Tales of the magnificent extravagances of France under the Bourbons have led a wondering later age to think that never since has gold been lavished upon luxury with so free a hand. But a French writer, the Vicomte Georges d'Avenel, has taken the trouble to make comparisons, and he has found that the incomes of to-day are relatively much larger than they were one, two, and three hundred years ago. The New York _World_ has summarized from the _Revue des Deux Mondes_ M. d'Avenel's discoveries: For purposes of exact comparison M. d'Avenel estimates all fortunes and incomes of bygone times in terms of their equivalent value to-day, not as mere nominal sums. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, he shows, no one had an income of $1,000,000. Louis IX in the exceptional year of the crusade of 1251 spent $775,000. After the Hundred Years' War, in 1450, Charles VII's budget was $212,000. In 1516 Francis I, who was noted for his taste for luxury, had only $259,000 for his person and his court. Napoleon III's civil list amounted to $5,000,000, but Louis XIV had less than $4,000,000 for all expenses of an extravagant court. Richelieu and Mazarin derived tremendous incomes from their privileges, Mazarin leaving by will nearly $40,000,000 to the king, who refused it and let it pass to Mazarin's eight nephews and nieces. Except these three no person up to the time of the Revolution enjoyed an income of $1,000,000, and the revenues of Richelieu and Mazarin were subject in fact to charges really connected with the state. The conclusion of this investigator is that the very rich of to-day are six times as rich, or those of equal fortune are twelve times as many, as the richest men of the old régime; and they are ten times as rich, or twenty times as many, as the rich princes of the feudal period. SERIOUS EXPLOSIONS ARE CAUSED BY DUST. GRAVE DANGER LURKS IN SUGAR. Particles of Cork Floating in the Atmosphere of Linoleum Factories Must Be Kept from Unprotected Lights. Almost every kind of dust which is composed of inflammable material will explode when touched by a flame. For instance, the house-maid who uses the contents of the sugar bowl to light the fire knows that nothing burns more easily than powdered sugar. Proprietors of large sweetmeat factories have learned that there is danger from this source. Some years ago an English inspector of mines conducted a number of experiments on the explosive power of coal dust. A disused shaft one hundred and fifty feet deep was chosen for the purpose. Samples of dust from different collieries were collected for the purpose. When two hundredweight of dust was emptied down a shaft and a charge of gunpowder fired, the result was startling.