers, of Texas, Beetheads; of Oregon, Web Feet; of Nevada, Sage Hens; of Colorado, Rovers.

Of American cities, the following are common nicknames:

Atlanta, Ga, and Keokuk, Iowa-Gate City.

Baltimore, Md.-Monumental City.

Boston, Mass.- Hub, City of Notions, and Modern Athens.

Brooklyn, N. Y.-City of Churches.

Buffalo, N. Y.-Queen City of the Lakes.

Cairo, Ill.-Eden.

Chicago, Ill.-Garden City.

Cincinnati, Ohio-Porkopolis, the Queen City of the West.

Cleveland, Ohio-Forest City.

Dubuque, Iowa-Key City.

Detroit, Mich.-City of the Straits.

Hannibal, Mo.-Bluff City.

Indianapolis, Ind.-Railroad City.

Louisville, Ky-Falls City.

Lowell, Mass.-City of Spindles.
Nashville, Tenn.-City of Rocks.
New Haven, Conn.-Elm City.

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