ECHOES FROM ODO CORNERS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1756, 1 November 1905, Page 24

ECHOES FROM ODO CORNERS.

(Collated By "Will-o’-the-Wisp.")

I plucked a quill from Fancy's wing And swiftly wrote, "Reign, lovely Spring." It rained! I turned my Muse to gently sing In accents sweet. "Hail, gentle Spring. It Railed! The preliminary skirmishing of our {parliamentary candidate is providing the usual crop of mixed metaphor and clever repartee. At a meeting in Waikaia Mr Gilfedder referred to the New Liberals as "men with a muck-rake delving into a sewer"—a metaphor jus* about as elegant as it is mixed. But the following perpetrated by a candidate for the Hawke's Bay seat will take some beating. ‘‘They'll keep cutting the wool off the sheep that lays the golden eggs until they pump it dry. • The glorious work will never be accomplished until the Government properly assist the good ship temperance to sail from one end of the land to the other, and with the cry of victory at each step she takes she shall plant her banner in every town and hamlet from Waikaremoan a to the topmost heights of Ruahine." The way ill-luck pursues some people is truly remarkable. Charles Bellman, a young man of about eighteen years, came to New Zealand from England eight months ago. He worked one month, met with an accident and was laid up in the hospital for seven months. He was out of the hospital one week when he was kicked by a horse, narrowly escaping with his life. He had barely recovered when, one day he was chopping wood, holding the axe in one hand and the block .in the other. He made a misshit and slashed his hand, necessitating another visit to the doctor, who inserted five stitches. This completes the list to date. There is a change of luck in odd numbers, and perhaps No. 3 will be the last misfortune that happens to Bellman. This is a canard. A London judge lately inquired of a witness what he meant by ‘‘up-to-dick ?" Witness replied: “ ‘Slapup,' ‘All-right,' ‘Up-to-date,' my lord!" Asking a learned counsel.if he could give the meaning, the lawyer replied: "It is a phrase that originated in Maoriland. In the early days when Mr Seddon was Still a miner, hie admiring mates constantly remarked it was ‘Up to Dick' to stand for Parliament. His tumultuous success as a politican has made the phrase not only colonially but universally applicable to anything superlatively good." Mr Roosevelt, in addressing the Kaiser, used the pronoun "you," but in the message handed to the press the words "Your Majesty" were substituted, and the President of the United States thereby saved from the crime of lese majeste. After all there is more majesty in the President's simple, natural life than in the Kaiser's spiked moustache and rooster feathers. Apropos the accomplishments of Bailey the spiritualistic medium, the f ollowing ia not without interest. Mr David Syme, proprietor of "Melbourne Age," has taken an interest in the spiritualistic movement in Melbourne lately, and the manifestations of one so-called successful medium have especially attracted him, but he does not seem to be one of the faithful; on the contrary, he is evidently impelled by a spirit of doubt and mistrust. At one seance recently, when the medium promised that his spirits were prepared to bring anything those present might ask for, Mr Syme asked for an Indian paper of that day's date. The spirit then under control declined to obey. “But," said Mr Syme, "it is a fair request. You offer to bring fresh bread hot from, an Indian oven, why not a paper hot from an Indian press?" The spirit said firmly in pigeon English that he couldn't do. it. The man of the "Age" pointed out that to a spirit who could bring fish fresh from the bottom of the sea, and relics from unknown Egyptian graves at a moment's notice, it should he an easy matter to bring the paper asked for. "If it's an easy matter do it yourself!" snapped the spirit, which had evidently lost its temper, and the seance ended there.

