Tit-Btts.

Evening Post, Volume XLVIII, Issue 48, 25 August 1894, Page 5 (Supplement)

Tit-Btts.

♦ To the minnow every cranny and pebble and quality and accident of its little native creek may become familiar ; but does the minnow understand the ocean tides and periodic currents, the trade-winds and monsoons, and moon's eclipses, by all which the condition of its little creek is regulated, and may from time to time (unmiriculously enough) be quite overset and reversed ? Such a minnow is man ; his creek this planet — earth ; his ocean the unineasurable all. — Thomas Carlyle. That happy state of mind, so rarely posseßßed, iv which we can say, "I have enough," is the higlic.it attainment of philosophy. Happiness consists, not in possessing' much, but in being content with what we possess. He who wants little always has enough. — Zimmerman. To-morrow is the day on which idle men work, and fools reform. Health lies in labour, and there is no royal road to it but through toil. Common-beueO is science exactly so far as it fulfils the ideal of common-sense ; that is, sees facts as they are, or at any rate without the distortion of prejudice, and reasons from them iv accordance with the dictates of sound judgment. — Huxley. Schubott was like a gardener bewildered with the luxuriant growth springing up around him. As fast as his ideas arose they were poured forth on paper. He was too rich for himself— his fancy outgrow his powors of arrangement. . .Beethoven will often take one dry subject, and by force of mere concentration kindle it into life and beauty Schubert will shower a dozen upon you and hardly stop to elaborate one. His music is more the work of a gifted dreamor, of one carried along irresistibly by tho current of his thoughts, than of one who, like Beethoven, worked at his idea until its expression was without a flaw. His thought posbesses Schubert — Beethoven labours till he has possessed his thoughts. — Haweis. How different is the view of past life in the man who is grown old in knowledge and wisdom from that of him who is grown old in ignorance and folly ! — Addison. In the mineral world we have gems and jewels which, be they ever so small, are infinitely more valuable thau greater masses in baser material ; so in the musical world we have jewels and gems of composition which sparkle and glitter among its surrounding ponderous and weighty • matter, and which in value may be likened to the diamond and the ruby. — Gates. " Wo must always distinguish between our emotions and our attitude," says the Rev F. B. Meyer. "The one may die off our lives like the sunset glory from the ridges of the Alps, they seem bo grey and cold when it is gone ; but the other should resemble the changeless perpetuity of the everlasting hills, unaltered by the transition of the ages or the alternations of day and night." Every man has his own vocation, says Emerson. There is one direction in which all space is open to him. He has faculties silently inviting him thither to endless exertion. He is like a ship in a river ; he runs against obstructions on every side but one ; on that side all obstruction is taken away, and he sweeps serenely over a deepening channel into an infinite sea. It always remains true that if we had been greater circumstances would have been less strong against üb. The man who explores the depths of natural science and revealed truth, bringing forth that which advances the prosperity of his species, and making the world the richer that he has been born into it, is the true economist.— Stephen Bourne, F.S.S. It is easy enough to say that you wish your enemy no evil, but wait until something happens to him, and see if you can help feeling glad. You will discover what a number of things you can do without when you have no money to get them. — Thackeray. The mental force of man has its limit of quantity, and no one, strive as he may, can exhaust in it physical labour and yet have enough left with which to achieve mental greatness. If congregations collect money on Sundays to relieve the poor by oharity, why should they not do something on week days to hinder ihtxn from requiring charity by fostering institutions which cultivate habits of prudence and self -denial. — Norman Macleod. Most people carry an ideal man and woman in their head, and when the practical relations of the men and women oi every day are discussed with reference only to these impossible ideals we need not marvel at any ridiculous conclusions. — Mary Olemmer. Educate the whole man — the head, tha heart, the body ; the head to think, the heart to feel, and the body to act. Love is a fancy that the disappointed tenderly cultivate. Good manners and good morals are sworn friends and fast allies. Face a situation and yon are threequarters master of it. Good example always brings forth good fruits. — Samuel Smiles. Thou must learn to bridle and break thj will in many things, if thou wilt live a quiet life. — Thomas a Kempis. Friendship gives no privilege to make ourselves disagreeable. Knowledge, like timber, shouldn't be much used till it's well seasoned. Courtship is to matrimony, as the diS' tant view of beautiful mountains is to thi climbing of them.

! Bat one person in fifteen h«s perfect eyes

NEW AUSTRALIA. «. Mr. C. C. Cunningham, brother of Mr. G. L. H. Cunningham of this city, has recently paid a visit to New Australia, in Paraguay, and writing on his return to San Martin, on May 14 th, he says :—: — The settlement consiets of about fifty mud huts, with thatched roofs and earthen floors. No doors, only curtains hung up. Thoy have got in some sweet potatoes, turnips, beans, peas, etc., and are breaking up a few acres of the camp land for wheat. Caterpillars aro there by the thousands. Insect life is not so bad as I have seen it in other parts of the world — only there are ants, cockroaches, crickets, and a horrid little thing called a ji«gle, which gets into your feet and under yourtoe nails, and gives you beans. My guide got some into his foot, and I was especially cautioned not to leave my books and socks on the floor for fear of them. There are some particularly nice people among the New Australians, but they are split up into sections, and are quarrelling among themselves. Lane and about 50 others have left the settlement (or are just about to leave), and intend starting another colony somewhere else in Paraguay. Thoso remaining have elected a Board of Management, and a man named Kidd is Chairman. These fifty are in addition to those whom Lane previously ejected. The feeling between the two parties is" very acute. If half I heard about Lane be true, •he must be so full of visionary ideas that he has no room for a grain of common sense. I rested one day at the settlement, and on the following morning started for the other settlement where the second batch are located. This is about twelve miles from the first one. We reached it in due course, and were again kindly received. I forgot to say that at the first settlement there are 200 men, women, aud children, ao far as I could guess, and at the second are about 70 or 80. At the new settlement they are living in huts, but are putting up some few houses of the same description as those .it the other place. At this place there is uo cultivation o£ any kind wliiitovor. We slept in a tent, an<l during the night it came on a lotjtilar '• piiiupero " — thunder, lightning, wiud, aud rain in earnest. I thought the whole place would have been demolished. Some of the poor fellows are Buffering from "chucho" malarial fever, andanother had a bad leg. We loft the following morning on our way buck to Villa Hica. As to my impressions of the New Australia — Afti-r r« ceiving so much kindness and hospitality from those at the settlements, and to the hearts of many of whom the scheme is very dear, I don't like to be too severe, but I am constrained to say that, in my opinion, the thing is a failure, or all but a failure ; it is trembling in the balance, and I am afraid it will fall. The distance from a market, the difficulties of communication, the prospects of their products being taxed by the Paraguayan Government, and the duties which the Argentine Government will also probably put upon them — Argentine being practically their only market — the climate, insect life, and rank growth after the land is once broken up, and other objections (which I have not time to enumerate, as I am writing to catch the mail), and, lastly, the dissensions among themselves — these, I say, tend me to the belief that the scheme will not succeed. I understood from M'Naught that the land had been granted to the Association in fee simple. This is true, but it is subject to certain conditions as to settlement of so many on the land within a certain time. The split in the camp will render the fulfilment of this condition very difficult ; and if not fulfilled, the probabilities are that the Government will resume possession of the land ; and then it seems to me that the New Australians who are in Paraguay will find themselves in an unenviable position. Any New Zealander thinking of leaving New Zealand for New Australia should be sent and detained in the Sunnyside Lunatic Asylum to prevent him from doing himself and his family an irreparable injury.