It was a weary time. A carriage clock had been placed on the discoloured wooden mantelpiece, and slowly its hands crept on from one to two and from two to three.

Touliu is a small city north of Chiayi. Although the town itself is hardly a tourist attraction, it is an important transit point for travellers heading to Tsaoling, one of Taiwan’s premier mountain resorts.

[The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria, […].

I long as old Eli did (verbo absit invidia) to hear what is become of the ark; but fear I shall not hear what I desire, and my answer shall be with the daughter in law translata est gloria Dei de—. Comment: Translata est gloria Dei de ... is a slight paraphrase from 1 Samuel 4:22.