Minor Matters.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXV, Issue XV, 13 October 1900, Page 676

Minor Matters.

A Tart Prescription. Homeopathists and others will enter into the spirit of a bit of professional advice lately given by a prominent physician in the South? His patient was st fashionable young woman, who entered his office with a jaunty step and consumed fifteen valuable minutes in chatting of social occurrences. Fnally she embarked on the topic of her own ailments, and graphically described ‘■the sinking feeling” which, she said, spoiled her life. The physician prepared a small bottle of minute pills and dexterously pressed his talkative patient toward the door, while he silenced her by repeating a volume of directions - and advice. Just as she opened the door, the lady turned. “Oh . doctor,” she cried, “what shall I do if these pills don’t stop that, sinking feeling?” “Take the cork,” suggested the doctor: and he called the next patient into liis private office. 4- 4- 4Humturs of the Siege. In times of long-continued danger, men often seek to relieve the strain by turning to account anything which can be called a joke. The brave defenders of Kimberley found plenty to laugh at even in times of bombardment. and the recently published journal of Dr. Oliver -Ashe lays stress on flie humours of the siege. it was very funny to see all the town’s big swells either fetching their meat themselves or sending a member of their family for it. Parsons, lawyers, doctors, business men—we were all there, nnd it was a huge joke that we were all in the same box; but it is well that the joke didn’t last too long. At times the shelling was very severe, and buglers were constantly on duty to give warning when the big' siege •gujjg_pf the Boers were fired. If the bugler got his little tune off smart, • there .were about.fifteen seconds in y wliivliytd dodge under a wall or rush intp your’fort.' t . ' 1.-X'i Msn.t-epk this inconvenience in dif- ~ ••fl-rent -ways. ?Ou«j* nervous'■’’man was put tip '■ ■ *wlieu ' ji>e*l>i)gler soundedTftie’ warn- , aui»Tffl>r exploded within a few yards of an Irish policeman, the only notice he took of it was to remark; “Begob. fwhat will they be playin’ nt next?" - - I had a shell-proof fort constructed under my house, and my servants were told that they could come into it stay time they heard the bugle. Lizzie did come in a few times, when she was handy, but as a rule she did not bother, and was really very plucky. John, our to get behind the . big** water-tank. I don’t think that would.have saved him, but he was happy there; so that was all , Tig-h*-’ • -K ’ lie' was very funny. One day we heard Lizzie lecturing him about sonictliiiigT and he retorted: ’ “Don’t makejjsucih a noise! I can’t- hear the gun go off.” 1 'l’ht-r boom of that gun would have Extinguished a megaphone. To Reduce Murder. ; , During the present century homicide lots bt-'en remarkably rife in civilised conntrijgis. . Indeed, in view of the rapid advancement for the better v.e have made in <our methods Of life and the Requisition of knowledge, it is somewhat alar.nppg ,t<> find that murder .-.is still u thing of comparatively frejutlerit occurrence. • a - y like many - other things, varies 1 according-to the country. l.et us, therefore, make a brief -study of criminal "statistics among' the Euro(teau nations with > view to finding out what factors?" if any," ten J to lessen the percentage of homicide. r-Itafy, which still rings with the which cut off _King Humbert, lias the unenviable distinction of heading the list, with no fewer than ninetylive murders per million inhabitants, as against six per million in Great Britain, which is lowest in the list. As one would expect, Spain runs lier sister country very close by producing eighty-three murders per million inhabitants. Next’ wc come to Hungary, and the terrier* happily, U oousidcrabl',-, J-hp

figures being sixty-seven per million; while in Austria, which comes fourth on the list, they fajl to twenty-three.

Then we come to teens, France, leading with sixteen. Belgium following with fourteen, and Germany bringing up the rear with eleven. Thus, England is the only country with single figures, while Italy, where crime flourishes most rankly, is within an ace of three figures.

But after all have you not noticed that the countries which figure foremost in the list are the cruellest in their treatment of animals; while Britain, which is at the bottom, is notoriously the land where dumb beasts are cherished as they arc nowhere else on the earth’s surface?

