P.N. ROTARY CLUB

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 2313, 4 December 1925, Page 11

P.N. ROTARY CLUB

Rotarian H. L, Young (President) was in the chair at yesterday’s meeting of the Palmerston North Rotary Club.

The- following visitors Were welcomed: Messrs Norman Ratcliife (Hamilton), J. Campbell, E. TL Crabb and C. Huxford (Palmerston North). The secretary (Rotarian C. T. Salmon) reported that the membership last month was 46. The highest attendance was 37, the lowest 34 and the average 35. This last worked out at a peVoentage of 70, which placed the Club ninth on the Dominion list. It was announced that on December 17th., the meeting would take the form of a "father and son" luncheon. The chairman stated a rotary club was that day being initiated at Masterton and that fraternal greetings had been telegraphed. The speakers of the day were Rotarians J. P, Stubbs. D. Morrison and C. T. Salmon. They dealt respectively with the fourth, fifth and sixth objects of loi&ry in eight minute speeches. The subjects were;— “The development of acquaintance as an opportunity of service.” —(J. P. Stubbs). "The recognition of the worthiness of all useful occupations and the dignifying by each rotation of his occupation as an opportunity to serve society.”—(D. Morrison.) “The advancement of understanding, good-will and international peace through a world fellowship of business and professional men united in the rotary ideal of service.” —(C. T. Salmon). AH-TISHOO ! ! A SNEEZE AND ITS PORTENTS. ANCIENT BELIEFS AND CUSTOMS. Isaac Disraeli has a story that when the monarch of that vague region Monomotapa sneezed, his attendants) would wish him long life in so loud a tone that those in the ante-chamber would hear and repeat the salutation. The people, in the corridors next took up the cry. then those in tne courtyard, until finally in the streets and through all the city every sneeze of his black majesty would be greeted with deafening cheers! It must be added that history does not relate whether he ever suffered from hay fever. This custom of saluting after sneezing is universal and very ancient; its cause is not far to seek. The savage fears anything he cannot understand, and how should he understand anything as mysterious and involuntary as a sneeze? An omen it must surely be. Death dn a Sneeze. The Hebrew Rabbins have a tale that before Jacob a man sneezed once only, and then died. Jacob, seeing the inconvenience of this, besought the Almighty to let him live after his sneeze long enough to put his affairs in order. His request was granted. The day came when Jacob sneezed. His friends looked to soe him die, but Jacob lived on. And ever since then it has been the custom to wish long life after a sneeze! The habit of saying: “God' bless you,” says one writer, received a great impetus during the plague at Romo in 589-90. Sneezing was one of the first signs of the disease, so that those who heard it would cry “God bless you” or “God help you” and take to their heels. The same held good during the plague in London in the years 1664 to 1666. Persian Travel Portent,

In the Telegu country, if a child sneezes on a wmuowUig-i-an or on the door-frame, balls oi boiled rice must be thrown over it to avert misfortune. The Persians held that, when starting on a journey, one sneeze is a bad omen, and unless by staring at the sun they can conjure up a second sneeze, the expedition must be given up. Bantu babies are held in the smoke of a fire of aromatic wood until they sneeze to prove they are not bewitched. And in British New Guinea there i# a belief that sneezing signifies the return alter an absence of the soul to the body. Hence, if a man does not sneeze for some weeks his friends grow deeply concerned and fear his soul may never return from its prolonged outing! The ancients believed that sneezing was a good omen. Among the Romans it is mentioned by Apuleius, Petronius, piiny and Plutarch; among the Greeks Theocritus says; “On Simichidas indeed the Loves have sneezed.” A writer on tho modern formula of salutation in Macedonia gives several interpretations. Im one of them sneezing means that enemies are speaking ill of the sneezer whereupon a wish is expressed that the said enemies “may split.” In another it is regarded as an indication of health and in this case the wish runs, “Health to thee and joy to thee,” with sometimes the addition, “and may thy mother-in-law burst!”