HERE AND THERE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17995, 4 November 1926, Page 8

HERE AND THERE.

AN EYE FOR EVERYTHING. Pianos. Tt is sometimes thought that gradu* ally the pla.ver-piano will drive the piano out ot the field, and that there will be no more piano-playing, save by the means of the mechanical instrument. But this is not likely’. The piano-player is a marA-ellous invention, and a great boon to numbers of people. But enjoyment of its performance cannot equal the fascination of personal playing of the instrument. There is a greater jo.v to be had from making music than from listening to it. The piano will alwavs possess its students. The Patron Saint ot Domestic Servants. St Zita of Lucca, the patron saint of domestic servants. AA-as the daughter of Tuscan peasants li\'ing in the hill district near Lucca. When she was eleA-en years of age she was placed by' her parents as a servant-maid in a Avealthy clothier’s household in that city', and there she remained until she died—in her sixtieth year. She worked her way up and became children’s nurse and finally housekeeper. Ruskin writes of her:—“ Here is a quite unquestionable fact, in the thirteenth century, of extreme and lovely significance—that a poor serA-ant girl, living in the midst of an intensely' acti\*e and warlike city, became so known there, and so beloA’ed for her mere and pure goodness,” that thirty y'ears after her death Dante, the greatest poet of Italy*, acknowledges her the patron saint of her city’ and “ sufficiently distinguishes a burgher of Lucca from one of any' other city by calling him ‘ one of Santa Zita's Elders.’ ” Napoleon's Three Skulls. There seems some danger of the famous Cotton collection of the Waterloo Relics being broken up. Cotton was a sergeant-major with an eye to the main chance, who almost immediately’ the battle was o\’er set about collecting relics, and soon had an exhibition on the battlefield itself. The original version of a A'ery old chestnut was concerned w’ith Cotton as guide to the battlefield. It was said, doubtless without foundation, that he used to point to three skulls, saying: “ That is the skull of Napoleon when he was a boy’, that other his skull when he was a man. ancl this was his skull when he fought the battle of Waterloo.” Origin of Sea-Bathing. The credit of disco\*ering that a dip in the sea might really be enjoyed belongs appropriately to Great Britain. The fashion is commonly supposed to owe its popularity to a certain Dr Russell. who about the middle of the eighteenth century’ produced a much-talked-of treatise on the merits of saltwater bathing. As far back as 1736 a few Englishmen, to all other appearances sane, liked splashing about in the sea, and would put up with a great deal of discomfort at the wretched village of Brighthelmston in order to do it. By the year 1770. Margate also had become a recognised health and pleasure resort, and sea-bathing was all the rage. A Gat and a Kitten. The civilisation of the New World, for all its bustle, still has time for cats. One of them in New York recently chose a rather difficult time hnd place to put the affections of the inhabitants to a test when it felt impelled to ferry its kitten across Broad Street, at the corner of Wall Street, in the midst of the afternoon stream of traffic. Directly in front of the Stock Exchange, the cat took her kitten in her mouth and strode with its cushioned tread across to the opposite sidewalk. Motor-cars coming from both directions halted, pedestrians gaA’e her the right of way , spectators, at the end of the trip, burst into applause at the courtesy’ to members of another species, and the cat and her charge continued, unhurried and unconcerned. A .Rent Free Manor House. At Matlock, Bath, Derbyshire, the housing shortage seems to haA-e passed. A Leicester and Derby property owner has publicly offered a beautifullysituated manor house there rent free for the Avinter months, in suite or as a whole. Early’ in September the owner said he had not had any’ lettings, although the offer had been open a month. Canaries for Prisoners. Five hundred canaries add a measure of cheer, with their merry' chirping, to the inmates of the loAva State prison, in the United States. The inmates become especially fond of pets and canaries seem to l>c faA*ourites. pehaps because they* best exemplify carefree happiness, even in captivity’. About 100 prisoners have their individual birds and tend them in their cells. The Victoria and Albert Museum. The Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington, owes its origin to the Great Exhibition of 1851. In 1856 there was erected an ugly' structure, nicknamed ” The Boiler-house,” in which were stored a number of models and other exhibits which the Exhibition Commissioners had no further use for. Other buildings were erected from time to time, and by degrees the South Kensington Museum, as it was then called, came into existence. The foundation stone of the present building Avas laid in 181*9. and the same year, byVommand of Queen Victoria, it was green the title it now’ bears. St Patrick's Prophecy. Dublin, which has in hand a very ambitious scheme for the extension of the city* boundaries, had an origin in a very remote pcrnxl (savs the “ Dailv Chronicle”). There was a fishing village on the site long before the Christian era, when it was called ” The Ilill of the Hazel ood. Its modern name was acquired by degree. First it was Bally Ath l hath, the Town of the Ford of Hurdles; then it become BaJlv Ath Cliath Dubh Linnc, The Town of the Ford of Hurdles on *he Black River, and so Dublin. According to tradition. St Patrick foretold great things for it. " That small village shall hereafter be an eminent city; it shall increase in eminence and dignitv. until at length it shall be lifted up unto ilia throne of the kingdom.”