MISCELLANEOUS EXTRACTS.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 2264, 12 May 1891, Page 4

MISCELLANEOUS EXTRACTS.

The principal room at Monte Carlo Casino was crowded on a recent Monday night by a number of fashionable men and women, most of whom were eagerly following the play of an English doctor named Seegart, who was having an extraordinary turn of luck. The doctor finally accumulated an enormous sum, and while he was in the act of. rising to leave with his winnings, his pent-up excitement brought on an attack of apoplexy, and he fell dead across the gaming table. As soon as the body had been removed, play was resumed as though nothing had happened. At the Cornell Agricultural station, U.S., the principal has been experimenting on grafting herbaceous plants, and achieved a good deal of j success. Geraniums and chrysanthemums graft easily, and amongst other plants well knowa here potatoes and tomatoes were found to graft readily. Tomatoes grafted on potatoes produced good tomatoes above ground and good potatoes below. There is money in this idea. At the time of his last report he had a new notion under experiment, the mingling of different fruits by grafting them together. -He fancied some entirely new fruits may be got in this way. The following extract from the Melbourne 'Telegraph ' strikingly illustrates the ups and downs of colonial life. At the last meeting of the Benevolent Asylum a number of j applications for admission to the institution were dealt with. The case of one of those admitted is peculiarly interesting. The name of Sydney Hicardo was formerly well known In the colony as that of one of the leading agriculturists and most enterprising farmers in Australia. Mr Ricardo many years back was a member of the Legislative Assembly, and when the enfeebled old man came before the committee with the request to be housed in the asylum of which for many years he has been a life governor, he produced the old-fashion-ed gold railway pass which used to be granted to members of the House. The world has not dealt kindly with the once prosperous farmer of Heidelberg, and at 75 years of age he is without support. What next ? In the announcements of a new play, Carl's Folly, in which Mr Charles Arnold, of Hans the Boat viaii fame, is to appear, it is stated that he will in an Australian sheep shearing scene shear a sheep in seven minutes, and afterwards a highly trained Newfoundland prize dog will rescue a woman from drowning. If they could only manage to shoot the author of this folly in the last act of the play it would really be a great attraction. Stage realism is certainly advancing with rapid strides. It has rattled on at a tremendous pace since Mr Vincent Crummies conceived the idea of having a play written to introduce a wooden tub and a pump. But even the sheep shearing performance can hardly be said to come up to that of the conscientious actor who " blackened " himself all over to play Othello.