In the little Hessean village of Nieder-Mörlen, between Giessen and
Frankfort, a strange scene may be witnessed every evening at half-past
five. Some two thousand geese, which have spent the day on the river’s
bank below the village, at a given signal from their leaders make their
way homewards with much pomp and circumstance and raucous noise. The
strangest part of the proceeding is seen when they reach the village
street and, without any guidance or driving, waddle each into its
own yard for the night. Like so many squads they break off in their
dozens from the main body, knowing instinctively their owners’ door,
and with solemn gait enter in as though conscious of their own innate
cleverness.--Mr. A.H. Ross, in “THE STRAND MAGAZINE.”
[Illustration]
Odds and Ends.
A Wonderful Balanced Rock--What a Lightning Flash Did--The Sea
Captain’s House, etc.
Near Dome Rock, Colorado, thirty-two miles up Platte Canyon from
Denver, is situated one of the most wonderful balanced rocks in the
world. This rock, as will be seen from the illustration, is poised
with very little of its surface touching the ground. The most peculiar
feature about the boulder is the fact that it does not rest on a flat
surface of soft earth, but is perched out on an incline with a very
steep angle. The slope on which it stands, moreover, is of smooth,
solid rock, too slippery for anyone to walk up, and how the boulder
maintains its position is a mystery.
[Illustration: A WONDERFUL BALANCED ROCK--IT IS PERCHED ON A STEEP
SLOPE OF SMOOTH, SLIPPERY ROCK, AND HOW IT MAINTAINS ITS POSITION IS A
MYSTERY.
_From a Photo. by J. R. Bauer._]
Church bells and church plate, as related in a recent WIDE WORLD
article, are not the only kinds of buried treasure of which there are
traditions in Worcestershire. Mr. J.W. Willis Bund, in his “Civil War
in Worcestershire,” says: “There is hardly a family who possessed a
landed estate at the time of the Civil War that has not some legend
of concealed treasure. For instance, the Berkeleys, of Spetchley,
say their butler, to save the family plate, hid it under one of the
elms in the avenue. The butler was wounded, and tried with his last
breath to confide his secret to a member of the family, but could get
no further than ’plate,’ ‘elm,’ ‘avenue,’ and died; so that the plate
remains hidden to this day.” The occasion upon which the Berkeley
plate was hidden was the sack and burning of their family mansion
at Spetchley, upon the eve of the Battle of Worcester, by the Scots
troops who accompanied Charles II. from the North. Sir Robert Berkeley
was a devoted Royalist and had suffered much for the King, and members
of his family were serving in the Royal army; but the Scots, who had
fought upon both sides, were not careful to distinguish between friend
and foe. The only portion of Spetchley which escaped the flames was
the stabling. Here Cromwell made his head-quarters, and after the war
Judge Berkeley converted the building into a house and lived there
for many years. The elm avenue in Spetchley Park, where the plate was
buried, still exists, and is one of the finest in Worcestershire. For
the photograph given above we are indebted to the courtesy of Mr. T.
Duckworth, of the Worcester Victoria Institute.
[Illustration: THE ELM AVENUE IN SPETCHLEY PARK, WORCESTERSHIRE--A
FAITHFUL BUTLER, AT THE TIME OF THE CIVIL WAR, BURIED THE FAMILY PLATE
UNDER ONE OF THE TREES TO SAVE IT FROM THE ENEMY, BUT DIED BEFORE HE
COULD REVEAL THE SECRET OF THE HIDING-PLACE.
_From a Photograph._]
The curious little building seen in the next photograph stands at the
end of a private walk on the shores of the River Orwell, in Suffolk.
It is known as the “Cat House,” for the reason that, in the “good old
times,” a white cat used to be exhibited at a window visible from the
river as a signal to smugglers, who flourished in the locality. When
the animal was shown, the “Free-Traders,” as the contrabandists were
euphemistically called, knew that the coast was clear, and promptly
sailed up and landed their cargo, secure from the attentions of the
“preventives.” Near “Cat House” is Downham Reach, which was the scene
of some of Margaret Catchpole’s most exciting adventures.
[Illustration: THE “CAT HOUSE,” NEAR IPSWICH, SO CALLED BECAUSE A WHITE
CAT WAS EXHIBITED AT THE WINDOW AS A SIGNAL TO SMUGGLERS.
