Varieties.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 1725, 6 September 1873, Page 3

Varieties.

.. '♦. ■■ ' — I The editor of a country • weekly persuasively remarks : " We offer especial inducements to our subscribers who club together and send in any little matter of eatlabtes, as it were." - • The Boston Globe ftMnka it is unkind to ridicule those items in. th&. papers about centenarians. It says that it is no easy thing to become a centenarian, and it knows several who have failed — one, particularly, who has been at it ninety-seven years, and has not succeeded. A Western musical; critic thus speaks of a prima donna :— She had,, and we suppose still retains, a magnifiaent voice for a fog whkjtle. Its compass was perfectly surprising. She would shake the chandelier with a wild whooD that made every man instinctively feel for his scalp, and followed it'up with a "roar that would shame a, bassoon. Addressing. a. temperance society, a speaker expressed the broad conviction that, "next to Beelzebub himself, Bacchus, inventor of spirituous beverages, brought more sin and misery on» the human race than any other individual of whom Scripture gives us any account."" Aggravating flippancy.— Useful Sister (to Ornamental Sister, who has been bewailing the dullness of her existence for the last hour), '• Bella, you're the most egotistical cieature I ever met in my life I" Bella (who always gets out of everything with a joke). "Well, Jane ? if I am egotistical at all events it's only about myself I" A tremendous " slide" of snow from a roof in a Maine village completely buried a man who happened to be passing by. The good people of the place went to work and dug him out. They found him unhurt, but in tears. He said he was a Swiss, and had not felt so happy for years— that it reminded him of days gone by in his native mountains. The following instance will > prove that a retentive memory is not invariably of the best sort :— A young nun solicited a favour of a person in opulent circumstances, and the answer was, "No ; you have nothing to expect from me until you return the ninepeuce your father charged me for the bond age of my pig 3 thirty years ago this very day !" Little Jenny T is five years old. Her uncle gave her a doll. Jenny cherished the doll wih all a mother's care. The other day she was nursing it on her knees ; she started ■uddenly, the doll fell, and the head wa9 broken of?. Jenny was overcome with grief at this misfortune, and looked aghast at the poor headless doll ; then raising her eyes, she said, with a sigh of resignation," " Another little angel in heaven " A military officer was quartered, a few years ago, in the height of the Fenian disturbance, at Killarnev, where the troops were accommodated, as is by no meana unusual in Ireland, in the workhouse, Being in search of a new sensation, he bethought himself of paying a tailor's bill, addressing, of course, from " The Workhouse, Killarney." Back came the answer by return of post. ' The tailor expressed himself as greatly pained to see so good a customer reduced so low ; he could not think of accepting the amount due to him, which he begged to return ; and, if a ten-pound note would be of a 'any service, he should be most happy to send it. [ Caught. — A worthy baronet in one of .the I midland counties was lately returning home in the evening from a visit, and found the seat in the dog cart rather colder than he expected. His coachman being attired in bis livery great coat, was desired by his master to let him put it on, and to take his lighter one, as he would not feel the cold so much. O.i the baronet's arrival at home and 'ringing the bell, the footman on opening the door, mii without looking who was in the great coat, says, •'• So you have left the old d •— 1 behind?" I- No," exclaims the baronet : •' the old d lis here, and he ; give* yon a month's warning P ''■•*:.