A very singular thing happened' in connection with the litigation Dalton v. Dee, from the Hawera district, heard in the Supreme Court, Wanganui. About a fortnight before the date on which the case was set down for hearing the defendant fell ill. A week later the plaintiff was also taken ill and died, and the day before the date of the hearing the defendant also died. A Scot whose wife had quarrelled with him, and had gone to live with her mother,, was met by a friend, who, in apparent sympathy, accosted him thus: "Man, Jamil, this is an awfu' thing that the wife has gane an* left ye.” "Deed, jnan,” quoth Jamie, "she'll dae warn* than that yet.” "Whit waur can she dae than that?” asked his friend, anxiously, "■She'll come back again,” ruefully replied Jamie. Mr Russell Sage is the amiable millionaire who denounced holidays as the robbing of employers. "When I engage a clerk,” he said. "I pay for his working time. Why ask me to pay for times he chooses to be idle?” With such views a man is capable of anything, and the following new story of Mr Sage will surprise nobody. He was asked for a subscription to a charity, and a list of subscribers was handed to him. Never having subscribed a cent to a charity in hie life, he regarded the proposal as brigandage. But looking over the list he saw the name of his wife, who has money of her own, and endows brigandy with it. He took a pen and wrote something on the list. The collector, overjoyed by this unexpected triumph, was eager to see what he had contributed. Opposite his wife's subscription the millionaire had written “Mr and Mrs”! Very late on a bitter cold night, recently a well-known and bulky Ta'hape 'eiti*en, who stays at a certain hostelry, took a warm bath. He fell asleep. The

* girtsdually cooled, but still he slept. Eventually the cold half-woke him, and he sleepily essayed to pull the blankets up round hie shoulders. His groping hand struck something hard and deadly cold. The shock woke him completely. The bath was frozen over. The noise that b’vlky citizen made as he thrashed out &n to tho floor of the bath-room was like a rhinocerous backing through a -plateglass window. Mr Robert Blatchford (better known as "Nunquam") in a chatty article in the "Clarion" speaks very convincingly of vegetarianism as true diet for mankind. He says since he has become a he has lost the keen craving for tobacco that he had hitherto experienced. Similarly the taste For wine has left him. Hock and Burgundy, once favourite beverages, now taste to him like physic. "Nunquam" thinks the solution of the Temperance problem and of many hygienic mysteries is to be found in a vegetable diet. An exiled Scot charged recently before the Stratford Magistrate's Court with having imbibed too freely of his native mountain dew, when asked if the charge was true replied: —"Gin the pollis say I was the waur o't, it maun be true —I ha'e never kent a pollisman to tell a lee!" And Scotsmen have no sense of humour. It. has been discovered in Rongotea that a half-acre section in the township is the property of the Presbyterian Church, having been set aside as a site for a church when the block was cut up nearly twenty years ago. A pill vendor, fined at Woolwich, London, for trading without a pedlar's license, claimed exemption on the plea that his pills wer© largely compounded of vegetable ingredients, vegetable hawkers not being required to have a license. The magistrate, however, answered this false logic by observing that he might say that oysters included pearls. “Or," added the clerk, "cocoanut matting might be classified as fruit." Lovely woman has been the downfall of a West Coast School Committee. She was the only lady member, and m ere men naturally wanted to smoke during the eveiing as usual. But she objected, and as she would not give in neither would they, and unanimously stayed away. So there was no quorum. As the committee thus failed in its duty, a commissioner has been appointed—a mere man, and the lady who never saw six more stubborn men ; n her life is out in the cold. A nttle more "White Australia." It is alleged that a Chinaman, Ah Long, has purchased a big sugar estate from the C.S.R. Co. in the Cairns (N. Queensland) district, consisting of 4000 acres, for Jei€,ooo cash down on th© nail. The triumphal march of our footballers, in the Old Country has made football much oftener the subject of conversation than heretofore in places where men most do congregate. Recently we heard it claimed that cricket was a much older game than football. On referring to authorities, however, we find-that on the score of antiquity football is an easy first. Though definite reference to the game in Britain cannot be traced earlier than the twelfth century, antiquarians incline to the view that football was introduced into Britain prior to the coming of the Conqueror—with those earlier conquerors, the Romans, in fact. They had a popular game with a ball called "harpastum" (from the Greek verb meaning to seize), which seems to have been a primitiveform of the Rugby game, and the Greek gamie "episcyrus" was probably of a nature. But there is one notable contrast. "Dusty" is the adjective applied by the poet Martial to Roman football ; to-day Mr Kipling speaks of " ‘mud'-died oafs at the goals." The foreshore inspector at Filey (Yorkshire) made the following verbal report to his council: "On September 1, a hawker coom'd owre fra' Scarborough wi' them diddering things of balls on elastic. Ah tell'd him to get off t’sands, and he gave a lot of sauce; so ah catched hod on him by t'collar and breeches and put him on t'rooad." Asked what the man said, the inspector replied, "Why, he groonted a bit."

