Varieties.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 106, 15 February 1873, Page 9

Varieties.

Odd—lt was the first pair that ate the first apple. Every man who commits suicide with a pistol must discharge his own debt o' nature (detoDator). When a storm is brewing, who can say whether it will be all hail, mild ale, or heavy wet ? Pere Hyacinthe has now become a paired Hyacinthe. Are not hyacinthe akin to tu-lips ? A popular doctor in Oswego, N.Y., gave a prescription with directions to ' take a teaspoonful every three years.' The patient recovered. Who are the most discontented of all tradesmen ? Blacksmiths ; for the bellows and blows are always going, and they are striking for wages all the year round. . The man who cultivates his friends often finds it end by their hoeing him a lot. One who weeds his friends finds it expensive at one shilling per mild havanna. Never deal with an undertaker if you can possibly avoid it. They are a mean set, always wanting to screw you down. The moustache movement is said to have reached West Point, where the cadet desires permission to let his beard grow, knowing that 'with .the girl of the period there's no use in pressing hissuit unless be be hir-sute. It is a sad sight to see an able-bodied man, dressed inVshirt of the latest fashion with a lamp in one hand and a slipper in the other, chasing the festive musquito about his lonely bed chamber at one o'clock in the morning. Moonlight croquet parties are becoming very fashionable at Memphis, and the games are said to be very long, with a decided tendency on the part of the balls to roll off into shady places. A wit being asked by a seedy poet whether he had ever written anything that would live, replied,—' Before you trouble yourself on that score, I advise you to write something that will let you live.' Sniggles says he has seen a rope walk, a note run, a watch spring, a house fly, and a Saratoga hop, and next summer he shall go over to the Rocky Mountains to see the big trees leave and the Pacific Slope. A youth entered a bookstore, and asked 'What kind of pens do you sell here, mister ?' • All kinds, you young rascal,' answered one of the clerks. 'Do you ?' said the little chap, ' then give me ten cents worth of pig pens.' Poetey. - Barber ; * No offence, sir, I hope, but has it ever struck you as a bald 'ed is like the better world ? Customer (curtly) : 'No !' Barber : ' Well, sir, (I thought of it myself), it's a bright and shiny place, you see, sir, where there's no parting !' (Customer smiles painfully). The ' Express' is responsible for the following : —A worthy inspector of schools was roeently engaged in examining a class of juveniles in grammar, at Wagga, and, as a matter of course, the question was asked —' What is a noun ?' The answer was., equally as a matter of course, prompt and unexceptionable —' A noun is the name of any person, place, or thing.' Seeking accurate demonstration of the class's acquirements, the inspector proceeded —' Now, lama noun ; which of the three am I?' Up went the hand of a promising five-year old maiden, and the triumphant answer —' Please, sir, you're a thing'— was elicited. The class was dismissed.

At a political meeting the speaker and audience were much disturbed by a man who constantly called out for Mr Henry. Whenever a new speaker came on, this man bawled out: 'Mr Henry! Henry ! Henry! I call for Mr Henry !' After several interruptions of this kind at each speech, a young man ascended the plat form, and was soon airing his eloquence in magniloquent style, striking out powerfully in his gestures, when the old cry was heard for Mr Henry. Putting his hand to his mouth like a speaking- trumphet, this man was bawling out at the top of his voice: ' Mr Henry ! Henry! Henry! I call for Mr Henry !' The chairman now rose and remarked that it would oblige the audience if the gentleman would refrain from any further calling for Mr Henry, as that gentleman was now speaking. 'ls that Mr Henry ?' said the disturber of the meeting. 'Thunder! that can't be Mr Henry ! why, that's the little cuss that told me to holler !' Mr Henry did not join in the laugh which followed. A fond father recently wrote: ' It generally takes twenty years of training to eradicate that word 'nice' from a woman's vocabulary. The Falls of Niagara, the Psalms of David, and the progress of the human race were all'nice' to my oldest girl till she got married.' A lazy dyspeptic was bewailing his own misfortunes, and speaking with a friend on the latter's hearty appearance. * What do you do to make yourself so strong and healthy ?' inquired the dyspeptic. * Live on fruitalone,' answered the friend. 'What kind of fruit?' 'The fruit of industry; and T am never troubled with indigestion.'

A Boy takes His View of Giels. — Grirls are the most unaccountable things in the world, except women. Like the wicked flea, when you have them they ain't there. I can cipher clean over to improper fractions, and the teacher says I do first-rate ; but I can't cipher out a. girl, proper or improper, and you can t either. The only rule in arithmetic that hits their case is the double rule of two. They are as full of the Old Nick as their skin can hold, and they would die if they couldn't torment somebody. When they try to be mean, they are as mean as pusley, though they ain't as mean as they let on, except sometimes, and then they are a good deal meaner. The only way to get along with a girl when she comes at you with her nonsense is to give her tit for tat, and that will flummux her, and when you get a girl flummuxed she is as nice as a new pin. A girl can sow more wild oats in a day than a boy can sow in a year ; but girls get their wild oats sowed after a while, which boys never do, and they settle down as calm and placid as a mudpuddle. But I like girls first-rate, and I guess the boys all do. I don't care how many tricks they play on me —and they don't care either. The hoitytoitiest girls in the world cant always boil over like a glass of soda. By and-bye they will get into the traces with somebody they like, and pull as steady as an old stage-horse. That is the beauty of them. So let them wave, I say; they will pay for it some day, sewing on buttons nnd trying to make a decent man of the feller they have spliced on to, and the chances are ten to one if they don't get the worst of it.