VARIETIES.

Western Star, Issue 377, 4 September 1880, Page 2 (Supplement)

VARIETIES.

A Florida man, who owns 150,000 head of cattle, is a miserly recluse, living in a shanty that has neither fireplace nor chimney. He sells his surplus cattle in Cuba. He seldom sees strangers, and he hides his money in cans on his land.

The private car in which Jay Gould travels comprises a parlor, Btate-room, kitchen and smoking saloon, besides a compartment for luggage and supplies. It has movable trucks, and can be run on any road in the country. An old farmer in Indiana says that for his part he don't know where the present rage for trimming bonnets with birds is going to end. Only four or five years ago he bought his daughter a humming bird ; next year she wanted a robin, the next a pheasant, and this season he declares he had to chain up his Thanksgiving turkey or she'd have had that perched on top of her head. The bill of fare of the average American man of family for the two days succeeding Thanksgiving Day reads as follows : Friday —Breakfast, warmed turkey; dinner, turkey hash; supper, fried turkey, dressing. Saturday—Breakfast, turkey remnants;' dinner driblets; supper, boned turkey, with the turkey left out; and then on Sunday at dinner generally occurs the grand turkey pot-pourri et finale, wind up. Dignity.—Dignity seldom goes out for a holiday, and never goes off guard. It is always to be found at its post," vigilant, prepared to take the offensive as well as to defend itself, should the smallest occasion arise. It cannot believe in the innocent intentions of its friends, but devotes its brains as well as its time to suspicions which discover nothing but the assertion of its own importance. A word or look thoughtlessly spoken or carelessly given wounds it to the quick; and what others would pass by as not worth a second thought, dignity maintains to be cause sufficient for a quarrel. "Think again, I pray you."—Queen Victoria was not twenty years of age when she ascended the throne. Coming into possession of power with a heart fresh, tender, and pure, and with all her instincts inclined to mercy, we may be sure that she found many things that tried her strength of resolution to the utmost. On a bright beautiful morning the young Queen was waited upon at her palace of Windsor by the Duke of Wellington, who had brought from London various papers requiring her signature to render them operative. One of them was a sentence of court-martial, pronounced against a soldier of the Line —that sentence that he be shot dead 1 The Queen looked upon the wondrous beauties that nature had spread to her view. " What has this man done?" she asked. The Duke looked at the paper, and replied, " Ah, my royal mistress, that man, I fear, is incorrigible ! He has deserted three times." " And can you not say anything in his behalf, my lord ?" Wellington shook his head. "Oh, think again, I pray you !" Seeing that her Majesty was so deeply moved, and feeling sure she would not have the man shot in any event, he finally confessed that the man was brave, gallant and a really good soldier. "But," he added, "think of the influence?" "Influence ?" cried Victoria, her eyes flash; ing and her bosom heaving with strong emotion. " Let it be ours to wield influence. I will try mercy in this man's case ; and I charge you, your Grace, to let me know the result. A good soldier, you said. Oh, I thank you for that! And you may tell him that your word saved him." Then she took the paper, and wrote, with a bold, firm hand, across the dark page, the bright, saving word—" Pardoned !" The Duke was fond of telling the story ; and he was willing also to confess that the giving of that paper to the pardoned soldier gave him far more joy than he could have experienced from the taking of a city.

_ Japanese Manakins.—When these little birds first appeared in the market they created quite a sensation, which, however, soon wore out. The White or Piebald Manakin has been bred in small cages through so manygenerations that very few of the original habits and manners of their ancestors remain. The first specimen I saw and possessed was believed by me to be partially blind, for the bird would allow me to handle him without stirring from his perch, and was peculiarly indifferent to the doings of the small Finches which inhabited the same cage. He would allow anyone of them to drive him from his chosen perch or from the food-dishes, and did not live long. Since then I discovered that what seemed partial blindness was only helplessness. Subsequently acquired Piebald Manakins I allowed to fly in a large aviary, but there, they were completely bewildered. Through being bred by the Japanese in miniature cages, the imported White and Piebald Manakins seem to be almost unable to fly, and consequently they are nearly as helpless in a large aviary as a young bird just leaving the nest. They tumble into the water, or hide in corners, or get into all sorts of odd scrapes. It is therefore advisable to keep these birds, if not always, certainly for some time, in a roomy cage by themselves, and then they may please their owner by their docility and tameness. " I