During his so-called holiday in the Old Country, Dr Hocken must have worked harder than a great many people do at their regular business. Searching about for records of very early New Zealand history, he discovered much, and gathered together a mass of information that should make a valuable and interesting book. Principally he concerned himself with that notable pioneer Samuel Marsden. About bis early life the doctor has collected a great deal that is new, and within a year he hopes to have the result of his labours ready for publication. That publication will cost money, and he intends to ask the Government for assistance in the matter. A well-known Norfolk landowner haakse the statement that the brick bearing Nelson's initials, preserved under a glass case at Paston Grammar School, is not a relic of the great admiral, but was the result of a schoolboy's "lark” about twenty-four years ago. At that time Mr Rider Haggard's father stated that Nelson while at the school had carved his initials on one of the walls. As the hoys could not find the brick bearing the initials one of them conceived the brilliant idea of supplying the defect, which he promptly did, filling up the initials with moss and earth to give them a properly ancient appearance. The Norfolk landowner declares that he saw the boy do it, that there are other eye-witnesses living, and that if he is challenged he will give their names. William P. Naughton, the ballot-box expert, found guilty of getting at the St. Vincent's Hospital art union for all the prize-money, is said to have been mixed up with some peculiar circumetant .ee in Maoriland. He bossed the drawing of a Sisters of Mercy art union 4n Auckland, and all the principal prizes were won by the girl he was engaged to. There were suspicions then, but William P. Naughton threatened large libel actions, and as no one knew more than that he seemed to be engaged to a very lucky girl, the voice of slander died away in the dim, dim distance. Now the voice of slander is calling out pretty loudly again. "Them brassworkers,” said the grimy

man who seated himself in the London Tube carriage, "them brassworkers 'it the mark." "What brassworkers?" inquired an innocent youth, thirsty for information. "Them at Berlin," was the reply. “What I say is that every British workman is a blanky fool. And when I say that I'm talkin' about what I know. I'm a British workman myself —and proud on it!" Reference to the map will show, up the west coast of North Auckland, a land--locked sheet of water known as Kaipara Harbour, with Kaipara river flowing in at the southern end, and Wairoa river at the northern; down one river and up the other is a waterway, beside which no other inside the coastline of the colony can be compared for a moment. To describe it as a harbour really conveys no idea of its far-flung proportions; it is an inland sea, with no less than 2000 miles of coastline, that is to say that the land surrounding it has 2000 miles of water frontage. All the navies in the world could be stowed away on that broad bosom and scarcely be seen from the other shore. in several Hjon&on papers is advertised the Danysz rat virus. The preparation is made at the Pasteur Instiute, and is sold as ati article of commerce. Dr Danysz, who has offered to visit Australasia and experiment with a rabbit disease, is responsible for this virus, and according to the advertisements it is very effective in disposing of rats. A London butcher has proffered a testimonial, in which he states that the virus beats everything he has tried for killing rats, and there is no trouble with dead bodies. Alter giving the rats a chance to get the preparation his sons killed forty with sticks. Apparently the rats die very gradually, and while dying leave their nests and venture abroad in a very weak state, probably looking for somebody to end their miserable lives. Mr Bert Peace, of Hamilton, who was recently in the King Country eetabl shing a branch bicycle business in Taumarunui, met with a startling experience there. He, or rather the bike on which he rode, was attacked by a bull, shortly after fording the Ongarue river, some six miles north of Taumarunui township. The animal, coming on at a smart pace, thrust his horns into the centre of the frame, and with a quick twisting movement of the head threw Mi’ Peace and half the machine a distance of several yards onto a steep scrub-covered bank, where, they rolled •&. considerable distance. The bull, after sniffing awhile at the remains of the machine left on the road, trotted off whence he came. Mr Peace, who was fortunately unhurt, then experienced the exhilarating task of carrying one half of the bicycle and trundling the other half the six or seven miles back to Taumaruuui. A Broken Hill syndicate who sold 100,000 share® in South Blocks to the Lake View Company, have declared a d’vidend of 175 per cent', on pound shares, and 3500 per cent, on 13s shares. These are something like dividends. A young Queenslander is a striking example of the indomitable energy occasionally met with in the true Australian type. Born of humble parents, he first engaged in the Miines Department a®, a clerk. He was sent to one of the mining towns. After a year or two he asked leave to sit for the University examinations. While in Brisbane he explained to the office that he had obtained an engineer's certificate, and asked permission, while in the city, to go up for examination as a mine manager. He succeeded at the University examination, and also got his mine manager's certificate, provided he put in a certain time underground. Quite recently he was admitted to practise a® a barrister, and he is now studying bacteriology —on a a salary ox .£BO a year! He may not h"ve made much money so far, but for energy a red ant and a bee and a circular saw don t compare with him. . , A disgraceful state of affairs is reported* from America—the sale of forty-nine girl® American and Canadian, to wealthy Chinamen, through collecting agencies at Shanghai and Chicago. The prices paid ranged from 500 to I,ooo. dollars, the girls being nominally engaged as high class serFour pellets of shot out of ‘an ordinary helping of beef, entered inwards from the abattoirs via the family butcher, are a weighty cargo. A Dunedin man had it accidentally consigned to Kim recently. Me announced the first pellet with a pronoun ; to the second and third he dedicated certain -adjectives. When the fourth skidded between his teeth he it with all the parts of speech of three. i?^ 1 - guages. A little investigation of the ]omt discovered sixteen pellets, all within a radius of about three inches. A correspondent relate? that & ratiier unusual and startling experience befel two peaceful resident® in a country district the other day. Prompted by curiosity to explore a lonely hut in which a man haa recently died, they turned their steps thither when out with their guns looking for sport. As they drew near to the forsaken domicile, their equilibrium was greatly disturbed by an unearthly rumbling noise inside, and awe-stricken fry /kfr® suggestion that it might h© the ghost or the departed, and conscious-smitten, too, because it was Sunday, they hesitated a long time on the outskirts. Determined, however, not to be baffled even if they had t-o- face his Satanic Majesty himself, one levelled his gun at the height of a man's head, while the other pushed the door open with the barrel of his weapon. The sight whicn greeted their already forsaken eyes was enough to shatter the nervous system of the strongest, for out of the door rushed horns, and a head with wild fiery eyes, and not taking time to see that it was only a harmless cow, which had evidently been caught in a trap, they dropped their guns and fled to the bush. Now tftat ‘‘spontaneous" generation ' (if the ridiculous term must be retained) has exchanged the realm of superstition for that of fact, an older theory about it becomes interesting. In Andrews’ ‘‘Anecdotes Ancient and Modern" (1789), we read: "Should a Glass-house fire be kept up, without extinction, for a longer term th-an seven years, there Is no doubt that Salamander would be generated in tne Cinders." This probably accounts for tne

