POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 36, 11 August 1934, Page 8

POSTSCRIPTS

Chronicle and Comment

BY PERCY FLAGE

Another thing this country needs is ■* less unemployment relief and more relief from unemployment. One of our contract-addicts holds that bridge is an intellectual occupation because ono certainly has to know a good * deal. " - . * «V . -;:■ . If Hitler—with a. face like that!—is tho world's most powerful "statesman," you just must continue boing sorry for tho world. * '-" * «• None of us is infallible. ' "We, read that a subject heartily thrashed a psychologist for warning him that h« had an inferiority complex. ■» •» * ■ i GOOD GNUS. ..?.-... This is "borrowed" from an English contemporary: ' . ■ , Oh, a wonderful bird is the gnu, It can paddle its own cnu, I admit; it's unable To sprout Russian sable, But, after all, cnu? > , * •, » * NOW FOB SEXTUPLETS! It was bound to happen. Eecords ..'■ aro scarcely announced these days before they are broken. Tako the case of the Canadian quintuplets. The news had only time enough to fly across tho globe when a Kumaniun mother brings sextuplets into tho world. Let her name and , address: go into print for all to memorise. The mother of six at a birth is Mrs. Johanna lovdache, of Inotest, a liumblp peasant woman. A month ago she was unknown outside . her little village. Today biologists everywhere are interested in her. Sho' has set a record for the world to ahoot at. ■: ■•■ ■ •■■'-'•■■ "' .- y ■■ "■"■■■! ■' ■•■ KEEPING PACE WITH DEMAND. Modern com/petition seems to b9 forcing some, of the American, public utility corporations to proffer unusual services to their customers. To call attention to these special services telegraph companies often use little stickers on the corners of their delivered mes- . sages. Tho story is current that a father, nervously waiting at his office for tho news that both worries and: thrills, received the following message: Charlotte gave birth to a baby girl this movning stop baby and mother both well and happy. On the corner of the envelope containing the message was this label: "When you want * boy, ring Western Union." * ' • j » • .■'*■:.. SCHOOLGIRLS TELL US. / 1 It was decided to hold a,, general : knowledge test at tho Wimbledon * County Schqpl for girls. Here aro ,'. tho answers to set questions as giv6t in the school magazine:—The Prince of Wales's motto is- "Mon Dieu!" or, "Dien Itchen." Pompeii was killed by the followers of Caesar. Pompeii was1 ' destroyed by the horse with the soldiers, in it. In battle tho ancient Britons, used a dye of syrup and shellfish.- Cromwell was murdered on the Ides of March. Columbus discovered America, in 1592. There seemed to be some doubt among the schoolgirls as to who is England's "Grand Old Man." Sir Walter Raleigh, Henry VIII, Bernard Shaw, George Lansbury, Lloyd George, "Time," and " Methusalist" all gota vote. Sir Edward Elgar was a jockey^ F. J.- Perry explores the Arctic by air,, and President Roosevelt is Premier of Russia. But surely one young candidate takes the prize for crediting tho Bank of Eii<jland with so much ingenuity on behalf of young mothers: "The reason why the penny is milled is so that coins will not be swallowed"!.. «- . * -■. »' , ■. '■'. ■■• ■■ SCHOOL'S IN. ■ Do you know that •' •■ ■: ■ . ■. (1) A Croydon1 (England) man lias a boot an inch and a half long, made forty - years ago and exhibited at the first Boot and Shoe Exhibition? (2) Coffins are-kept ready at Klauovice railway station, Bohemia, as there) have been so many suicides there? (3) A letter has travelled 19,000 miles in 19 days from New York to / New York, via •; Germany a.ud Brazil, by aeroplane, airship, and liner? (4) For a bet, Josef Braschl, art Austrian, wheeled a friend in a wheel- • barrow from Vienna to Paris—B6o miles —in 29J days? . ! ; (5) The '' White Horse " Parin at' Hermansburger, Heide, Saxony, has been in the possession of the samo family for 1100 years? (C)\A Belfast woman claims to have a thoi-'nless rose' tree planted 60 years ago by her grandfather? It is a crim* son climber. ".■■■■■> (7) James and Amelia, the centenarian tortoises at the London Zoo, prefer oranges, bananas, and potatoes, and: havo waist measurements of nearly six feet? ~ '..-■■ . : (8) A stork ringed in Saxony has been traced'to Tanganyika, East, Af- , 'rica, after a 5000-mile flight from Gci> many? • ' .-..■... (9) Argentina, which imported ■ 69, tons of toothpicks last year, has in- - stalled four factories, and is nowmaking her own?. ' ■ (10) A budding genius is usually < blooming nuisance? WINE IS A MOCKER. ' Lord Byron poured libations, to Bacchus, and his ungodly crew, Fitzgerald, who interpreted Omar, loved wine when it was red. Alf. Tennyson and Bobbie Burns At the decanter took thoir turns. Will Shakespeare was ndt on tl*' wagon— ' • .. He, too, enjoyed a foaming flagon. Goethe, a favourite of mine, And Heme —they had many a stein^ Verlaine and Villon—what a pair!— ■' Rimbaud and Monsieur Baudelaire, And other members of that tribe, . Would most prodigiously imbibe,. Yet, friends, I ask of you tonight, Could any of those champions write In tho inimitable way Of dear Felicia Hemans, say? Of sweet Eliza Cook, who gave The world that wistful poem and braver "The Old Armchair"? Or L.E.L., Of elder days, who, strange to tell, When others snatched at scraps of' fame, Made a good living at tho game? Then take that bkllad, moist with tears, Of one who, dying at Algiers, . Was doomed—or so I understand— No more to soo the Fatherland: I ask again-7-could Avon's bard, Or Burns, jor Villon evil-starred, Have written things like that? Go tot It wasn't in them so to do, Which proves, as Mr. Volstead says, That pent-up Prohibition pays. ■* » « REGISTERED, PRESUMABLY. Another tit-bit relative to the old-timo Turkish navy, as told by Sir Harry ' Luke in his cheerful reminiscences entitled "An Eastern Chequorboard." On one occasion a warship was ordered out at very short notico to demonstrate against certain insurgents. . "Start'in half an hour," said someone at the Ministry of- Marino to the commanding officer. "Pardon, Excellency, we cannot." "Follow, why not?" ' . "Excellency, there is no rudder/ "Imbecile,"start at once; tljfi rudder' shall be scut on by post."