POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 108, 2 November 1940, Page 8

POSTSCRIPTS

Chronicle and Comment

BY PERCY FLAGE

1 There's an old saying: "See Naples and die." It wasn't so with the R.A.F. | bombers, anyhow. I «• , * * i "I wouldn't lower myself so far," as [ the nervous parachutist said to the | squadron commander. «■ * •* W.M.: Is there some affinity between our Finance Minister and General Metaxas? * * * Anon.: "Dear Mum," writes an evacuee, "it is very nice here, but I'd like some money to help a poor old lady who sells ices!" * •» * R.I.P. A German family put the customary notice in the paper following the' death of grandpa: "Pray for Ernst Muller, called by God to a Better World." Next day they were arrested for criticising the Nazi regime. "THE WALRUS." * » # THE WAY TO PUT IT. M.V.V.X. Rangachari, in "Reason": We have not a bolder pair of limbs nor powerful voice than Gandhi's for considerable time. He leads. We have faith in his two feet, weak as is his frame. We confide in his teaching which can scarcely be connected into a system. To toddle and to twaddle that is the highest humanity ever did or even could. •» * * INFORMATION DEPARTMENT. Dear Sir,—Could you settle an argument for us about Royal Chief? Was he ever trained by a trotting trainer by the name of M. B. Edwards or a man named Berry, or was he ever sent to a trotting trainer's place for a rest? We know that at present he is being trained by a Mr. Jones, but my friend will have that some years ago this same Royal Chief was as above. If you can possibly settle this problem would esteem it a great favour.— FaithfuHy yours, The head of our Turf department, who knows more than a thing or two of the racing business, has no knowledge of anyone else but F. D. Jones having charge of Royal Chief. It is possible that the horse was spelled on a trotting owner's farm. * * * BRAIN-TEASERS. Writes L.D.A.: I am venturing to break new ground by submitting herewith a novel brain-teaser. It might safely be called a strip-teaser, for I think most of your Postscripters will have to strip off their coats and get down to it. We hear a lot nowadays about town v. country, and the drift to the cities. This gave me the following idea. Can you or your readers answer these questions:— Which city in the world is—The. largest, the poorest, the queerest, the truest, the most false, the brightest, the happiest, the fastest? Example: Earliest, Preco-city. No. 2: A word of five letters— These are coins not used out here. These are birds known far and near, This a colour shade, and four— Men, not nice, do.more and more, Five is just that sort of quip Which should never be let slip. _ The same letters are used in eaca five words. „„„■,,. We shall be off the air from 7£tt : thif evening; hope you won't mind. «• •» * ■ ■. . SCHOOL'S IN. Do you know that — 1. Dolls were in use amongst Arabs in Mahomet's day, and the prophet's very young wife, Ayesha, used to induce him to join her in her play with them? 2. Tests made by noted astronomer* indicate that the moon consists principally of pumice, or some similar porous substance? 3. The city of Budapest, Hungary, has a monopoly of the undertaking business? 4. Brazil is 200,000 square miles larger than the United States? 5. Knowing that there was a pigeon post at Bagdad, the Crusaders riding to the Holy Land took falcons to intercept the message-carrying homing birds of the Saracens? 6. Liquor, formerly included with th« food and medicines carried by Saint Bernard dogs in the Alps, has been replaced by hot coffee in thermos bottles? ' . ,; 7. London, with its fogs, continues to have the lowest mortality record, per thousand of inhabitants, of anycity in the world? 8. According to an old belief, the crying of a. child during baptism Is an indication that the devil is going out of it? 9. Thackeray's daughters were so busy reading Dickens's works that they wouldn't read their father's novels till later in life, always asking him-to try to write like Dickens? 10. In England, in the fourteenth century, meals of more than two courses were prohibited by law? ■ » * * THERE WILL BE NEW HORIZONS. My thoughts are horses racing Mad pastures of my brain. I kneel to fitful chanting In the temple of my pain. But all these forms and faces, These phantoms that I shun, They will be coolly lifted Into oblivion. On pointed spears of anguish! I file the ragged years To ironies of laughter And turbulence of tears. There will be new horizons, Flushed with resurgent flame. Where I will fear no voices . And shudder at no name. A lustrous calm will gather To lift my spirit free, Quiet as a snow-drift, Hushed like the dawn at sea. LUCIA TRENT- * * * MEET PAT. Pat oi! the dark luminous eyes and the gift of reticence is, in her fourtu year, an individualist. The other day a friend next door died. On the morning when he was to be laid away, Pat disappeared for a space, returning later with an armful of posies and a solemn face. Her mother, believing that the flowers were intended for the house, was beginning to thank her, when the lass intervened with: "They're not for you; they're for Mr. Js communion"! She meant "funeral," having heard the word and misinterpreted it. A Sabbath or two ago, Pat went with her elder sister to Sunday school. She was, as usual, quiet, but interested, following the programme with both ears. When the teacher asked if someone would sing, Pat rose immediately with every confidence. Here is her song—very serious for her: Whistle while you work, Mussolini made a shirt, Hitler wore it, Churchill tore it ... Whistle while you work. "Thank you very much, dear," said the teacher, hiding her risible emotions. That's Pat. . . . , ..