JAPANESE TALLOW TREES. Experimental planting of trees that yield a high grade oil useful in the arts. JAPANESE TALLOW TREES EXPERIMENTS made at the United States government's plant testing gardens at Fort Brown, Texas, in growing the Japanese tallow tree have proved so successful that many of these trees have been distributed among the farmers of the lower Rio Grande Valley section and considerable attention is being devoted to their cultivation. It is stated that the nuts of these trees contain an oil which is used in the manufacture of a high grade of varnish and that the product is in great demand in this country. The climate and soil of the extreme southern portion of Texas where the trees are being grown seems splendidly adapted to them. The trees, of ornamental appearance, are of quick growth. WHERE KINGS ARE MEASURED. Column in Roskilde Cathedral, near Copenhagen, where the height of many sovereigns is registered. Made by Lester L. Kneeland of Lynn, Mass. It is perfect in mechanism but not even big enough to hold "little son." INDIAN IRRIGATION. without delaying trains. Man and wife drawing water to put on the fields with what is known in India as the donkli. The most primitive way to water crops. Labor and life are equally cheap. CONCRETE BRIDGE IN A DAY PROBABLY never before in the his tory of railroading has a permanent bridge been erected as quickly as that recently built by the Pennsylvania Company in the suburbs of York, Pa. It is built of nine large slabs of reinforced concrete, which after being molded to exact dimensions were placed alongside the railroad, convenient to the bridge that was to be replaced. At the appointed time two immense steam cranes, mounted on cars, tore up one-half of the old bridge bodily, tracks, spans and all, and deposited it on the solid ground. One by one the great blocks of concrete were lifted into place, but so rapidly was the work accomplished that in thirty minutes after the first half of the old bridge was removed the new section was there to take its place, with track all laid ready. for the passage of trains. The other half of the bridge was replaced in much the same manner, and the entire structure was completed in a single day and not a single train delayed. on account of the work, and the bridge is located on one of the busiest sections of the road, trains following one another very frequently. ANCIENT INDIAN BATH AT a point on the Pacific Coast, a few miles below Delmar, California, there is to be seen in a rocky ledge a peculiar basin which has been cut in the solid rock. It is some six feet by four and of a depth of about five feet. At high tide the basin is filled, but at low tide it and the surrounding rock ledge are exposed. About the basin are gutters which allow the surplus water to run off. It is supposed that the basin was used by the Indians in early times as a bath, the sea-water being heated by means of hot stones, and that invalid redskins made visits to the scene to seek Curiously resembling the Kangaroo in its general appearance this prehistoric beast was of colossal size and was a dangerous customer. He stood twenty-five feet high when upreared. THIS FELLOW WAS SIXTY-SIX FEET LONG. He is called the Diplodocus and his back seems strong enough to carry the epithet. curate specimens, so far as science can tell, of the great beasts that roamed this. globe in the distant past. In all, some thirty are to be erected. The work is being carried out by Mr. J. Pallenburg, a well known animal sculptor. They are being built around the shores of a delightful little lake, some three acres in extent. These weird beasts of almost countless ages ago are being built up of that very handy substance, cement, and at the time of writing some fifteen were already out of the builders' hands. |