THROUGH Our EXCHANGES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 34, 8 February 1913, Page 8

THROUGH Our EXCHANGES.

The doll is probably the most an-1 tiquo of toys, it has boon found in-' side the graves of the children of an-1 cient Home. -i! “Punishment in a future state” was' tlie Dean of St. Paul’s subject in Ins sermon at St. Paul’s Cathedral on December 15., “We should now like to be assured,” he said, “that torture ha; | been entirely abolished, and that the lighter sentences of the Diety, like the sentences of our judges, are terminable in case of good conduct in gaol. But we really know nothing about it. There have been no definite revelations of the future life. The devil has no better trick than pretending to be dead,” was one of the Dean s striking sentences. A taxicab driver, taking a passenger not long ago from Woking to a 1 snooting party near Godaiming, Surrey, in a district where several tra-' geclies have occurred lately, lost his way and found himself in a wild and ■ ■desolate spot. Hearing a tap on the window, lie looked round and saw h;s fare apparently presenting a double-1 barrelled gun at bis head. The driver | dropped on to his knees and screamed, “Good heavens, sir, don’t shoot.” | : rue man with the gun burst out laughing, and explained was ' putting Ids gun together when the muzzle touched the glass. '

Nothing surprises one 1 nowadays. A Cnioago man had a house in one part of the city which he wished to move to a vacant lot in another pain on the shore, three miles away, tie iouud tnat to move the house in tno ordinary way through the streeu> would cost more than it was worth. When a friend facetiously suggested co him that he could better move it by water, he figured on the idea,.and at last put it into practice. The house, which, was a two-storey structure of good size, was loaded by means of tne

usual rollers on to two scows. A tug tnen caught hold and towed it the three miles close to the new location.] This part of the work was very simple, | and it took only an hour. The whole operation required three days, and tire 1 total cost came inside £3OO.

In a letter addressed to the New York Sun a correspondent asks, “in the name' of propriety in abbreviation,” why that journal describes a body of members of Parliament as “M.P.’s.” He asks, “For the plural of M.P. would not the better form bo M.M.P., after the analogy of pp. for pages, L.L.D. for doctor of Jaws, MSS for for manuscripts, and MM. for messieurs? If you prefer to re-j gard the M.P. as a familiar name, to, be turned into the plural like any oth-| er word, you have a combination thati is easy to pronounce but difficult to I write satisfactorily.” He describes! the familiar way of writing M.P.’s as grotesque, and asks, “Why the apostrophe? Or if the apostrophe bo used, why the abbreviation point before it?”I

Rather an intelligent native of the' “Flowery Land,” in conversation v.itn' an Auckland Star reporter, informed j him that things arc very bad in China! just now. In another three or four: years, however, an era of general pro-j sperity is expected, and numbers of I Chinese ‘ now in New Zealand will; leave these shores for p;ood. lhe‘ Chinaman referred to had been hack to his own country three or four timer, 1 but on the last occasion, not long ago, 1 the general outlook was very depre;;-’ sing. Letters from China, received quite recently, state. that depression is universal, money being almost nonexistent, but the residents are looking forward with confidence to the arrival of very good times before long. Very few of the Chinamen who have recently left New Zealand, or who arc, arranging to take their departure shortly, intend to return to the domin-l ion, as they affirm that they will be j able to do better in their own country. It is said that China will short-! ly offer very 'good openings for enterprising Europeans in various industrial undertakings. “The one man band”—the man with the silver-spangled and braided uniform, who plays an accordion, blows a whistle, and beats a drum and trianj.de with bis feet at the same time— I . | collected quite a crowd of Timaruvians on Saturday night. Rut ho was nof always happy with bis audience, who filled in the time when the “band” did not play by pelting it with pennies, pebbles, and. jokes. At one. time the musician became so exasper-. uted that “he spoke in solemn tones! of death,” stating that a man of hie stamp did not fear death if inter-j fared with. Fie also made use of that) word, an acquaintance with which wad so strenuously denied by the good cap-] tain of POLS. Pinafore. However! (says the Post), his audience did not] appear very much afraid, and scem-| ed to think that the “band’s” little j display of temper rather added to j the merit of the entertainment.

