WAS BALLOONS AT WOOLWICH.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 2, Issue 211, 14 July 1879, Page 2

WAS BALLOONS AT WOOLWICH.

(From the Morning Post.) In the event of Lord Chelmsford accepting a balloon equipment, as proffered by the Government some time since, a staff of aeronauts and several balloons are ready to proceed at once to the scene of operations. The adoption by the Government of the balloon as a warlike agent has created a new industrial department at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, as well as introducing another branch of study to military officers, The Royal Engineers and workpeople engaged in the manufacture of war balloons have had placed at their disposal a long loft near the inflating platform, which forms an admirable workshop for the purpose. An unusually large balloon, to be called the Saladin, of 38,000 cubic feet,- is nearly complete, while two smaller, tho Talia-

man, 19,000 ft,, and the Saracen, 15,000 feet, has been finished, and already made ascents. The Vedete, 14,000 ft., is ready for trial, and the Pilot, a small supply balloon of GOOft., has been tested to good purpose. A great many ascents have been made to a height of 1400 ft., at which position the balloon is held by a rope, and signals by flashes and discs have been exchanged with the earth, practice at which the sappers who form the balloon class have become expert. Arrangements are now made to establish telephonic communication with the car when aloft by means of the mooring rope. The practicability of sending up a fresh supply of gas to a balloon by means of the little Pilot has been demonstrated. yji AN OUTRAGED PARENT. Old Bazembee was returning from his club the other evening, when, he hung up his overcoat on the hall hat rack and prepeared to go upstairs, he heard such stranely excited voices in the front parlor that he paused to listen. A voice that he recognised as belonging to that fast young Synder he had warned Maria about, said contemptuously: " Peace, woman, and weary me no longer by your reproaches. I tell you the day of my wedding with Alice Montressor is fixed, and, by heavens nothing shall prevent our union." Could these words bo addressed to his daughter! Yes, they were indeed, and Maria's sob-choked tones replied : " This, then, is the reward of my sacrifice—my devotion. At the very moment when our guilty secret can no longer be kept, you coolly tell me that I have no hope. Ruined and forsaken, you taunt me with your latest conquest. Monstercoward !" It only required a second for Bazembee to rush up the stairs and get his shotgun out of the closet. The next moment he

buist into the parlor with blazing eyes, and, hurling the blackhearted betrayer to the floor, he placed the muzzle of his breech-loader at his temple, hissing: "Villian, swear to me that you will make an honest woman of this poor duped angel or I will strew the floor with your devilsh brains!" _ " Hooray!'' shouted young Snyder, sitting up and clapping his hands. " That's way up. Magnif. Sperlendid!" " Beautiful, papa. Encore ! Encore ! Bravo!" added Maria, delightedly.v- ---' 'Never saw anything better at Baldwin's." "Bh? i What? I-er-er?" stammered the bewildered parent, grounding armsI' We were so afraid that you would object to my taking part in the private theatricals. Ma said you'd never listen to it. But you act better than any of us —doesn't he, Bobby 1" " You bet," replied Bobby, fervently. •' Guess you must have been a regular Macready once, sir ?" Then Mr Bazambee coughed, and wiped his forehead, and mumbled about having seen a good deal of that sort of thing when he was young, and that Maria must be sure to take in the tea when her young friend had gone, and then went up to bed, and dreamed he was playing an outraged ; community to crowded houses all night.

A little boy was one day asked by a clergyman if he know what an implicit, child-like faith was, He thought he did. Being asked to describe it, after thinking a moment, he said, " When my mother ■ says a_ thing is so, I must believe it is so, km if it ain't so." ifM, How to stump It,—An orator who was in great demand in political campaigns, being asked by an admirer the 'secret of lm success, replied, " When I have facts, I give 'em facts; but when I haven't I yell and saw the air." Question.—The man going from Jerusalem to Jericho fell among what? Bright Sunday school boy—He fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and clicked liira ' Man can do many things, but there is one thing he cannot do; he can't button on a new collar, just after cutting his thumb-nails without looking up in the air. The man who wrote that " nothing was impossible" never tried to find the pocket of his wife's dress when it was hanging up in a clothes-press An amusing case came before the judge of the Bristol County Court recently. A dressmaker sued a lady for the cost of making a dress, the defence being-first, it was a misfit, The lady retired to a private room to try on the dress in the presence of ox, perts—two dressmakers—who could not ' agree, and then the learned judge then adjourned the Court for a few minutes, and had tho parties before him in his private room, where the dress was tried on. His Honor, pronounced it a very bed misfit, gave judgment for the defendant, and awarded her the cost of the material, # . which was claimed as a set-oft' ! The man wlw is waiting for something | to turn np generally finds it when lie j steps on a barrel hoop. ! "Ah," he sighed, as he laid down a [ book of travel which had ocoupied him ; all the evening, " how I should delight to i make a tour round the world." His fair i young wife, a bride of two months, for > answer s.aid, «My dear, take a careful ■ survey of my new dress, and tell me how > you like it." He did as requested, i walking around her, with exclamations of n ; satisfaction. <( There," she triumphantly i remarked when he had resumed his seat, , " you have had you wish. You said you ; would delight to take a trip around the ■ world. You have just been around me—- < am I not all tho world to you ?" Tableau: > quick curtain i Female Extravagance.-A woman's i waist j For Persons of Neglected Education, • -There is more fashion in the city, but , thero are more stiles in the country, j A New York barber lias this sign'in his , window -" Neither English, French, • German, nor the United States spoden, , here." , The Soporifics, and the Settler.-Medical ! examiner:" What.is there besides ether 1 .and chloroform to. produce unconsciousi ness?"-Student:" A bludgeon," «&