_From a Photo. by Frith & Co._]
[Illustration: THIS TERRIFIC OIL FIRE, STARTED BY A LIGHTNING FLASH,
DID A HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS’ WORTH OF DAMAGE.
_From a Photograph._]
The accompanying photograph depicts a terrific oil fire, which
occurred on the night of June 23rd, 1908, at Warren, Pennsylvania.
The conflagration started through a tank being struck by lightning,
and in a very short time twenty-five oil-holders, large and small,
together with the wax-house, were destroyed. The fire burned for nearly
twenty-four hours, and its fierceness is almost impossible to conceive.
The total loss incurred was something like one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars.
The extraordinary-looking dwelling seen in the next picture was
built to exactly resemble a steamship’s bridge, with chart-room and
other appurtenances all complete. This curious erection is situated
at Algorta, near Bilbao, in the North of Spain, and is called
“Casa-Barco,” or “house-boat.” It was probably built by a retired
sea-captain, who felt like a fish out of water until he had provided
for himself the same environment to which he had been used during
his active career at sea. One can imagine the old gentleman taking
his evening walk to and fro along the lofty bridge, scanning the
surrounding country with a sailor’s eye, and half inclined now and then
to ring for “more speed,” or to send an order down the tube to the
steersman.
[Illustration: A HOUSE BUILT TO RESEMBLE A STEAMSHIP’S BRIDGE.
_From a Photograph._]
The cat seen in the next photograph was the pet of the crew of the
ill-fated whaler _Windward_, which was wrecked in Baffin’s Bay last
season. After the disaster pussy had a long, cold voyage in the open
boats in which the ship-wrecked men pulled--amidst ice-bergs, snow,
and tossing seas--for over five hundred miles, encountering dangers
and adventures galore, till after three weeks of fearful exposure and
hardship they were picked up by the whaler _Morning_, in which the
correspondent who sent us the picture was a passenger. “Pussy then
made up for her sufferings by making her home in my bunk,” he writes.
“During the cold nights of the Arctic autumn I found her a very good
substitute for a hot-water bottle.”
[Illustration: A CAT WHICH MADE A FIVE-HUNDRED-MILE VOYAGE IN AN OPEN
BOAT IN THE ARCTIC OCEAN.
_From a Photograph._]
[Illustration: ANOTHER REMARKABLE ROCK--IT IS AN ALMOST PERFECT GLOBE,
AND THOUGH IT PROBABLY WEIGHS TWENTY TONS FOUR STRONG MEN CAN SET IT
SPINNING ON ITS BASE.
_From a Photograph._]
On the foreshore of the Mata Beach, Mangapai, New Zealand, stands the
remarkable rock shown above. It is an almost perfect sphere of hard
blue rock, shot with white quartz, of an entirely different formation
from any other known rocks in the district. The mystery is, of course,
to know how it reached its present position on the soft sandstone of
the beach. Popular opinion is that in distant ages it was shot from a
volcano, since extinct. The rock, which probably weighs twenty tons,
rests in a cup like depression in the sandstone formation on which it
stands, and is so nicely poised that four strong men, encircling it
with their arms and all pushing one way, can set it spinning on its
base.
[Illustration: THE BULL-THROWER SEIZING THE ANIMAL BY THE TAIL.
_From a Photograph._]
[Illustration: OVER! THE BULL GOES CRASHING TO EARTH AMID A CLOUD OF
DUST.
_From a Photograph_]
The two snapshots reproduced above illustrate striking phases of an
exciting Mexican pastime--that of flooring bulls with the hand from
horseback! The rider, galloping after the bull, seizes it by the tail
and, passing his leg over the tail for the sake of leverage, pulls the
poor beast round sideways until it trips and goes crashing to earth
amidst a cloud of dust. Needless to say, the bull-thrower needs a
strong hand and steady nerves, or he may find himself in trouble.
[Illustration: THE MAP-CONTENTS OF “THE WIDE WORLD MAGAZINE,” WHICH
SHOWS AT A GLANCE THE LOCALITY OF EACH ARTICLE AND NARRATIVE OF
ADVENTURE IN THIS NUMBER.]
[Transcriber’s Note: