POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 145, 16 December 1933, Page 8

POSTSCRIPTS

Chronicle and Commtnt

BY PERCY FLAGE

In reply to Bill McClancy: Yds, Hitler is frequently to be found in • brown study- « * '. * At any rate, the morning after they celebrate Christmas with gusto (and other stimulants), the Ellsworth Expedition ■will have plenty of iee-packi handy. Urging thrift on his complement, Byrd reminds thorn that the ship is entering tho "groat non-shop area of thq world." There are, of course, no Eskimo chain-stores down in the Antarctic. * » » HEAVY GOING. Bear Plagu,—A great quantity of liquor is now on the high seas en route to America. Probably many of the consumers are already half seas over themselves. WINSH. •.• # \ • CAUSE AND'EFFECtY ;:,;■• Interesting news items from' Cal«dock Stern and Wild:—"Many distilleries are now working overtime to cope with orders from U.S.A." "A strange marine monster, with oy'es like motor lamps, has been sighted in Loch Ness." Y. RARAPA. THE DEPRESSION. Yes, the ould man is dead tin years come Christmas. Ho was a terror to worry, and if he was aloive today he'd have been dead years ago wi'd this, deprishun, but Oiui not loike that; so long as Oi can live till Oi doi it won't worry me. EHIN-GO-BRAGH. NOT A GRAVE OFFENCE. It happened, in Melbourne a few dayi ago, and was reported as follows:— When a man named Tomb was charged at Fitzroy Court today with having been, found on licensed premises aftai 1 hours, he said he went there to sea a man named Churchyard, who had been his friend for years. They were both entered as lodgers. Mr. Clark, P.M.: I am afraid they would be cold companj r if they had a double room. ' Solicitor: This is a ease where the tomb enters tho box; and the box doei not enter the tomb. •■ #■•'.- TALKING OF BUTTER— ' Pear Percy Flage,—That neat joke, "Byron on butter," reminds nic of what the. poet said about butter and seventeen-year-old girls.- Byron admired the matured woman rather than the flapper. He has a rhymed couplet, "The nursery lisps out in all they utter, . ' Besides, they always smell of bread and butter." Still on the same subject, . did you know the Bible mentions butter? la the fifth chapter of Judges, that sweet thing Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, .is credited with having "brought forth butter in" a .-Jordly; dish." Again, in the. Psalms,- fourth chapter, David tells .us,:"The words of his mouth were smoother than .tratter, but war was in his heart." 8.P.8, , * ■■ • ■•.«... SCHOOL'S IN. Do you know that ■ , (1) The introduction, of a n«*| alphabet derived from Latin character* has caused education in Turkey t* advance by leaps and bounds? (2) According to one scientist, th« normal infant is born with the faculty of distinguishing light from darkness and, possibly, with the sense of colour'? (3) Only two persons were killed on American air-lines \in the first- six months of this year, though the passenger miles flown were 76,642,393 ? , (4) A Washington journal recently recorded that, "shot by brqtheT, girl is slightly improved"? r (5) In the Nicobar Islands most things are purchased with coconut money—so many nuts- for a knife, or a boat? (6) The Chinese Hame for a "coolie," a labourer, means "seller of strength"? (7) The oldest statue ever found is the image of an unknown king, Daddu, 6000 years old, unearthed in the ruins of a temple at Bismya, near Bagdad? . (8) Seneca, the Roman Stoic, could repeat any 2000 disconnected words .after hearing them once ? . . . (9) Holland is to expend .• some £80,000,000' on a. draining scheme which will mean reclaiming 550,000 acres on which to settle 20,000 to 30,000 families? x (10) Near Kenya there is a threeroom "hotel" perched on a tall trca in the midst of the jungle from which visitors can watch the big game? • • • , SOUTHWARD. HO! Southward ho with Byrd we roll Stowaway'd on Fancy's back, • Heading for the Far South Pole And huge icebergs greon and blacS (White ones, too, but such, of course, Are in these days commonplace), And th' ebullient sea-horse •» Neighing in tho white man's face| And no wonder! Oh, the seals Barking as the great ice floes, And the walrus at his meals, With a fish beneath his nose; ■ Also, the sea pachyderm ' Barging, caring not a hang, Through I;he wild Antarctic's Sturm. Und—and not forgetting—Drang. We may see Behemoth's calf, When the 'Spring-sprung ice goef "Ping!" Bunt its mammy (please don't laugh()f Just like any udder thing; But of one sight, we declare, We shall' not be burked or bilkeds; That is, how, by whom, and where, Sea cows are brought in and milked. LILLIPUTIAN PRINCESS. As it is many moons since we had Royalty in column B—we8 —we are incorrigibly Republican, don't you believe—we break the spell by introducing'a'real but most -unusual princess to Postscripters' notice. She comes from Africa, of'all places, is 28, unmarried, and though only 30in in height and 421b in weight, is said to be "perfectly proportioned." The little lady is Princess Übingi, the ruler of 250,000 tree-dwell-ing pigmies. Just a. few mouths ago the princess left her native forest of Central Africa, where her tribe of tree dwellers and ant-eating people live, oa an educational .tour*of Great Britain. She is the first member of her race to leave her native -habitat, and one of the conditions of her trip to England is that she must return within two years. Übingi is insured for £5000—£160 an inch, and the last time we heard of her she was holding court in one of the big emporiums in Sunderland, which town gave her a civic reception. She rather startled Sunderland's Mayor by responding to liis official gallantry witH a pretty curtsy and a shriek of laughter -"-her favourite way of greeting friends.