A novel illustration of the ingenuity of thieves has been afforded by an incident reported from the continent. For some time past a North German railway company had been suffering from the repeated loss of goods which were sent by luggage train, and which, notwithstanding all research and precautions, continued to disappear in a very mysterious manner. The secret which the inquiries set on foot had failed to discover was at length revealed by a rather amusing accident. A long box, on one side of which were words equivalent to “This side up,” had, in disregard of this caution, been set up on end in the goods shed. Some time afterwards the employés were not a little startled to hear a voice, apparently proceeding from the box in question, begging the hearers to let the speaker out. On opening the lid, the railway officials were surprised and amused to find a man inside standing on his head. In the explanation which followed, the fellow wanted to account for his appearance under such unusual circumstances as due to the result of a wager, but he was given into custody, and it was soon found that the thieves had adopted this method of conveying themselves on to the railway premises, and that during the absence of the employés they had let themselves out of the box which they at once filled with any articles they could lay their hands on, refastened the lid, and then decamped. But for the unfortunate inability of human nature to endure an inverted position for an indefinite period, the ingenious authors of the scheme might have flourished a long time without detection. A TRAIN STOPPED BY CATERPILLARS. _Colonies and India_ quotes from a New Zealand paper the following story:—In the neighbourhood of Turakina an army of caterpillars, hundreds of thousands strong, was marching across the railway line, bound for a new field of oats, when the train came along. Thousands of the creeping vermin were crushed by the wheels of the engine, and suddenly the train came to a dead stop. On examination it was found that the wheels of the engine had become so greasy that they kept on revolving without advancing—they could not grip the rails. The guard and the engine driver procured sand and strewed it on the rails, and the train made a fresh start, but it was found that during the stoppage caterpillars in thousands had crawled all over the engine, and all over the carriages inside and out. TRAVELLING IN RUSSIA.