MISCELLANEOUS.

Southland Times, Issue 1986, 21 September 1874, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

A French paper points out how the passion for gambling in England is shown by the fact that even in wedding notices it is necessary to state that there were " no cards." A bookbinder had a book brought him to be re-bound After the job was finished he made the following entry in his daybook — " For repairing the Way to Heaven, 25 cents." Boswell, observing to Johnson that there was no instance of a beggar dying from want in the streets of Scotland, " I believe, sir, you are very right," says Johnson, "but this does not arise from the want of beggars, but the impossibility of starving a Scotchman. " True Sympathy. — We can most of us sympathise, but to understand is a subtler quality. Unselfish sympathy, that forgets itself, and does not obtrude, is the sweetest aud rarest of all. — ' The White Cat,' in the Cornhill Magazine. Goose and Gridiron. — A goose, proud of her wings, taunted a gridiron with its inability to fly. " Foolish bird !" that utensil replied ; " I shall perhaps one day broil those members of which you now boast." Moral : Boast not of transient advantages. — -"Songs and Fables," by Professor Rnnkine. One's Ideal. — " You mean," he said, sitting down by her, and speaking more thoughtfully, " you mean that one never realises one's ideal. I suppose that is true ; but that is not the ideal's fault. It is only that as soon as one has attained to it one seems to see something "beyond. I do not think that the fact of the possession destroys the charm. And I suspect also that one's ideal as it existed in the past never altogether loses its hold. Even if Rachel had grown 'old and ugly, Jacob would still recall her to his mind as he had at first seen her, a fresh, beautiful young girl, watering her sheep beside the Veil."—" Under the Limes." Sic Gabnet Wolesley.— This stately little gentleman of proud military bearing, quick bright eye, broad, high forehead, ardent temperament, a sparkling, vivacious intelligence animating every feature — this, then, is Sir Garnet Wolseley — the pacificator of Red River, and the young hero chosen for the conmand of the British Expedition to Coomassie. He is the very reverse of my conception of Sir Garnet Wolseley, who called the gentlemen of the press " drones," aud a " curse to modern armies." If he had not been a soldier, by his appearance I should judge him to have made a firstclass special correspondent, just the man to have seized an item, and dared a general-in-chief to lay hands on him, just the man to be sent to any part of the world to collect news. His eager eyes betray the inquisitive soul and indomitable energy. Taking no offence whatever at his sharp-tempered criticism of the " Necessity of the Age," I admit at once that the British Government could have found no worthier man to entrust the castigation. of the Ashantees to than Sir Garnet Wolseley. — " Coomassie and Magdala." By H. M. Stanley. The RoarATS" Conquest. — It is astonishing that learned men find a ground for extolling Roman conquest in the cry, " How else could Europe have resisted the barbarians ?" If Greece and Carthage had not been conquered by Rome, on the basin of the Mediterranean, numerous powers would have kept one another in cheek, then as now. Freedom and law would have been saved, and wifeh them manly spirit. With the resources of civilised wealth, and unbroken national spirit, barbarians can always be repressed. Rome broke men's spirits, and would not endure that a provincial should ever have protection from a violent and tyrannical official. Therefore was Europe cursed by the barbarian invasion, with infinite anguish, and with an almost total wreck of the knowledge aud culture which long 'centuries had worked out. — Fraser's Magazine.