WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 156, 29 March 1926, Page 6

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

NOTES AT RANDOM

(By

“Wi.”)

[During the absence on holiday of T7D.H. this column is being conducted by his colleague “Wi."] The traffic policemen don’t call it a day till they have landed an intoxicated motorist. Perhaps it is because the London money market hears too much about Mr. Lang and not enough about New South Wales. The catch in the good roads scheme, for the farmer, is the week-end picnic party. The Mother of Parliaments, always conservative, has refused to be rushed into adopting Australia’s compulsory voting scheme. In Belgium compulsory voting has been enforced for some years. The Belgians enjoy a peculiar franchise. Every citizen over 25 domiciled in the same commune for twelve months has one Parliamentary vote. On attaining a certain educational standard, he is given a second, and at 35, provided he pays house tax and is married, or a widower, he is given a third. Privilege carries its obligation, and failure to vote is a misdemeanour punishable by fine To remove, all excuse for not voting the Government pays the fare to the polling station of every citizen who can show a legitimate reason for being absent from , his commune at the time of the election. . From the purest accident a development mav follow of far-reaching results. An incident which occurred at Redhall Park, Clitheroe, led to bottled beer being a popular beverage in England. Redhall Park belonged for a time to Alexander Nowell, headmaster of Westminster, who, being a staunch Protestant, took refuge there on Queen Mary’s accession in 1553. He was fishing in the Ribble one morning—with a stone bottle of ale planted near by in the hollow of a pollard tree—when he received a warning that the Queen’s men were on their way to arrest him, so, leaving his rod and his' bottle behind, he fled across the meadows.. After some davs of perilous wandering Nowell reached the coast and was smuggled over to Holland. On Mary's death Nowell returned to his beloved trout stream (he. spent a tenth part of his time in angling, says Izaak Walton), and chanced upon the bottle abandoned six years previously. He cautiously sipped the beer, and to his surprise found it more palatable than any he had tasted before. “That same night,” we are told, “Dr. Nowell summoned his whole household in solemn conclave. Even’ empty pitcher, jar, and bottle that could be found was filled .with ale, corked, and then consigned ' to' the cellar.” The doctor had discovered bottled beer. For some years it was a stillroom secret at Redhall Park, until at last the discovery was given to the world, and the popularity of the new liquor speedily established itself. ! .

How many people know the origin of that widely-used phrase “according to Cocker” In 1677 Edward Cocker’s “Arithmetick” was licensed for publication. In his original “proeme” to the work the author described himself as a “practitioner in the arts of writing, arithmetick, and engraving . . . in which arts I have been directed by the secret influence of Divine Providence.” / His preface continues For you, the pretended numerists of this vapouring age . . .for you this

book is composed . . that by studiously conferring with the notes, names, orders, and applications of numbers delivered herein you niEjy become such artists indeed as you now only seem to be”! Cocker was not destined to 'See anything of the success which has made his name proverbial, for he died in the year of his “Arithmetick’s” publication, which was edited from a manuscript left by him and 'which ran to over fifty editions He was, however, not without some ‘‘honour” in his own day, for in an extant petition maide some years before his. death he refers to an award of £l5O made him by the King for his encouragement in the arts of writing and engraving, as he’ was hindered in his work “by reason of extreme want and necessity.”

Ou another subject of common curiosity, I have been trying to find the original meaning of that peculiar American money mark, the dollar sign, an “S” with a vertical line drawn through its centre. There is a wide variety of explanations, for nobodv seems to know with , any certainty whence , the mark arose.* Our own capital "L” with a stroke, £, stands for “libra,” which is the Latin for pound (ust as the "s” is derived from "solidus” and the'“d” from “denarius”).. But the dollar sign of America is a mystery. One explanation is that it represents the initials U.S.; another that it comes from ’ those Spanish “pieces of eight,” the “peso” of eight reals, whose symbol ■- was a double eight. Another theory is that it is a contraction of the letters P and S, used by the Spaniards to indicate the “peso.” Yet another explanation is also based on the Spanish coinage, for the “peso duro” bore on the reverse the Pillars of Hercules with a scroll round them, and the strokes ■ in the dollar mark have been said to represent the pillars and the S the scroll! None of the explanations seems very satisfactory. There is no obscurity about the'name of the coin itself, and its derivation is of interest “Dollar” is from the German "thaler,” which is a curious word to have come to have a monetary significance. The first coins which were called by this name were made from silver mined at sthal (literally, Joachim’s Dale), in Bohemia. The monev made from this silver was—for the beginning of the seventeenth century—of so excellent a quality that it became standard currency, and the pieces struck were known in the first place as Joachimsthalers—i.e., Joachim’s Vallev-pieces. Later the first half of the word was shed, and the coin became a thaler without any qualification.

Still on the subject of origins, where did the first playing cards come from? There is a pack of cards in the museum of the Asiatic Society 1000 years old. Up to the fifteenth century most of the cards used in England came from Germany and France, and it was not until the time of James I that the manufacture of cards began in Britain. Since then the "devil’s pasteboards” have been a big source of revenue. . A tax of os. per gross packs was levied during the reign of James I; in Queen Anne’s time 6d. per pack for 32 years to "help pay for the war.” In 1828 the tax was Is. a pack. The original signs on the cards represented cups, money, clubs or batons, and swords—cups faith, money charity, clubs fortitude, and swords justice. Our present spade represents the leaf of a wild plum (German) ; the club an acorn (German) or French trefoil; the heart also of German design, and the diamond a form of value. The manufacturers of playing cards have several degrees of excellency for their productions. The best cards are known as Moguls, the second class as Harrys, and the third class as Highlanders, An. drews, or Harlequins. The indicator pips in the corners of cards were invented by Dr. Normandy about '-hr. year 186$.