POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 115, 18 May 1938, Page 10

POSTSCRIPTS

Chronicle and Comment

BY PERCY FLAGE

What's biting the Sydney watersiders? Don't they believe that Japan is in China only, for China's good? * a » Probably Neville Chamberlain prefers a touch "of gout to nasty twinges of conscience. * * * An air service is one thing, but—» speaking politically—a' hot-air service (no names mentioned) is a cow—of another colour. ' »» ; • ■ The only thing wrong with Welling* ton is the regularity with which it misses the big prizes in the art unions. *»\ » , "It's, no use raising my rent," Henry Plug told.his landlord, "because I can't raise it myself." .'■_'»' rf ~ * • . i "More Anon": ""They say that December and May cannot mate, but the golden key opens all doors " 'v. '."*'■'''-• •' ~ FLEAS.

I learn from a work entitled "Flea* as a Menace to Man and Domestic Animals" that fleas have large hearts, writes Ellis Beach. This ■work is published by the British Museum, and ha» run into three editions. There are a great many kinds of fleas—perhaps W many as fifty. The flea has a 1 pea*shaped gizzarjd lined with bristles, . so that it won't be sick. v -The book ; says that if fleas are disturbed they sham death, but I seem to remember that some fleas don't bother to pretend. ,•■>.« • - FIRST PATENT, , The honour of receiving! the first patent granted in\ 1617,, belongs to a London publisher—one Aaron Rapburne—:who was, no doubt, thinking of bringing out some early fdrift of illustrated paper (writes He was "graunted a for the terme of XXI years of the sole makeirig.'carveing, describeing, and graVeing.in copper, Jsrass, or other metalle, alle suche and soe manie pictures, plottes, or descriptions, and to imprint and sette forthe and selle the same." vl

"TOBAGCO MANIACS." Mrs. J.M. writes apropos a f Column 8 par, "Obnoxious Weed," to remind us that James I was fussy about smoking, which he characterised as "a custom' loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, dangerous to the lungs, the black stinking fume whereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless." In the time of Charles I there Was issued a book in which tobacco was described ' as /'the spirit's incubus that begets many ugly and deformed phantasies in the brain.'',' Napoleon was no smoker. He condemned the foulness of the, weed, Which he declared made hun' sick. ..:'■'•' ; ■. •" "'" Our correspondent, who indulge! when her nerves feel the need of a cigarette or two, wants to know if wo smoke. Do we! v -"••. '•'■•■' ■ ..• *SKULL STORY. Emmett Walpole (still in S.E. Queensland) writes us at some length. He "sent us the story of those " mysterious skulls found in a Sydney ware-he-use (it was cabled, you remember), I and, as a "follow up" another skull yarn which he cut from a Sydney Sunday paper. 'Here it is:—

There is a man living on Kangaroo '- Island' (Northern Australia) who refused to sell his mother's skull for .twenty guineas. His' father was - one of Colonel Light's chainmen, when 100 years ago he mapped out the city of . Adelaide in virgin bush. His mother • was one of the of the Tasmanian aborigines. A scientist came to the island, favoured the simple half-caste with his patronage, learned that the woman was buried? at Antechamber Bay , t and took him there to pay homage—with a shovel on the truck. But the half-caste put --two and ; two together,, and, strange to relate', when they arrived there, >he could not find \ the grave. The persuasion went up to twenty guineas, but the half-caste remained firm. His living was poor, and his skin was dark-jr-but a man's a-' ■■ man of a' that; Saved from a museum* ■■■ case, the old lady- rests- to? peace. (Ernestine Hilljtells the story.),

-'DREAMS OF CHILDHOOD. . Tell me a fairy story; It is bedtime, mother mine, And I always sleep so sweetly, » When I've listened from eight to . nine. . "Tell me about our rulers. How'they thought they could soar so high ' . That the sky was the only limitSo they fell down from the sky. ■ 'And tell how they Splayed at horses, «■ And they kicked, as horses can; . There must be a lot of fun, mother, ■ In being a Parliament man, . And I'm sure they are very kind men, They'd be good to a child like hie, They'd give me schoolbooks,' and And that nasty medicine, free. And except for rent, food, and cloth- . ing. And such little things as that, Your expenses would be so small. • mother, ~ . ~ ■•«#' , You could only laugh and grow tat. Tell me that pretty, story Of the Social Credit dream—' How 1 a diet of simple-skim-milk Changed into the richest cream; How the general! wealth, divided, Gave 'each man, week, five pound; How the cream turned back into skimmilk— . There was not enough to go round* And now I am growing sleepy, And so I will say good-night, And dream of our lovely futurePlease, mother, switch off the light. A.. * •-'• *•'■■■■.■ MOTOR-CYCLE RECORDS. Dear Flage,—l regret I have not written in reply to "Visitor" (May 7) and "Aerodrome." (May, 11). before, but I "have recently had a long and painful interview with my dentist! How- • ever, thanks to "Visitor" for the information With* regard to the death ot a bad wonder, where he heard of it;" I did not see it! reported anywhere.. ' ~. . With regard to Aerodrome's" note,, I think the Italian he is thinking bf is \. O. Tenni, not Lenni. I have looked * up Tenni's dossier and find his name first figures in 1936, when he ran'second ■,' in the 1500 class of the Eifelrennen at Nurburg Ring, driving a Maserati car. Then in 1937 he seems to have turned over to motor-cycles, and with some success, too, since he won the 250 class of the European Grand Prix (Switzerland) at 79.46 nup.h. Npt he ran third in the 500 class at the same meeting " at a speed of 87.18 m.p.h., and finally he ran second in the 250 class of the German Grand Prix at 75.20 m.p.h. All these performances were on Italian -Guzzi motor-cycles.' v . / ■ Tenni is of particular interest; since he has done the opposite to everybody else by going pver from cars to motorcycles," while the reverse is usual. Actually, most of the world-renowned racing drivers started their careers w racing motor-cyclists. '. a*E. SLAD&JONEi^