CLIPTOMANIA.

Evening Star, Issue 6760, 27 November 1884, Page 3

CLIPTOMANIA.

j A txaio; man in France, on opening a money i drawer, f.und scraps which burnod out to bo I tho paper of the TJink of France. Five notes 1 of l,000frea;hh»(! heen apparent! >-destroyed, • and it »m ascei uued thni r.t- culprit could , only bo n. mou-e. A trap was s t for the thief, tho rcmua -ts ;u tlit Jiuwer were col- ! leoted, ?iud un h'.ur Inter thy nibblcr was caught, taken to a vetcriunry surgeon, put ,to death, and dissented. Its stomach contained the undigested meal of paper. The pieces wero matched and gummed together. Every trade has ita trick, and tho mousetrap trade has ita distinctive customs. According to tho evidence i'i a case heard in I the City of London Court, the fc:k'k of the mouse-trap trade is to apeak of all quantities as fractions, a dozen being a unit. Eight mouse traps are two-thirds and teu are fivo- \ Bixths. - If a man asked for half a mouse trap he would bo supplied with six whole traps, and so on. The custom stems to have greatly amused and p rplexed the Judge before whim the ease was tried. He was further e:i ba'rassed about a dispu'ed charge for porterage and warehousing for sixteen—we nw-n two thirds mildly inquired if that was also a custom of the trade. Finally His Honor remarked that he did not understand the order that had been given and executed, but as the part es to the action seemed to understand it judgment would be given for the plaintiff, but without costs. A flea is a little thing, but its bite will make a lazy man more earnestly busy than a dozen hopes of gilded competency. An amusing illustration of tho invincible repugnance 0? the " mild Hindoo " to work has just been furnished. Two assistant engineers were recently sent to England from the Punjaub for the purpose of undergoing two years of technical icstruc ion. During the first six months, while they wcro travelling through tho prinoipal towns of England and Scotland, tho young gentlemen were perfectly contented, but when the pleasant " t ur of inspection " was over, and they were set to work in a factory, the matter struck them in a fresh light, and they prayed to be sent home—which they were.

A rather smart anecdote baa got about which tends to chow the feeling of loyal attachment and patriotism which exists among the Welsh people in regard to tho uncrowned King of Wales—Sir Watkin Williams Wynn. A horse, wearing the colors of the master of Wynustay, wa3 runnicg a race It was a warm favorite amongst the Welsh people, and apparently held the race, to the intense delight of the spectators. Eventually, owing to the eccentricities of war, tho horse gradually fell to the rear, coming in last, when the admirers of the horse exclaimed: " Hurrah for Sir Watkin; he drives them all before him." This is not at all bad for "Taffies."

There are many ways of evading ticket collectors. Some men might get under the Beat; others would prefer to hang, limpctwiso, to the outside of the carriage; but never before, we think, has anyone conceived the brilliant deßign that got a hawker ut Sheffield into trouble. He was one of a race party of seven, and he lay upon the seat while his six companions eat upon him. Ho may have been a " sharp" when he lay down, but he must have been a flat when he got up, If there had only been half-a-dozen more they might have explained to the ticket collector that they were a coroner's jury sitting upon bis body, The London correspondent of a provincial contemporary is responsible for the following:—There was in England a short time ago one of the richest men in the world—a well- known Yankee millionaire. He stayed at an hotel in Devonshire, and occasionally played lawn tennis. It is a rule that if a ball is lost the player paya 10i, and this American Rothschild lost' a ball. When told he must pay 10.1 ho declined to any longer, while ho and his valet spent tho remainder of the afternoon in trying to discover the lost ball. All millionaires have peculiarities, and this is tho latest on record."

' Iron' states that the Governor of Samos —Abyssidea Pasha—has at last succeeded, after years of work, in uncovering the entrances to a tunnel of which Bcrodotua speaks with admiration aa the work of Eupalinos and Megaira, and which, according to the sama authority, was built during the tenth century eo. The tunnel, about 5,000 feet long, was ii. tended to' secure a supply of fresh water to the old seaport town of Samos.

The following sarcastic intimation, which tells its own tale of sad and patient longBufferin?, is, according to a correspondent, prominently displayed on the outer door of a certain counting-house in a large manufacturing town in America : —"Notice —The hours of attendance at this office are: To canvassers for church subscriptions, ten till two; book and insurance agents, two till four; commercial travellers, beggars, and advertising men all day. We attend to tur own business at night."

An extraordinf ry trial, greatly resembling the Tuza Esslar affair, is now proceeding before a jury at Cracow. A small Jewish farmer and his wife, together with a Polish peasant, were eighteen months Pgo found guilty by a provincial Court of tho murder of a Christian girl. Tho verdict was, however, quaßhed on the ground of being against the weight of evidence, and a new trial was ordered. The accusation that the jews took the life of the Christian in the exercise of a supposed religious rite ia repeated again in the present case, which presents many mysterious features, and discloses shocking ignorance and superstition on both Bides.