HERE AND THERE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16539, 24 September 1921, Page 8

HERE AND THERE.

PROPHESYING DEATH. Following a meeting between Cole, ridge and Keats, the former said, “ There is death in that hand.’* Keats died within a year. George Fox, the founder of the Quakers, met Cromwell riding in Hampton Court Park, and later wrote in his diary, “ Before I came to him, as he rode at the head of his Life Guards, I saw and felt a waft of death go forth against him, and when I came to him he looked like a dead man.” The great Protector died a few weeks laterA premonition of the tragic fate which was in store for him on April 14, 1865, was felt by Lincoln, the great President of the United States. At a meeting on the morning of the fatal dav he was observed to wear a grave and troubled look. When General Grant asked what was the matter, Lincoln replied that he had had a strange dream. In the afternoon his mood changed to one of extreme gaiety, and his wife remarked uneasily: “I have seen you thus only once before, and that was just before our Willie died.” Lincoln was shot the same night. “ Zadkiel,” in his almanac for 1861, published in the autumn of 1860, used the passage: “ The position of Saturn in May will be evil for all persons born upon August 26. Among the sufferers 1 regret to see the worthy Prince Conthese realms.” Tho Prince Consort died in December, 1861. PLANTS THAT SLEEP. In the same way that there is a circulation of the blood in man, so tliero is a circulation of the sap in plants. This movement shows itself in different ways, but tho simplest form is seen in those flowers which follow the sun. It is due to no act of will on the part of the plant, but simply to the fact that the parts turned towards the sun grow more quickly than the rest: hence stalks are lengthened in that direction, and the plant itself keeps facing towards the sun. When the sun hap set such flowers as the evening primrose open, whilst others which have been expanded all day close their petals aa darkness draws on. As a rule, those flowers which depend for fertilisation upon the action of day insects, such as bees and butterflies, close at dusk. But many flowers attract nocturnal insects—motli9, earwigs, and beetles—and these have formed the habit of remaining closed all day and opening after the sun has set. If you examine oommon clover at night, you will find that its leaves are folded downwards instead of being spread out flat—in fact, the leaves are asleep. The beet, lupin, and mimosa all take their rest at night, and the last can feel pain, for if one of tho leaves be pinched, those near it will curl up immediately. *•* LIBELLING THE HORSE. How we do misuse words to be sure, For instance, take horse-radish. Tho horse-radish is not & radish at all. but a big coarse plant of the same genus as scurvy grass, and known only because the root is used in making a. sauce for roast beef. The fact of the matter is that horse-radish is so called merely because it ia <* large, coarse-looking plant. You will find that exactly the same line of reasoning appears in the naming of a number o? other plants and creatures which also bear the name of one of the noblest of our domestic animals. The horse chestnut may be * handsome tree hut, unlike the Spanish, chestnut, its fruit is practically value, less. Then there is the so-called horse mushroom, a big coarse fungus which, though not actually unwholesome, haa little flavour. The horse-leech, a creature which nas a hideous hunger for blood, bv some is supposed to have gained its name because it attacks horses and fastens upon them, but the real reason seems because it is large, coarse, and more or less useless. ,r ArRT persiflage. Mr Orville Wright was once entertained at lunch by the Amateur Airmen s Club, an association of weafthv young Americans, each of whom pilots Ins own aeroplane. When the coffee and cigar stage had been reached someone happened to remark that flving for pleasure was becoming more popular every day, and the proposal was made that they should trv and invent a suitable name for the "new fad i'lyphoid fever,” was the first suggestion and, keeping up the spirit of the joke, others suggested “ inflewenza ” and “ aerosipelas.” “ What do you say, Mr Wright ?” asked one voung fellow at length. “Why not ‘ skyatiea replied Orville. YOUNGEST TOWN CLERK. The youngest Town Clerk in the Kingdom resides at Peel, Isle of Man She is Miss Lillian Cringle, a charming young lady of nineteen summers. Such outstanding ability and initiative did MIS 3 Cringle show during a recent Local Government Board inquiry into the alleged maladministration of municipal affairs by the Town Commissioners that she has won the admiration and respect of ail, and more than justified her election as Town Clerk. Certainly on achievement to be proud of. V PLANTS AND THEIR ORIGIN. It is fairly generally known that most of the flowers ,that adorn our gardens have been procured from plants w hich originally grew wild. For instance, the chequered lily came from France and Italy about 1550, while the Crown Imperial lily was first brought from Persia to Constantinople. From there it was taken to the Emperor’s garden at Yienna, whence it found its way all over Europe. Again, the belladonna lily wa9 procured from South America in 1593, while the Guernsey lily was brought from Japan and was first cultivated at the beginning of the seventeenth century in the garden of an Englishman in Paris. This plant is said to have derived its name from the following episode. A ship, laden with bulbs, was, wrecked off the coast of Guernsey, A number of the bulbs were cast up on the shore and took root in the soil, where they grew rapidly. The dahlia was discovered in Mexico and sent to a professor at the Botanio Gardens, Madrid, who named it in. honour of the Swedish professor. Dahl. So far as the rose is concerned, it is found in almost every country north of the Equator, and derives its name from rhos, meaning red. Of this plant more than one hundred species have been described. KISSING NOT A CRIME. A Berlin judge has ruled that t<» kiss in public is not to commit an offence against public morals. A policeman saw a young man kiss a girl in the Tiergarten (Zoo), where Berlin lovers keep their summer evening trysts, and shocked at the incident arrested the pair—one a t-Terk, the other a typist He later took them before the Magistrate. Counsel for the defence said the case was full of supreme importance to “lovers of all time and all nations who look on the touching of lips as a symbol of mutual devotion.“ He denounced scornfully the policeman, who, on his own admission, spent half an hour peeping from behind a bush to see whether the young lovers would, by kissing, give him an excuse for arresting them. As indicated, the Court dismissed the case.