FLOTSAM AND JETSAM.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 34, 22 August 1891, Page 302

FLOTSAM AND JETSAM.

LADY TENNYSON. THE ranks of musical composers are about to receive a distinguished recruit. Lady Tennyson, who is known to be an excellent amateur musician, is about to publish a volume of her husband’s poems, set to her own arrangement of crotchets and quavers. She has for years been in the habit of writing melodies to several of the Laureate’s unpublished fragments, fifteen of which are now to be given to the public. A NOVEL DINNER IDEA. ANEW experiment, that of serving a dinner-party with salad grown under the guests’ own eyes, was successfully tried at the house of Prince and Princess Blucher the other day. Here is the recipe ; take good germinating lettuce seed and soak it in alcohol for about six hours, sow it into an equal mixture of rich soil and unslaked lime and place it on the table. After the soup, water it with lukewarm water, whereupon it commences to sprout immediately. At the Prince's party the thing worked like a charm, aud the lettuces when plucked and prepared for eating were of the size of Barcelona nuts. WORSE THAN THE GIRLS. A STR ANGE fad of the young men of the present day is darkening the eyebrows and eyelashes. They imagine this process gives an expression of strength to the face which is otherwise lacking. The stuff used for the purpose comes in a tiny box, and is a black powder. In the box is a little kid pencil, similar in form to the stump of a blender used by a crayon or pastelle artist. This tiny kid implement is dipped in the black powder and applied in a dexterous manner, first to trace the eyebrows darker and into the desired shape. After this the eyelashes are touched, and then a slight line is drawn under the eyes on the lower lid At each corner is put the final touch, a little dash of the dark powder, which gives a languid look presumed to be captivating. MONOSYLLABLES. AN amusing story is printed by The Bear, a rather highclass weekly publication which makes a speciality of the unearthing of interesting facts and incidents of Prussian History. King Frederick William 111., father of the old Emperor, was a man who was remarkably laconic in his style of speech. Most of his utterances were confined to one word, blurted out either as an interrogation or a command. When staying at the Teplitz watering place, where baths and mineral springs are at the service of patients, he heard of a Hungarian magnate residing there, who like himself, never said a word more than he was actually obliged. * Genius,’ said His Majesty ; ‘ see him.’ Next day he met the magnate on the promenade, when the following conversation took place between the two great masters of monosyllables : —King : ‘ Bathing ?’ Magnate : ‘ Drinking !’ King : ‘ Army ?’ Magnate : * Rich !’ King : ‘ Congratulate !’ Magnate : ‘ Police ?’ King : ‘ Sovereign !’ Magnate : ‘ Congratulate !’ THE CHERRY AND ITS NAME. THOUGH we cannot expect any nice discrimination of merely specific characters in the early times, from which most of our genuinely vernacular plant-names have their origin, it is remarkable that for so conspicuously beautiful a group of trees as the cherries, with the exception of the Gean, all the common forms of the name are derivatives from the Latin Cerasus. No doubt the Romans first introduced the cultivation of the tree as an orchard fruit into Britain, and thus their name gave rise to the ‘ ceris beam ’ of the Anglo-Saxon, and the ‘ cherry ’ of on r Nonnandised modern English ; but it is also said that in the * Dark Ages ’ this cultivation was lost, and that the tree was again introduced about the time of Henry VIII. Certainly, though he can hardly be quoted as referring to its cultivation, Shakespere was perfectly familiar with the cherry, the main ideas associated with it in his mind being, to judge from ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ the close resemblance of one fruit on the tree to another—as we say, ‘ like two peas in a pod ’ —and the union in diversity of the two stalks that so often separate themselves from the rest of the umbel, each bearing its cherry, like sisters growing up together, or like two ruby lips inviting kisses. FEARFUL OF CONSEQUENCES. A CYNICAL person has said foolishly, that the chief evil connected with wrong-doing is that of being found out; a statement which might come appropriately enough from the mouth of a savage, and which finds apt illustration in the following anecdote, taken from the life of John G. Paton, missionary to the Island of Tanna in the New Hebrides. One morning the Tannese, rushing toward me in great excitement, cried : ‘ Missi, missi, there is a God, or ship on fire, or something of fear, coming over the sea. We see no Hames, but it smokes like a volcano. Is it a spirit ’’ One party after another followed, in quick succession, shouting the same questions, to which I replied : • I cannot go at once. I must dress first in my best clothes. It is probably one of Queen Victoria’s men of war, coming to ask me if your conduct is good or bad, if you are stealing my property, threatening my life, or how you are using me.’ They pleaded with me to go and see it, but I would not. The two principal chiefs came running up and asked, * Missi, will it be a ship of war?’ • I think it will, but I have no time to speak to you now ; I must get on my best clothes.’ * Missi, only tell ns, will he ask you if we have been stealing your things ?' ‘ I expect he will.’ • And shall you tell him ?’ • I must tell him the tiuth.’ * O Missi, tell him not ! Everything shall be brought back to you at once, and no one will be allowed to steal from you again.’

*Be quick,’ I said. * Everything must be returned before he comes. Away, away, ana let me get ready to meet the great chief of the man-of-war.' Hitherto, no thief could ever be found, and no chief had power to cause anything to be restored to me; but now, in an incredibly brief space of time, one came running to the Mission House with a pot, another with a pan, another with a blanket, others with knives, forks, plates, and all sorts of stolen property. The chiefs called me to receive these things, but I replied: ‘ Lay them all down at the door; 1 have no time to speak with you. ’ I delayed my toilet, enjoying mischievously the magical effect of that approaching vessel. At last, the chiefs running about in breathless haste, called out to me : * Missi, missi, do tell us, is the stolen property all here ?’ Of course I could not tell, but running out I looked on the promiscuous-heap of my belongings, and said : ‘ I don’t see the lid of my kettle !’ * No, missi,’ said one chief, * for it is on the other side of the island. But tell him not, for I have sent for it, and it will be here to-morrow.’ And next day it appeared.'