MORE HOWLERS

Otago Witness, Issue 4039, 11 August 1931, Page 65

MORE HOWLERS

BATTLE OF ROWLAND HILL A NEW USE FOR COSMETICS. “ Sir Phillip Sidney will always be remembered in English history because he gave up his hot-water bottle to another soldier on the battlefield.” No doubt Jones Minor (or whoever was the perpetrator of this “ howler ”) considered it quite as great a sacrifice ae the more usual glass of water. This was one oi the “ howlers ” received in a recent competition run by the University Corresponds. nt. Here are some more with a historical flavour:— The battle about the penny post was fought on Rowland Hill. Christopher Columbus didn’t discover America, but he diecovered something just like it. Bannock Burn so called because Alfred burned cakes there. Q.: Show as clearly as you ca~ the debt that England owes to Chatham? A.: Chatham did much to help England from foreign attacks, and so England owes him £2OOO for his work. ' Wilberforce introduced the slave trade in Elizabeth’s reign. While the Parliament was discussing about the Bill of Rights, James II suddenly had a baby so the Seven Bishops said he couldn’t be king any longer. The knierht rushed down the path where he thought he heard the cry, but alas! his end came quickly, for turning a sharp corner he crashed into a yawning abbess. “ WHITE FOR JOY.” It was a misogynistic schoolboy who wrote; “White is a colour that stands for joy; women are married in white but men never are.” There is a similarity of ideas about this, too: “ ‘ His bridle reins were golden chains ’ (Slave’s Dream). .This means that he had just been married.” Literature is responsible for some amusing examplee: The sonnet was first written by an Italian lady’ called Octava Rima. The length of the sonnet is five metres. Keats wrote an ode to the “ Greasy Urn.” Johnson was a great literary restorer — he practically’ killed patriotism and it did not last long after him. A passive verb is when the subject is the sufferer and the object the doer, as “ He is married to her.” HOW TO PRESERVE TEETH. Under the heading of “ Mathematics and Science” we get these:— A sextant is a church caretaker. In cases of poisoning a cosmetic is used. A matrix is a component part of a bedstead. The best way to preserve the teeth is to put them in water overnight. Wireless valves work by eccentricity. And some defy classification:— A toadstool is a thing that looks like a mushroom then if you eat it ymu die and you know it is not a mushroom. M.A. is what a lady becomes when she gets married. Levi sat at the receipt of costumes. Venus was a goddess who used to cure colds with lightning.