JOTTINGS AT RANDOM.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 6972, 26 September 1884, Page 4

JOTTINGS AT RANDOM.

|By Abgtts.]

Next to the incidents of the kitten who fell into the milk-pail, and the duke who, according to my childhood's English history, was drowned in a butt of wine, no instance of having too much of a good thing has affected me so deeply as the recent sad fate of the Bacred fig-tree of India. This tree, held in reverence for centuries, has at last succumbed to the well-meant attentions of its admirers. These latter, chielly pilgrims from Burmah, have been in the habit of manifesting their devotion by annual libations of Eau de Cologne, which was lavishly poured upon the fig-tree. The vegetable divinity stood it as long as possible, but finally sickened, refused to make new growth, next ceased to bear figs, then failed to mature its leaves, and ultimately died— killed by kindness. Thus, it seems, even divinity cannot bear a surfeit of Ean de Cologne, and the sacred fig-tree ef India now teaches an awful lesson to consumers of perfumery. My brethren, lot us take the lesson to heart, and never, never irrigate our gardens with scented alcohol, but rather let us sell it to the heathen at a fair profit. If our vines and our fig- trees require feeding are there not nlways tho dogs and cats of our neighbors to trap ? A well-intentioned fig-tree, divine or otherwise, will do far more in tho way of fruit if our enemy'B favorite cat is buried at the roots than for hogsheads of perfumery, and there is the extra advantage of defunct feline thrown in. If the Burmese pilgrims had known this they would have offered sacrifices instead of pouring libations, and their fix- tree would have been living now.

But there is another consideration growing out of the incident narrated. If Eau de Cologne is so fatal to trees, might it not act with equal force, if applied in sufficient quantities, upon those who oppose our harbor scheme? If this ahould be found to be the case there will be no need to burn- in effigy in future. All that will be required will be to seize an obnoxious person and apply perfume — say, for instance, by holding his head in a bucket of it for ten minutes. Even hospital committees might be made amenable to reason in this way. A large vessel filled with perfume might be kept ready, and when a member was factious the chairman could order half-an-hour's submersion. This would, perhaps, even sweeten the manner of Mr Sutton, although it must be admitted that he would constitute a crucial teat of the scheme. At all bvents, it would be kill or cure, and in either case somebody would be the gainer. If cured, business could proceed ; if killed, business could proceed, and Mr Harker could bury the corse under one of his rose bushes at Hawarden, and give the world a modern edition of Isabella and the " Pot of Basil."

A young miner at Roefton recently had an adventure compared with which " Up in a balloon " would be a mild joke. The Globe Goldinining Company (of no kin to to the Hawke's Bay bubble) have an serial wire tramway, connecting the mine with the battery. The latter is situated a mile and a half from the mine, and the wire tramway is consequently of that length. Buckets conveying quartz to the battery travel along one of the lines, returning empty to the mine along the other. The buckets are whirled over ascents and descents, cliffs, gullies and precipices, and at one spot the span of the wire between its supports ia nearly 1000 feet, the buckets swinging in mid air at an altitude of over 300 feet as they travel over the gully below. The young miner one evening took* it into his 'head that a returning empty bucket would convey him from the battery to the mine, and save a long and weary climb. He started about 5 p.m., and his progress met with no check until reaching the gully just described, when the wire ceased moving. The cause wag due to the men at tha break in tbe mine having stopped work for the day, and the poor fellow in the bucket was left suspended 300 ft in the air, through the dark hours of tbe night, until 9 o'clock the following morning. The night was fortunately a mild one, and beyond the terrible dread lest he might sleep, and fall out of the bucket and be dashed to pieces, he suffered no injury. But he will not try it agaia, not even to attend a hospital committee meeting.

The Native Lands Court must be "fearfully and wonderfully made." In the Legislative Council last week, Dr Pollen drew attention to the fact that at the Court now or recently sitting in the Waikato all the proceedings are conducted in Maori without interpretation, although the Chief Judge, who is one of those presiding, does not understand a single word of Maori. This is, as Dominie Sampson would have said "Prodigious ! " An affair of this kind " beats Banagher." # A judge (so-called perhaps because he is prevented from judging) sits to hear evidence and arguments addressed to him in a language he doesn't know a word of, and which is not interpreted to him ! And it is said that at one hearing of this kind, property of the value of £60,000 was involved. The Government will be appointing blind architects next, or policemen without legs. How in the world Major Atkinson came to allow a person who doles not understand Maori <o be appointed a " Chief Judge of the Native Lands Court " is one of those things "no fellah can understand." It is no wouder the Maoris have no great respeot for the NativeTEands Courts.

What is a " Chaffy P " And what part of speech, and how declined or conjugated, if amenable to such treatment, is " A Baggy ? " Worse still, and lastly— a kind of " Pelion upon Ossa " query — what is a " Strawwolloper P " These terms,, for which the gentle reader will look in vain in any dictionary, recently puzzled the Resident Magistrate and all the lawyers at Timaru. It was a case of non-plus— a kind 'of "jjome'-' zither,' come 'zither' my little foot page, and riddle ma riddle ma ree what ' Btrawwolloper,' 'chaffy/ aud 'Baggy' may be*' sort of maze-r---and all the legal gentlemen were con-

founded. One gentleman looked under the head of " musical instruments " in the encyclopaedia, and found " Sackbut," but " baggy " was not there, and "psaltery" gave no clue to "strawwalloper." One of the parties to the suit was at last called upon for an explanation, and he, with a look of contemptuous pity for those who had to confess such gross ignorance by enquiring, explained that " chaffy," "baggy," and " straw wolloper" were the respective names of artists who attended to the wants of a threshing machine. But the names are very pretty and sesthetical, without the explanation, and we shall doubtless have them used in debate presently. " You're a chaffy old strawwolloper " would be a flight of rhetoric that might silence a Gladstone or or a Button. America has produced a novel sensation. Solomon is credited with having said, "There is nothing new under the sun," although he never sawpraotical toleration exemplified in the form of a Jew, an "Infidel," and a Catholic all members of tha same Ministry — never saw a "strawwalloper" — and above all, never saw Miss Lulu Hirst, the latest wonder. So, depend upon it that poor old Solomon (whose name, by the way, is "Sun," repeated in three languages — " Sol," "Om," and "On") did not know as much as he bragged, and a really new thing under the sun is the latest wonder.. According to those who have described Miss Lulu, who is the daughter of of a farmer in Georgia, her hands appear to pc surcharged with electricity, so that any walking stick, billiard cue, or umbrella, which she merely touches with one palm, defies the strength of the most powerful man to move it from it* position. Her father calls it " psychio force," and the scientists who have witnessed her feats on the stage of Wallock's Theatre, in New York, are completely nonplussed by them. Other girls are ooming forward whp possess the same power, and the prodigious strength they seem to exert has not yet been traced to any agency outside of themselves. This should be an interesting paragraph to Spiritualists.