The good old Anglo-Saxon adage, "The unexpected always happens," is as true to-day as it ever was, and the fact is often verified by the occurrence of peculiar accidents. Some accidents are so odd and brought about by such a strange combination of circumstances that probably they could not be repeated in a century, simply because all the conditions would not be identical at a given time. For example, an accident happened in connection with the erection of a sky-scraper in one of our large Eastern cities in the following manner: A laborer was engaged in regulating the "paying out" of a rope attached to a fall and tackle used in lowering barrels of bricks from one of the upper stories to the ground. The rope was controlled by being wound two or three times around a gaspipe, one end of which was stuck into a hole in the wood work on the ground floor. At the time the accident in question occurred a barrel was filled with bricks preparatory to being lowered and was swung out into midair in the usual way. In paying out the rope the laborer carelessly let it slip off the gaspipe, but he clung tenaciously to the end of the rope and his weight, being less than that of the barrel of bricks he was hoisted to the top of the building as the bricks descended, the barrel striking him as it passed — not sufficiently hard, however, to compel him to loosen his grasp. As the bricks reached the ground the jar knocked the bottom out of the barrel and released the bricks. As a consequence the laborer, clinging to the rope with a tenacity born of despair, fell to the ground. The barrel in its turn struck the beams at the top and broke into pieces, which fell upon the man lying below. It is needless to say that the man was seriously injured, but, curious to say, a pipe which he was smoking at the moment he started on his perilous journey to the roof was held still in his clinched teeth when he was picked up.

      Here is another case where all the beholders expected to see a man dashed to death, but through pure accident he came out without a scratch. This also occurred on a building in course of construction. A workingman who was employed on one of the upper stories of a frame building stepped off and fell to the ground. His companions thought surely that he must be killed, or at any rate severely hurt, but there was a huge pile of shavings where he fell and he tumbled into them as if into a feather bed and after he recovered from his surprise picked himself up and returned to his work in the upper part of the building as nonchalantly as though nothing unusual had happened.

      Here is a man who met with a strange accident, but who did not get off as luckily as the hero of the pile of shavings. He heard a cry of fire in a house adjoining his own. In his own house he had a chemical fire extinguisher, which he fastened to his back and went to see what he could do to assist his neighbors. For some reason best known to itself the extinguisher went off like a huge skyrocket and the unfortunate man was lifted bodily through the window and hurled to the ground and killed by the fall, although not injured in the slightest degree by the explosion of the extinguisher.

      The greatest risk incurred in shooting is generally that of being hurt by the direct discharge of the piece, but here is the case of a man who was out hunting and discharged his gun, when a shot, through pure misadventure, hit a hard object and rebounded into one of his eyes, completely destroying the sight.

      One stormy night in Philadelphia a man was standing before a show window engrossed in the beautiful holiday display. He was holding an umbrella over his head and above him was an arc light. In some unaccountable way the tip of the rod of his umbrella came in contact with the iron frame of the lamp, the frame, because of some freak of the current, having become charged. The circuit was completed and the man, who an instant before believed himself in a place of perfect safety, received a shock which killed him.

      And so it is that the most remote and insignificant causes produce startling results. A man is never hurt in just the same manner he anticipates, if he thinks about it at all. If he had a dread of railway smashups he is usually dragged out of telescoped passenger trains comparatively uninjured, but escapes that fate only to sneeze too hard on some ill-starred day, breaking a blood vessel in a vital locality, from which he dies. — San Francisco Call.