Think of Italy and Spain, with their bull-fights and cock-fights, and ask yourself if it is surprising that a people who delight in such amusements could be anything save brutal in their moments of heat and anger. What is there in these pastimes that in anyway teaches men ami women to control their impulses ami passions? On the other hand, take the Englishman. with his notorious love of sport. Is not the tendency of most of our national pastimes to train men to control themselves? Could a man expect to succeed as a cricketer, footballer, golfer, huntsman, jockey, runner. rower, or sportsman of any sort without submitting himself to more or less strict discipline—discipline, moreover, which is for the most part self-imposed? This constant exercise of restraint, which goes band-iu-hand with. and. indeed, is in a measure the outcome of our love of animals, is no less characteristic of our masses than of our educated classes; and undoubtedly it to a vast extent accounts for the comparatively low percentage of homicide among us. Of course, no one characteristic can account entirely for such a thing: but the relationship of the crime of murder to man’s love of dumb animals is remarkably interesting and instructive. »<’ ■Just glance at the list, beginning with the highest and ending with the lowest:—ltaly. Spain. Hungary. Austria. France. Belgium. Germany, and Britain. Will not the same order reversed accurately indicate the degree of affection evinced by these nations for animals? The problem is. one worthy of close, study; for if crime can be lessened by inculcating a love of dumb beasts among the masses, surely its partial solution is by no means so hopeless a thing- as We are wont to imagine. 4 1 + 4Rats! A Boston fire insurance company recently marie an interesting- investigation to discover, if possible, whether there is any reason for the popular belief that rats and mice set fires by gnawing matches. The experiment covered a period of three months. Rats and mice, singly or several at a time, were confined in large iron cages containing matches,of various kinds, and cotton-waste. The mice, no matter how hungry they were, never gnawed the matches, but the rats set several fires, the sulphur matches being in each ease the instrument. Hereafter, when people speak of fires set by mice, these insurance men will very likely say “Rats!”' 4- 4- 4Rather Startling! People living in the vicinity of the gaol at Tiniaru have been greatly disturbed during the past few nights by cries of “murder" and "help." The explanation is that a man named O'Connor, a lunatic, has been in the g:iol on remand. The unfortunate man was brought before Captain Wray and committed to Sunnyside Asylum. It seems almost inhuman that unfortunates of this class .should be kept in a -prison eell for three days, not to speak of the danger to the officers in charge. It was sit first thought that O'Connor was suffering from the effects of drink, but even if that had been so, surely a prison cell is hardly the place for persons in such a state. Cases of this deseription show the necessity for an inebriate home or some fiUuilttr institution.

Oar Bankruptcy Act. Mr Cress well, a Napier solicitor, addressing a Supreme Court Jury on behalf of a man charged with fraudulent bankruptcy, said that the Bankruptcy Act on the Statute Book of this colony was the most pernicious Act ever placed there, and the public did not know it. It should be called an Act for the Easy Manufacture of Criminals, or an Easier Method of Sending an Innocent Man to Gaol. Under the Bankruptcy Act of 1892 there were no fewer than 230 ways of sending a man to gaol. Any man in this colony who was not absolutely independent was liable to be brought under these 230 ways of getting into gaol. ♦ + ♦ Getting Started. An Auckland young man with mild manners stepped into the office of his somewhat crusty uncle, who was engaged in the practice of law. “Well.” said the old gentleman, “now that you have left college, what are you going to do for a living?” "1 think I'll study some more and adopt the profession of law.” "That's right," was the sarcastic rejoinder. “Go ahgad and have your own way. Don’t take any 'advice. I thought we had a talk about that the other day. I told you the profession was overcrowded. But you won’t believe me. of course. You've got to go ahead and put in a few years finding out for yourself." “I’m willing to take advice," replied the nephew, mildly. “The fact is. I’m trying to take all the advice T can get. When you told me to give up the idea of practicing law, 1 went to a friend who is a civil engineer. He said my general education ought to give me a good foundation for any profession, but he advised me to let engineering alone. He said there were too many people in the business now. He said commerce was the thing for a young man, and he gave me the address of a friend of his who keeps a. chemist shop. “The druggist said that I could go through a college of pharmacy without any trouble, but. he wouldn't, advise me to do it, as there were as many people in the business as it -would stand. He asked me why I didn’t take up medicine. I thanked him for the hint, and went to, see our family physician. He told me that it was an exacting life, in which the percentage of eminent success was small. In fact, he said that there were more physicians now than there was practice for. He had heard me sing, and asked me if I' had never thought of a career in music. I went to see a musician; and be tried my voice." "What did he. say?" "He wasn’t as gently considerate as the others. He said there wereWiundreds of people with better voices than mine looking for work. lie thought I might, make a good bricklayer. or something of that kind. So 1 hunted up a bricklayer, and talked it over with him. He said the bricklaying business was overcrowded, and that he should think a man with my training would be a lawyer. So I came back here, and I'm willing to start in ami go to work studying with you. or go through the list again, getting more advice, whichever you think proper." 4r 4- 4? The Daily Paper. Assuming that vou ar Suburbia, did you ever study the ways of your fellow passengers in the early train with their favourite papers? Did vou ever notice the very well preserved elderly gentleman who refuses to believe, that he is getting long-sighted with advancing years? lie walks with a jaunty step and aggressively squared shoulders, and you would certainly not guess his real age from his appearance and carriage. But his treatment of his paper bewrayeth him. Having folded it conveniently he holds it at arms’ length, tickling t he nose of the unhappy passenger on the opposite seat, and then he. Screws up his eyes and frowns at it with .-in air of ferocity. • It is not ferocity really: it is long-sight, which is given to attacking elderly gentlemen when they, least expect it. Observing our subject, one would think that he disagreed most uncompromisingly with the leader writer, so terrific becomes his scowl. But it is merely eyes. At the other extreme is the short-sighted passenger, who apparently smells as well as reads his journal. He, thank heaven! does not take up so much room ns his opposite; in fact, he* like aU short-sighted

