Illustration by H. Arthur

· The world's best-selling fiction writer is Agatha Christie, whose 78 crime novels have sold an estimated 2 billion copies in 44 languages.

· On May 5, 2001, more than 2,500 people bared all in the name of art, lying naked on the streets of Montreal, Quebec, Canada for U.S. photographer Spencer Tunick. The brave volunteers lay outside the city's Place des Arts, shivering in temperatures as low as 55 degrees Fahrenheit. Tunick's project, shot from above, was intended to illustrate the vulnerability of humanity.

· Beethoven was totally deaf when he composed his Ninth Symphony.

· Vintage port takes 40 years to reach maturity.

· The mouth produces a quart of saliva every day.

· In the Andes, time is often measured by how long it takes to chew a quid of coca leaf. Sometimes, and not just in the Andes, a destination is said to be so many cigarettes away.

· Morocco was the first country to recognize the United States in 1789.

· Having survived a barrel ride over Niagara Falls that broke "nearly every bone" in his body, in 1911, Bobby Leech embarked on a lecture tour around the world. In New Zealand, he slipped on a banana peel and died of complications from the fall.

· Seven thousand years ago, the ancient Egyptians bowled on alleys not unlike our own.

· When the circus dwarf Lavinia Bump married the circus dwarf Tom Thumb, more than 2,000 guests attended their wedding, including President and Mrs. Abraham Lincoln and the entire United States Cabinet. The famous ceremony was dubbed "The Fairy Wedding."

· Two out of three adults in the United States wear glasses at some time.

· Ducks will lay eggs only in the morning.