Trivia

Q. In which war - Vietnam, Korea or World War II - did the greatest proportion of battle deaths come from small-arms fire? B A. Vietnam with 51 percent. Korea, 33 percent. World War II, 32 percent. Some experts attribute that specific death rise to lightweight rounds of M-16 and AK-47 rifles. Others say it’s predictable in guerrilla combat.

A bloodhound’s droopy ears channel scent to its nose.

It’s said those who run the big Australian sheep stations of the Outback measure the land’s capacity not by sheep per acre but by acres per sheep.

Q. What’s a “boscage”?

A. A clump of trees or shrubs, a thicket. Remarkable how many common words have quite uncommon synonyms, notes our Language man.

Surgeons don’t earn a lot of money in the Czech Republic. Some take second jobs. Typical base pay is said to be equivalent to $250 a month.

It was the writer Ellen Glasgow who made the point: “All change is not growth, as all movement is not forward.”

“Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a function.” So intoned Garrison Keiller, that thinking performer, who may not have thought much about the history of rats.

Your tongue is a muscle.