ODDS AND ENDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 6255, 3 December 1881, Page 3

ODDS AND ENDS.

Tiie man who docs not advertise lias it done for him finally under the head o " failures in business." Not much confidence can be felt in Kgypti.iu securities when the property is hi the hands of Shcrif's oilicers. Half the beauty and charm of a brilliant thought, is lost when conveyed to the hearer with the flavour of onions. The Czar has succeeded in maintaining absolute monarchy. 13ut he is afraid to come out and see how :t is getting along. The first virtue is to restrain the tongue. He approaches nearer to the gods who knows how to bo silent, even though he is in tho right. A skull is the natural receptacle for brains, but there are men who make you feel that Nature made the hole and then forgot to fill it up. The sweetest thing in life is to dream that you have nothing in the world to do except to do nothing, but the hardest work in life is to be able to do it well and gracefully.

Compassionate old lady (paying her fare) : "How jaded your horse looks, cabman; is not the bit uncomfortably large for his mouth?" Cabby: "It ain't the bit in his mouth, mum ; it's the small bit in his stomach, the result of hard times, mum."

Customer: "I don't know how it is, but my clothes never fit me nicely. Xow, you always make my friend Captain Stollert's coats to sit beautifully." Tailor: " xcs, sir, but he's got shoulders to hang 'em on ! If a gentleman's made like a champagne bottle no tailor can fit him !" Exit customer in high dudgeon.

A story is told of a certain Cornishman who, even on the occasion of his wife's funeral, unable to resist a feeling of impatience at having to proceed for a considerable distance at the regulation pace of about half a mile an hour, murmured to his nearest neighbour, " Dear, dear, this is making a toil of a pleasure !"

A promising youth recently surprised his father by asking, "Father, do you like mother?" "Why, yes, of course." "And she likes you?" "Of course she dees." "Did she ever say so ?" " Many a time, my son." "Did she marry you because she loved you ?" " Certainly she did." The boy carefully scrutinised his parent, and after a long pause, asked, " Well, was she as nearsighted then as she is now J"

Just after a late election to a colonial Legislative Council of a prosperous Scotchman, a friend met him with •'All hail, M'Bean!" "Thanks," said the member elect; " but you know it wasn't M'Bean. It was Macbeth." Repeating this to another north-the-Tweed man as an instance of Scottish imperviousnc-ss to anything lika humour, the listener gravely assented, and then pleaded, " But, after all, you know M'Bean was right."

Several men were standing at the corner of a street when one of the most iashionable ladies of the neighbourhood passed. "Ah," exclaimed one of the men, "what a complexion ! There is nothing to beat it in the neighbourhood. lam proud of that woman, I am." "Are you iier husband?" asked a stranger. "No, sir. 1 ' " Her father, then ?" "No, sir ; I am no relation of her's, but I am proud of her complexion. lam the chemist that sold it to her. I make it myself." A SUMMER IDYL. The grasshoppers, with voice divine, Siup on the sweet potato vine. And soon the " skeeter" with a Will poke at us " that litilu bill." Anil countlcss hordes of busy ants, Will wander o'er the picnic pants. And the voracious pinching bug Will give our ear cm awful hug. And if you're now with wisdom b!e3t, Beware the awful hornet's Lest. Be cautious, gentle, ii yoa please, When you squeeze the honey bees. Now doth the farmer twist and squirm, His eye falls on the army worm. But here in Auckland most do tease Us, nasty acrobatic Jleas. A New Haven woman learning that nitroglycerine was a now medicine for toothache, induccd her husband to bring home a small can of it in his vest- pocket. Just the moment he put the can opener to it to get a few drops to put in the aching tooth there was a slight sizzling noise, a hole in the roof of the house, and two individuals running about the room without a hair left on their head and their ing in shreds. However, the tooth stopped aching. . 7 There was a great crash on a cert:uu ga-a-day at the Mansion House, and one 01 Her Majesty's Ministers being anxious to get away more quickly and quietly than >\as possible by the grand entrance, conducted the ladies of his party to a private "way knew of. "Yon can't pass here, sir, Sk Policeman X. "Oh, yes you can let n.e through ; I am the First Lord of t miralty." "If you was a City ll' T,nrd sir, I could not do it." Then the First Lord saw that his hopeles {