Spray.

Western Star, Issue 2218, 1 July 1898, Page 4

Spray.

Interpreters. The lark sings —bathed in sunshine — “ Oil, Love is joy and gladness.” In shade the nightingale complains, “ Oh, Love is pain and sadness.” It lakes a nightingale and lark To tell Love’s complex hist’ry ; For Love is joy, and Love is pain, And therein lies the myst’ry ! Blowing Out the Gas. At a hotel recently a rustic came running downstairs in the middle of the night, saying. “ There’s the durndest smell in that room of mine that beats any sewer I ever smelled. I’ve been trying to sleep for some time, but it seems to be getting worse all the while.” After several suggestions as to what might be the cause, the clerk intimated that tiie gas might possibly be leaking. “ Not by a durn sight,” replied the stranger ; “ that can’t be the cause, for I blew that out an hour ago.” Tribute to a Smoker. A custom prevails at funerals among the Dutch settlers in Natal for some one of the deceased’s friends to make an (nation at his grave, recording Ins virtues and the good deeds performed by mm. It happened once, however, that an individual died who was not consideredi t .> have been possessed of any virtues "hateve.-. Consequently the obsequies were nearly being- completed in silence when one of his countrymen said, m solemn tone s—'“ Him was a berry good smokei. St. Paul’s Clock. The clock which was placed in the lower of St. Paul’s Cathedral. London, k the largest in the British Isles, dials (there are three of them) are eacl 17ft. in diameter, and the ligures upon them are each 2ft, fun. in length, pendulum is 15ft. long, and the ball at Its lower end weighs 7001 b. It is provided with a Phelps bell, which weighs 5% tons, and the bell is struck by a ,iam™ weighing 2091 b. Each of the weights weighs 12001 b. The hands are made of mire Conner That which marks the minutes is 9ft. Gin. in length, the other exactly sft. Repartee. Mr. J. L. Macadam, the Scotchman who invented the kind of paving winch heats his name, is said to have been a guest a a largo dinner given In honour of Sn Walter Scott. Being asked -■<> ies P°™ to a toast. Mr. Macadam rose and a the end of his speech, proposed thO dealt * of “the great Sir Walter Scott, colossus of literature !” In an instant Sir Walter was on Ins feet, and, lifting his glass, exclaimed : “ Here s to the great Mr. Macadam, the colossus ol roads !” A Tiny Telephone. M. Trouve, the well-known electrician of Paris, lias brought out a tiny telephone no larger than a franc piece, and, in conjunction with Boston. tin* - wizard',” has applied it to clairvoyance The telephones attached to the ears ol the blind folded performer are hidden b> a wig and connected by fine wires, also invisible, to a transmitter behind a screen. A confederate behind the screen, who can see and hear all that passes, prompts him by means of tiie telephone. A Wonderful Cat. Dr. Samuel Hopper, an American, has a cat that is the talk of the town, it is a large tiger-marked Tom, of a pugnac.fous disposition and very Bohemian habits, and the doctor lias taught it to hold firecrackers in its teeth while thej are exploded. He says It took consderahle patience to accomplish this Jesuit, hut that now that the cat has he come accustomed to the noise it come and begs tor il.--cvack.ers every eve,, mg. She Was an Observer. -• You have brought new sunshine Into my life,” he said rapturously. “Do you mean that ? she asked ItmK, o y Of course I mean it. Can you doubt ine v” “Oh, of course, I know you wouldn't intentionally misrepresent. But you Know a young man so often things a •drl lias brought sunshine into ins me, when bi reality it’s only moonshine.’ People Live Longer. The ordinary limits of human life certainly seem to lie extending. A correspondent has been examining the obituary lists of tie* year, and lie finds that of 7124 people whose ages wengiven no less than 2521 wore over i 0 years old : in fact, their average was 79 49. Has there been something, then, since ISIS or thereabouts peculiarly conducive to longevity in England .

Foreign Yankees. Some statistics Just given show that in IS9O no less than 20,070,0tG residents in the United States, or :« per cent of tinwhole population, were of foreign parentage. Nearly seven millions of them were Germans, live millions Irish, and two millions English. In Mew j ork and Chicago a Ikmit four-tilths of trie residents are of foreign descent. 'these figures are astonishing enough ; tor it might be imagined that the Americans ought to be raising a race ol their own I,V this time. Clever, yes ; but for bard work the American stands aside for the Irish, the German, the Italian, or the Slav. Two and a Half Million Students If the figures contained in. the Calendar for lS9ii of the Sciences and Art Department as to the number of persons now receiving instruction were any guide as to the progress of art culture in Great Britain, they should result in an entire revolution of feeding before the century is out. In the fifties we were spending about £BO.OOO a year in instruction ; now the vote is £700,000. Then there was Inn .a handful of students : now there are nearly-two millions and a-half ! Only Losing Time. ■< ] n the life to come,” shouted the evangelist. “ there will lie no marrying or giving in marriage.” . Those who were sitting near the Chicago woman hoard a low cry of horror as she rose from her seat. in that event,” she remarked to the usher as she left the church, “I’ve got no time to lie monkeying here.” Father of Seventy Children. All the recent difficulties in Chitral .appear to have risen from Lite circumstance of what Mr. Nicholas Easy would have called Aman-rii-Mulkh’s philoprogenitiveness. “ I could never ascertain,” said Captain Younghusband. “ the exact number of ids children. Ido not think he quite knew himself, but at any rate it was somewhere near seventy. Of these children there were about seventeen sons who could claim a certain amount of respect and respectability,” and it is this excess of respectability which apparently led to the row of such respectable dimensions in Chitral. A New Version. The boy stood on the back yard fence, whence all but him bail fled. The flames that lit ids father’s barn shone just above the shed. Ten Chinese crackers in ids hand, and twenty in ids hat, with piteous accent loud lie cried, “ I never thought of that !” Some other crackers to the tail of a small dog he’d tied. The sparks flew wide and red and tiot, they lit upon Hie brat : they tired the crackers in ids hand, and lit those in Ids hat. Then came the hurst of rattling sound — the boy, where was be gone ? Ask of the winds that far around strewed bits of meat and bone and scraps of clothes and balls and top and nails and books and yarn and relics of that dreadful boy that burned his father’s barn.