people, tries to curl himself into as small a compass as possible. .Then there is the Choleric old gentleman (n first-elasß passenger) who disagrees with the journalist’s views, and snorts and grunts at the printed page, with every symptom of impatience. There is the impatient passenger who tears open his journal on the platform and reads until the train conies in; and the methodical one who deliberately folds his paper at the news he first desires to read, then puts it into his pocket, nnd contentedly waits till seated in the carriage to look at. it. 'There are many more varieties of newspaper readers in the morning train, but these are some of the most usual types. + + + Her Stipulation. That there are still |>eople unfamiliar with the telephone is proved by the recent experience of a New Zealand man. He wished to have telephonic connection between his house and a new one built for his son. The best route took the wire over the cottage of an old lady, to whom he applied for |>ermission to make the slight use of her roof that was necessary. The old lady gave her consent, but made a firm stipulation at the same time. “I’m willing you should run wires over my roof and hitch 'em wherever you see fit,” she said pleasantly, “provided you don't use 'em after nine o’clock at night. That's my bedtime, and I'm a light sleeper at best, and the noise of folks talking overhead would be sure to keep me awake.” * ♦ ♦ “ Eggscnsed.” A teacher in a suburban public school received the following “eggscuse" from the mother of a boy who had failed to be present on a certain day: “Dear Teacher,—Please eggscuse Andrew James for not having went to school yesterday. He started all right, but him xtnd another boy stopped for a little swim in the river, aud a dog come along and carried off Andrew James' pants and shirt, and he had to stay in the water until the other boy come home and got more pants and shirts for him, and then it was too late. Under the sircumstances you could not expect him to be here, so kindly eggscuse." 4- 4- 4? Young New Zealand Volunteers. Much amusement has been caused in Fairlie during the past few days by the formation of a second corps of volunteers. Some schoolboys, to the number of <ilx>ut 20. have been imitating the Mackenzie Mounted Rifles. They made a number of mock khaki hats out of brown paper, and with sticks for rifles presented a brave show. A bottle made a noisy,if not very musical bugle, and a band composed of tin whistles played some patriotic airs in fragments. The eaptain and his lieutenants seemed to have a. good command of their men, although there was more talking in the ranks than is usually allowed. Evidently volunteering has taken a very firm hold in Fairlie. 4- 4- 4" The King of the Beggars. While we have heard of the kings of many lands, and have come to recognise men who have acquired superior power and influence in any particular callings as “kings of . trade,” and the like, the King of the Beggars will be to most readers a new dignitary. Such a personage, however, exists, and is recognised by the State. In “China, in Transformation” it is said that organisations have acquired sueh a hold on the social life of China that even the beggars are formed into a sort of society. They are organised into companies, regiments, and battalions, and even have a king. His title is the King of the Beggars, and he is responsible for the conduct of his tattered subjects. On him the blame is laid when disorders, more serious than usual, occur among them. The King of the Beggars at Peking is a real power. While the beggars swarm like troublesome insects around some chosen village, and seek by insolence to intimidate every one they meet, their king calls a meeting of the principal inhabitants and proposes for a certain sum to rid the place of its invaders. After a long dispute the contracting parties come to an agreement, the ransom is paid, and the beggars decamp, to pour down like an avalanche on some other place; tyl oft" in the same man*