popular idea that a salamander lives in rue fire, a fallacy so far removed from, the truth that the curious lizard-like beasfc so called cannot endure even the heat of the sun, but skulks away under stone* to avoid it. It will never lose its reputation for fire-eating, though, which lingers still in the cooking utensil that is named after it. Lord Giamis. who came of age a few days ago, would on that eventful day hear from the lips of his father, the Earl of Strathmore, the secret of the "haunted room" in Castle Giamis, Forfarshire. This has been the invariaCie practice on such occasions from time immemorial. What secret tlie "haunted room" conceals is supposed to be passed on to every heir as he attains his majority. Thus its precise nature is never in tile possession of more than three persons, and m fact seldom more than two persons at the same time, for some assert that the paternal grandsire in this family never survives until the dreau secret is divulged to the third party. Conjecture and tradition say that a long time ago, when the Lindsays and the Ogilvies i*ere at feud, a number oT the latter clan were imprisoned and died in that particular .chamber. That the loom has some uncanny peculiarities appears beyond doubt, for the late Lord Strathmore had it walled up after visiting the apartment one night to determine the origin of certain weird noises which it is said had for a long time disturbed and puzzled him. Here is a short poem by a Welshman, extracted from ‘‘History of Wales," by B. B. Woodward, 8.A., as a very interesting item of the genius of T. elsh poetry. There is a great truth embodied in the lines, which may be of as great service to the present age as to the past. Besides, the world is greatly indebted to the genius of the Welch, race in more ways than one, and it is desirable that their teachings in poetry, as well as music, should not be forgotten in the headlong rush of modern times." The piece referred to is as follows : Poverty causes exertion, Exertion causes prosperity, Prosperity causes wealth, Wealth causes pride, Pride causes contention, Contention causes war, TV ar causes poverty, Poverty causes peace. The peace of poverty causes exertion, Exertion brings n>und the same circle as before. —Cattwg Ddoeth.