SCRAPS.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 2180, 4 July 1890, Page 5

SCRAPS.

A Russian doctor speaks enthusiastically of what he calls " urtication " — that is, pricking with a bunch of fresh nettles — as a cure for ansethesia, neuralgia, and numerous other disenses. It has long been in uso among the Russian peasantry.

THE COMMON-PIiA-CS BOOK. In reading authors, if you fiud .Bright passages which strike the mind, [ And which perhaps you may have reason | To think of at another seuson, Don't be contented with the sight, But put them down in black and white. Consumption is rare in childhood, but increases rapidly after the age of fifteen, and is most common between the ages of twentyfive and thirty. Those who escape it till the latter age are less and less prone to it as the years advance, and may escape it entirely even though they have a hereditary predisposition to it.

"If I gave you a pound of metal and ordered you to make the most out of it, what kind of metal would you select ?" asked a well-known jeweller. " Gold, of course," was the prompt reply. " I'd prefer a pound of steel," said tue jeweller, and I'd hare it made into hair springs for watches. A pound of such springs would sell for an even §140,000."

Dean Stanley says that each one of us is bound to make the little circle in which he lives better and happier ; each one of us is bound to see that ouc of that small circle the widest good may flow ; each of us may have fixed in his mind the t'nought that out of a single household may flow iufluences that shall stimulate the whole commonwealth and the civilised world.

It is good to make a jest, but not to make a trade ot jot»ting. The Earl of Leicester, know iag that Queen Elizabeth was much delighted to see a gentleman dance well, brought the master of a dancing school to dtinco before her. " Psbaw !" said the Queen, "it is his profession ; I will not see him." She liked it not where it was a mastur quality, but whero it attended on other perfections. The same may we say of jesting.

There is a custom observed from time immemorial, iv some pirts of Dorsec for laud to be let by audio a by means of an inch of candle ; the candle is lighted, and, whilst it ia burning, those desiring to rent bid in the same way as at an auction, the last, bidder obtaining the use of the fiald for the ensuing year at the amount of rental he offers. This curious custom, the origin of which is lost ia. obscurity of time, is not confined to any particular village or town in the country*

The enjoyment of beautiful flowers ia com.mon to ali the inhabitants of Japan. Even the humble labourer is a customer at the gardens where flowers are kept for sale. In view of this, liana-echi, or flower- markets, are often held on summer evenings, lighted with torches of pitch and m»ny-colourod lanterns. They attract the poorer classes especially, and afford them an opportunity to gain a flowering Bprig of the most popular plants which, bloom, a^: this time.