ner. Troublesome as Chinese beggars • re, however, even they are ruled by etiquette, and have their professional eode. They may not eall at private houses except on special occasions o£ mourning or festivity, and even that privilege may be compounded for by a covenant between the bead of a family and the chief of the beggars. The roadside is al ways free to them, and the road to Peking is lined with the whining fraternity. They are sometimes really enterprising. Once at the burial of a native Christian in Fuchau a company of beggars and lepers gathered round the grave and demanded twenty thousand cash before they would allow the eqflin to be lowered. One of the rabble actually got down into the grave and prevented the. lowering of the coffin. They eventually compromised for eighthundred cash. * * + Land Boom in Taranaki. A quite erroneous impression appears to prevail in Wellington and Auckland as to prices being paid for land in Taranaki for dairying. A speaker at the Industrial Association's banquet said he knew where land in this district had gone up to over .£.30 per acre. Quite so, and double that, but not for dairying, as the gentleman in question stated. As a result of careful inquiries, we have, not been able to hear of a dairy farm, as such, changing hands at more than about £ 15 or £ 16 in any part of Taranaki. The high prices recorded are purely speculative, for cutting up into suburban lots. 4> + 4r Scandal. A sewer is a channel for the conveyance of disagreeable matter. Any person who receives and carries mean report or suspicion of his neighbour is therefore a human sewer. A good sewer is a good tiling. It receives disagreeable mutter, and carries it along, hidden from sight and away from the other senses, to some remote place, and discharges it there. A leaky sewer is an abomination. Human sewers usually leak. I once had a friend, an otherwise good fellow, who had acquired the habit of collecting and distributing social sewage. He was not amenable to logical suggestion against the habit. He held the idea that a spade should be called a spade, and that if disagreeable things existed, honesty required that they be discussed. One day, when my friend was carrying- an unusually heavy load of sewage and was distributing it freely, this thought came into my mind, and I gave it utterance. “You remind me of a sewer,” said I. There might have been a serious impairment of our friendship as the result of my utterance had I not immediately- followed my offensive remark by an apology and a brotherly explanation, somewhat in the vein as above. My friend is too self-respecting to allow himself to be in any way related to a leaky sewer, and has reformed beautifully. A short time since, in speaking of the incident, he acknowledged its effectiveness by saying: “Every time I think of anything mean, 1 fancy I can smell it.” 4- 4" 4 1 “ Your TTncleaned Annt.” In a township not a hundred miles from Masterton (says the Wairarapa “Star") a resident was astounded at receiving the following wire: “Meet your uncleaned aunt.” It subsequently dawned upon him that he had been requested to meet his uncle and aunt. This reminds us (Haw-era “Star”) of a little incident a few years back. The House of Representatives had been discussing the question of barmaids. A member possessed of prohibition proclivities ventured the remark that “Barmaids lured young men to destruction.” The telegraph operator thought otherwise, for he advised the various newspapers that their virtuous member was of opinion that “barmaids loved young men to distraction.” 4- 4* 4- ■ ■■ — ■ ■<«. A Lesson in Humility. Fine as is the point of the hypodermic injector, by which an anodyne is thrown into the system of a sleepless man, it is not so sharp or penetrating as the suggestion of the gentle wife .intent upon making her husband a better man. ' “Isn’t it curious, Cynthia,” the colonel said to Mrs Calliper, “how sometimes the current of Our lives is deflected by the most trivial incider Now, there wa*s PhiTetns Golilhitou.

You remember what n vaia, consequential man he was? But all that was changed by just the slightest thing in the world. “lie went one Sunday to a ehurefr where he had never been before, awl where he was quite unknown. As usual, he made towards the middle aisle, where at • home he was accustomed to sit; but the man that met him led him, not down the middle aisle, but along the back of the pews and down a side aisle, and gave him a seat pretty well back. “That was a erusher for Philetus. Here was a man, evidently a person of some account, who, with the unprejudiced eyes of a total stranger, had sized him up as a man of side aisle importance. “Could it be that his friends and acquaintances really so regarded him? It set him thinking, and the result you see in the modest, thoughtful Philetus Goblinton of to-day.” “Jason, dear,” said Mrs Calliper, "don’t you suppose it would be a. good thing for you to go to a strange ehurch onee in a while?”