POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 72, 21 September 1940, Page 10

POSTSCRIPTS

Chronicle and Comment

BY PERCY FLAGE

Nice girls don't hug the jitterbug. * * * Nowadays Goering supplies the guns; providing the butter is Denmark's job. -* * * It "is sad to think that our R.A.F. bombers can rise so high and yet sink so low when raiding. * * * It was George Meredith who said that an opinion formed by a woman is inflexible;1 the fact is not half so stubborn. * » * There's a legend in Naziland to the effect that once, during a speech in the Sportspalast, Goebbels opened his mouth so wide that he bit his ear. * -* ■ * ■ Hitler once said to Mussolini: "The. German nation, animated by the same ideals, stands shoulder to shoulder with the battle-tri d Italian nation. The battle-tried-a'nd-found-wanting warriors. * ' * * . THOSE ENGLISH. "Life" (U.S.A.) .—The English hava so far won more wars, furnished livelier people, done more good turns, written- more great books, and made more commotion than any other group that has ever lived. ■ True, they are deficient in a few respects, such as music and mechanised knick-knacks, but this is a small matter. . . . Considered in toto, they are much the best that the world has produced ,so far. Until the chart indicates otherwise, they may be expected to hold top rating. * * * FLUSTERWITZE. Jocular assault and battery upon the newspapers of Germany is committed daily, writes Dr. S. Hoffman. Retold again and again is the story of the Hungarian dog trainer visiting Leipzig whose star canine died mysteriously one morning. A vet., called in to determine the cause of death, learned that the dog had eaten a bit of sausage which had been wrapped in a newspaper. When .he found that it had been "Der Stunner," a' notorious antiSemitic sheet, the vet. nodded understandingly. "That explains it," he said. "Not even a dog can stomach a paper like that." * * * • BRAIN-TEASERS. Joe supplies this No. 1. Here it is. Two books make an encyclopaedia; each book from outside covers measures 2i inches. Each cover is £in thick, pages cf each book measuring 2 inches. Page A is first page of first book and Z last page of second book. Standing-, normally on a shelf, how far is page A from page Z? - No. 2 is something different: Decapitate a well-know bird And you will come upon a word Which has the meaning "to excite.' Another blow will bring to light An English river. Lop its head, And there remains a term oft said Standing for "using"; when that's found • Your answer will be safe and sound. An example: Plaid, laid, aid. Now off with those heads! ■:.' :»'[ '■;■„■; *■ ■■■-.. '*■•' ■ .:.--:■' vSCHOOL'S IN. ' Do you know that (1) Finnish army aviators adopted the swastika as the official insignia for their aeroplanes towards the close of the World War? (2) A German group who rescued £140 000 in advance is establishing Manitoba's first beet sugar plant.? (Or was.) . ' (3) In Arabia camels have been fitted with radio receiving sets, aerials being fixed to their humps? ■ (4) Scales used to weigh diamonds are so delicately poised that.a single eyelash will turn the balance? ■ - (5) The oceans, including the inland seas connected with them, cover about 144 500,000 square miles, or 74 per cent, of the earth's total surface? (6) The custom of handshaking originated in ancient times when it was necessary to show that one carried no weapon in one's hand? (7) Of the favourite dishes of the average American ice cream tops the list, and fried chicken is a close second? (8) The United States possesses onethird of the world's total road mileage, and, with Russia, half the worlds mileage? (9) If rain did not return water taken from th/ oceans by evaporation they would dry up in 3000 years? (10) Shakespeare expressed tens of thousands of different ideas with a 'writing vocabulary of only 15,009 words? - „ ** • * ! • OUT IN THE DARK. Out in the dark over the snow, The fallow fawns invisible go With the fallow doe; And the winds blow Fast as the stars are slow.. Stealthily the dark haunts round And. when the lamp goes, without sound. At a swifter bound Than the swiftest hound, Arrives, and all else is drowned. And I and star and wind and dee? Are in the dark together,—near, Yet far,—and fear Drums on my ear In that sage company drear. How- weak and little is the light, All the universe of sight, Love and delight^ Before the might— If you love it not—of night. EDWARD THOMAS, * * * STRANGE RELIGIOUS SECTS. Emmett Walpole continues to keep in . touch with this feature. A good scout, this wandering Englishman. Among his latest clippings is this one (abridged): England is full of strange religious sec t s _no fewer than 400 of them. There are the Peculiar People, for example. They have 30 of their 34 places of worship in Essex. They accept the Bible xigidly, and pin their faith strongly io divine healing. Another quaint sect are the Glasites, sometimes called Sandomanians, founded by a Scots divine. They believe in equality to the point of sharing all their goods among members of the sect, and will not, under any consideration, make a second marriage. Once weekly they hold what is called a "Love Feast," a meal of broth and bread. There is the House of David, founded by "King" Benjamin in Kentucky in 1861, who never shave and accept poverty as their lot—there is a branch in-Aus-tralia. Other sects are the Mazdaznans, who look upon Olaman Hanish as their founder, who believe in deep'breathing as the salvation of bodily as well as economic troubles; the Bahaists, Four Square Gospellers, Cocklers, Theosophists. Anthroposophists, Mormons. Unitarians, Quakers, Christadelphians, Plymouth Brethren, Rosicrucians. Seventh Day Adventists, and scores of others. Each of these people believes that unless you turn from your way of living and follow his or her particular path, you are doomed as a lost soul.