Items.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XIX, Issue 6046, 11 September 1894, Page 3

Items.

Umbrellas made from paper pulp and varnished are now coming into use in various parts of France. The largest oil-painting in the world is one by Tintoretto, entitled Paradise. It is 33i feet in height and 84 feet in width. Three bosom friends started out one evening to have a good time, and when the time for going home came walking was difficult. They finally reached the home of Brown, and made noise enough to waken the neighborhood. A window was raised, and a feminine voice said, "What on earth's wanted?" In thickened accents came the answer, "Will Mishis Brown pleesh comedown and pick out her husband ? " The Countess of Radnor is organising for charity a band of instrumentalists composed of titled ladies. A couple residing in the village of Ferring, Worthing, recently celebrated their seventieth wedding day. The eldest of their thirteen children is 69 years of age. Old Salt : They've dropped the anchor, mum." Old Lady : Serve 'em right, it's been hanging over the side all day." When one of the players was carried off a Rugby football field the other day, limp and exhausted, a youngster joyously remarked : " There's one dead. They'll all be dead soon, an' then I'll set the ball." The service at St. Luke's Church, Greytown was abandoned on Sunday evening, as the only persons present were the minister, his wife, a lay-reader, a lady member of the congregation, and the verger. A man named Tregellis, a visitor at Deal, was so excited at witnessing a lifeboat return from a distressed vessel the other day, that he fell dead on the shore.

The Premier of New South Wales told a deputation from the Federated Seamen's Union that, in his opinion, the Statute Book of the colony was the most antiquated in the world—a mere monument of neglect. When the spider's web on the grass is thickly bespangled with morning dew, and the dandelions ox:>en fully their golden petals before eight o'clock in the morning, it is a very sure sign that the day will be fair ; but we never go home so late. The steamer Waroonga, which recently left Freemantle for Melbourne and Sydney, took 11,7630z. 13dwt. 4 sr. gold from Coolgardie, 913uz. from Tilgarn, and 98oz. sdwt. 20gr. from the Murchison.

It is estimated that the cost of constructing a railway from Mombassa to the shores of Lake Victoria Nyanza would exceed L 4,000,000. The ground is extremely difficult, and the highest point on the route is about 8000 feet above the

A little boy got into trouble with a schoolfellow the other day and agreed with him to "have it out" before the school next morning. That evening when Dick knelt to say his prayers, after the usual " Now I lay me," he added with special petition : " And, O God, make me as strong as lions and things, 'cause I've got to lick a boy in the morning. Amen."