Varieties.

Otago Witness, Issue 765, 27 July 1866, Page 14

Varieties.

What Length ought a lady's crinoline to be ?~A little above two f eer.

A 'Maiden Speech.— Ask Papa. " Dear me," exclaimed a lady, as she looked at the hoa constrictor in a enow, " why the ekin of the creature is of a regular tartan pattern.", "It is, my dear." remarked her husband ; "and that is what Shakspcre alluded to when he talked about a snake being • Scotched.' "

A gentleman in Scotland, says a contemporary, has preserved a number of the Greenock " Advertiser,," containing the following announcement :—": — " Notice to Correspondents. — T. C:-— The lines commencing, 'On Linden when the sun was low,' are not up to the standard. Poetry is evidei.tly not ' T.O.V forte/ It is needless to 6ay that •T. C was Thomas Campbell,

A Totjchikg Appeal. — " Policeman, spare that dog, touch uot a single h*"ir ; he worries many a hog, from' out his muddy lair, Oh, when he •ftas a pup, sofiisky and so plump, he lapped his milk from a cup, when hungry, at a jump. And then bis funny tricks, so funny, in, their place, so lull of canine licks upon your hands a^d face. You will surely let him live ! Oh, do not kill him— dead ;he ■wags his narrative, and prays for life — not lead. Go, get the muzzle now, and put upon his mouth, and stop that how, wow, wow ! and tendency to drougth. He is your children's pct — companion of their joy ; you will not kill him yet, and thus their hopes destroy. No, policeman, spare that pup, touch not a single hair ; oh, put your pistol up, and go away from there."

An' unusual number of funeral parties have lately gone from Canada to bury their dead on the American side of the border. Lately the United States revenue officer insisted in one instance upon seeing the corpse, notwithstanding the indignant protects of the relatives. He did not succeed in " seeing a corpse," but he saw very costly silks. Void. — An eminent special pleader visited the theatre, when the play enacled was "Macbeth." In the scene where Macbeth, questioning the witches in the cavern, says, " What is't you do ?" they answer, " A deed ■without a name:' The phrase struck the ears of the lawyer, who turned to a friend and eaid, " Why, then it's void "

On a recent trip of one of the Illinois river packets— a light draft one, as there were only two feet of water in the channel — the passengers weie startled by the cry of a man overboard^ The steamer was stopped, and preparations were made to save the man, when he cried, '•' Go-ahead with your darned steamboat, I'll walk behind."

A certain bishop was recently rebuking one of his clergy for fox hunting. "My lord," was the clergyman's answer, " every man must have some relaxation. I as3ureyou I never go to balls." " Oh," said the bishop, I perceive you allude to my having been at the Duchess of iSs party ; but, I give you my word, I never was in the same room as the dancers 1" "My lord," responded the clergyman, "my horse and I are gettiug old, and we are never in the same field as the hounds 1"

Cattain Mayxe Reid's Style. — Alonzo seized the maiden, leapt on his bare- boned steed, and, with a yell, disappeared from the wondering Apaches ! Away, like lightning, sweptthe steed, at about four miles an hour, till just when they reached the 42nd milepost on the confined prairie, they saw an object crouching behind it. The " Jaguar of the Wilds of Airicay !" whispered Alonzo, in stentorian accents. But, wait a bit— here goes ! To bound from his steed, draw his knife, stab the jaguar to the heart, skia and dress it, catch up his horse — now about 16 miles distant — throw the skin around the lily shoulders of his dusky bride, was the work of about half a eecond!