The chairman of the Grantham (Eng.) Bench has propounded a new 1 test for drunkenness, ion must ask 1 t.ie suspected person to stand on one leg. If he can do it, he is sober; it he cannot, he ns drunk. Whether he is “half-seas over” or “three sheets in the wind” docs not matter; he is “drunk in the Police Court sense.” How, by the way, do these drunken similes arise? Want is the difference between being “as drunk as a fiddler,” “as drunk as a lord,” “as drunk as ;ii wheelbarrow,” “as drunk as Chloe,” | and “as drunk as .David's sow”? That David kept sheep wo know; but where does the unclean pig conic in ? .

A man known as “Father Daniel,” but whose real name was Jean Baptiste Routeau, died suddenly the other day in a gipsy caravan in winch lie lived at Courbovoie, just outside Paris. Eo was 88. A key which the police found in the old man’s hand unlocked a strong box in one of tne Parisian banks, and this box was found to contain £20,000 in gold, bonds and shares. For .twenty years or more lie bad earned his livelihood as a profe.ssiona! beggar, and had concealed the fact that in 1908 he had inherited a fortune. He came from a good family. The arrest of a girl of good family at Danbury, Connecticut, caught in the act of robbing a house, has caused considerable sensation in that town (says a Chronicle telegram). The girl, Amy Travers, was dressed in man’s clothing, which she confesses were' given her by a confederate, George Smith, a notorious thief. She is infatuated with the burglar, and refuses to give any information which might lead to his capture, from the partial confession she lias made, however. several robberies of houses art attributed to the girl, working undo the direction of Smith. Amy Travers is exceeding popular in Danbury, ant. was a teacher in one of -the local Sunday schools. As the result of a remarkable series of experiments conducted by Professor R. M. .Yerkes, in the psychological department of Harvard College, it has been demonstrated that angleworm* can think and remember (says the Evening Standard). The method which Professor Yerkes adopted was a« follows: An angle or fish-worm will always crawl out of hi lighted place into a dark one. Knowing this, Professor Yerkes put the angleworm inlr a glass dish in which there were two dark holes. The right hand hole was merely a regular earth cavity. ’1 lie left hand one, however, contained a mildly charged electric battery, tinobject of which was to give tiie worm a shock in case he should desire tc poke himself into it. According tc last reports the angleworm had learned the lesson pretty well, and was con-' tinuaily going to the right when he was put into the glass dish.

The “Argentine Tango,” the dance introduced into Paris ball rooms early in 1911, has attained such a vogue

that it has been the' subject of repre

sensations by a party of Argentine dancing professors who have just visited Paris, and of an official statement by the French Academy of Dancing Masters (says the Petite Kepubliqne). The French version of the Tango, the Argentine delegation declared, was corrupt, and the “five-step Tango,” which was last year’s favourite version, is to be replaced by a dance of twelvesteps. The dancers will follow a uniform metronome time of eighty-two (a little slower than the standard time for “God Save the King”). Tne dancers take up a position similar tc that in the Boston. After mazurka steps the man leans backwards and the lady bows, and the dancers then take side-way paces in opposite directions, without unclasping the hands, moving the arms in cadence with the music. This is followed by a twostep figure. The last issue of the English “War Cry” to hand contains the announcement that General Bramwell Booth lias decided upon the introduction of a method of profit-sharing which will give customers a share in the profits received from certain departments of the Salvation Army trading operations. The new arrangement was to come into operation on January Ist, and the departments affected by it included uniform and outfit, books and brass band music, musical instruments, furnishing and general. These will constitute and be known as “The Salvation Army Supply Stores.” The whole of the net profits in each year up to £SOOO will bo divided amongst the customers whose purchases during the year amount to £2 or more, and half of any further profits up to £IO,OOO will be divided in the same way. The net profits will be arrived it after charging 5 per cent interest on the capital employed in the business, i’ho- profit-sharing arrangement is in to way to interfere with the management of the business by the General, vho is still to have absolute control.