EDITOR'S WALLET.

Otago Witness, Issue 3001, 20 September 1911, Page 82

EDITOR'S WALLET.

Everything has Its B^se. Tho newly-made lord stood in his newlymade grounds, with a newly-made smile of proprietorship upon his face. He was monarch of all he surveyed. Beyond the gilded gates that divided his estate from the road he espied a oouple of old country-women. They were grazing: through the bars with admiration depicted 'in every furrowed line of their features. "Some of my parishioners, by Jove I" drawled the lordly one, turning to his companion. "The admiration of the poor's very amusin'. Wonder what, they're sayin'." As they drew- within earshot they heard the elder woman exclaim: "Just what I was thinking myself, Jane —what a lovely spot that would make to dry the washing in!" Missionary's Stories. "Pastor Willie, an Australian aboriginal teacher, was a very good teacher, but he made his sermons too long, and his congregation murmured. The white pastor heard of this, and thought that Willie required a hint. He told the aborigine that the congregation would like shorter seranons, and that, as he would be with him I in the church that morning, he would tap . with his foot upon the floor. The day was hot, and a few minutes of an aboriginal congregation made it a very hi<jh church. At 25 minutes the minister tapped upon the floor. Willie went on with his argu- . nient. At 25i minutes the minister tanned ! harder. Willie continued expounding. Then a choir boy. a pretty lad, in, a white surplice and biack face, yawned cavernously. Pastor- Willie was stung by the insult. He turned to the unfortunate choir boy. 'You tired, eh? You want not hear me, eh? By cripes, you do that again, I start all over again.' " He Felt It. "Football," cried ihe old gentleman in the Red Lion smokeroom, "is a curse and a disgrace. Football," he continued, thumping the table with his fist, ' is an abomination, and a blot on civilisation. The very name of football," he shouted, sweeping two glasses a.nd a pint pot off the board in his excitement, "the very name of football is enough to' make a decent, respectable man go and 'arug hisself out of pure disgust!" "The gentleman seems to feel rather deeplv on the subject," eaid a'commercial : traveller, who had been listening to his remarks. "He do," assented one of the natives. "Has he lost something at a match?" inquired the commercial. "He 'ave so. 'Ad a relative killed at one," replied the other oracularly. X "What relative was it?" asked tho queerist. " 'ls wife's first husband?" was the response. , Their Own Invention. The advertisements were the most inthings in the paper, according to Mr Hudson's ideas. He read them to his wife as she sat at work on the stockings of their active eon. "No need to spend your time hunting for antiques now," said Mr Hudson, after skimming the cream from r long article, as was his wont. "Here's a man that will undertake and guarantee to make your : new furniture look as if 'twas a hundred years old, by a' process known only to him." "I don't see any need of processes for our furniture." remarked Mrs Hudson, as she cast a hopeless stocking to the flames. "Tommy's feet, are all the process we need. Perhaps we could rent him ou> bv the day." Not Ojiite. John Snobbins, the cobbler, leeently christened his establishment "The Boot Hospital." A customer of a kindred.' lightsome spirit brought him a pair of boots which would have disgraced a gouty tramp. "Shouldn't have these mended, if I was you," said Snobbins severely. "I ' would present them to the deservin' poor." "But v I want them mended," was the reply. -"This is supposed to be a hospital for boots, isn't it?" "Yes, it's a 'ospital all right; but it ain't a mortuary." . Easily Found. It is often said that a Yorkshireman is so keen after money that he will grab at it dead or alive A certain native worked at a sawmill, and one day he met with a,n accident, two of his fingers being cut off and dropping: in the sawdust. Of course the man was hurried off to the infirmary, and after, he was gone his mates began to look for his fingers in the sawdust, when in walked the foreman, who said: "I say, what are you -wasting your time there for? Why don't you get on with your work?" One of the men replied: "That Yorkshire chap has had two fingers cut off, and we're looking for them." "What a waste of time !" cried the foreman. "We'll soon find them." And he threw half a crown on the floor, when up came the two fingers wriggling cut of the sawdust to get at the money! Many-handed. A teacher, after a lesson on the prominent men of the day, to gauge the attention that had been paid, asked the members of her class individually which of the persons she had mentioned they would most like to see. Some said tho King, some tho Prime Minister, and so on; but one small boy at the back shouted: "Please, miss, I'd rather-see my fa.rver's guv'nor." "Well," replied the teacher, "he can hardly be elapsed as a prominent man; but still, let the class hear why you would, like to see him." "Because, teacher, I've heard farver say as how he 'as got over two .hundred handa" What Matter Which ? I When the news became known,, his fel-low-clerks gathered round and congratulated him. "■Rut," said one man doubtfully, " I un-

derstand the girl you're engaged to is a twin. Bit awkward, isn't it? How do you tell the difference between her and her sister?" The man who had just spent six weeks' salary on an engagement-ring smiled indulgently. "Tut! all right. They're a jolly nice family, anyway, and I never bother very.much which one it is!" Didn't Agree With Her. One day a doctor was summoned to a farmhouse, whore he found a woman in a high fever and evidently exceedingly ill He said to her husband, who was the only other person in the house: "Your wife is very ill, and must have nothing' to eat except -milk and beef-tea, but I want you to give her a cup of one or the other every two hours." When he came next morning and asked about his patient, her husband said: "That beef-tea don't agree with her, doctor. It certainly don't. She began to feel bad as soon as she took it." "That's odd," said the doctor. "You didn't give her any little bits of the meat in it, did you?" "No, sir. I strained it first on icoount of the grounds." "Grounds!" roared the doctor. 'What did you make that beef-tea out of?" "Corn beef and the best tea. I boiled 'em together all yesterday afternoon to get the strength out. But it don't agree ■with her, doctor. It certainly don't."'