TIMELY TOPICS

Northern Advocate, 27 July 1935, Page 8

TIMELY TOPICS

PHYSICAL EDUCATION.

The British Government had not hesitated to make a literary education compulsory for all. said Mr P. A. Openshaw, headmaster of Lucton School, Herefordshire, in hi- annual report. Was there any reason, he

asked, why the same methods should | not be adopted for physical educa- 1 tion? It might mean extra staff '• 1 \ | might mean adapting the time-table; j but it could be done. One small way j in which the school time-table might j be altered would be to make Saturday a school day, thus making it possible to have a half-holiday on Wednesday. He had never understood why this was not done everywhere. One could | understand the desire of a stair to re- j tain its week-end freedom (from 4 j p.m. on Friday until Monday morn- j ing), and he was sure he would incur a certain amount of odium if he said that a profession which had - nearly four months’ holiday in a year did not really require two whole days’ holiday every week. If that sacrific were made, a good deal more could be done in the cause of physical education for boys. <j> <s> <•s> Words That Tell a Story. FOOLSCAP.—The name “foolscap” for writing-paper is actuj ally taken from the words “fool s cap.” It was .s'o called because, in early days, the watermark of foolscap was the quaint little pointed cap with jingling bells worn by jesters. There is a persistent story that this water mark was first introduced by one of the English Parliaments which, disgusted with .the folly of Charles I, substituted a fool s cap for the Royal Coat-of-arms as a watermark for paper. That story like many another legend has been proved untrue, for examples of the fool’s cap as a water mark dating as far back as 1479 have been found in different countries of Europe.

. <£ <?> <s> <J> ® Do You Know? 1. —What is a will-o’-the-wisp? 2. —What line follows: ‘To me the meanest flower that blows can give”? 3. —Who was the author of the, first English poems written in England? 4. —What is the name of an element obtained in very small quantities from pitchblende and used in the treatment of disease? 5. —What character says: “I know a bank whereon the wild thyme grows”? 6. —When, and by whom, was New Zealand discovered by a European? ... The answers to the above will appear on Saturday next, when another series of questions will be printed. <S> <S> <£ <S> <S> . Words Of Wisdom. To reach the port of heaven, we must sometimes sail with the wind and sometimes against it—but we must sail and not drift nor lie at anchor, — Anon. <S> <£ <S> <s> <*> Tale Of The Day. Mutt: Have you heard about Banks? He’s got water on the brain. Mitt: How did he get that? Mutt: From a tap on the head, probably. » ■ ■'