After Dinner Gossip.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIX, Issue IX, 30 August 1902, Page 524

After Dinner Gossip.

In tha Palaeo of tha Czar

The Czar was lounging on the tliruue. The doctor paced the liatloki, When through the palace came a faint Auil feeble sort of squallski. The doctor hurried to the Czar And cried: *’l wish you joyski. You are once more a papavitch. But—lt Is not a boyski.” The Czar laid down his sceptreviteli, And said. “It makes me sickski To think that it is not for me To play with little Nickski. 'Tis bad enough to walk the floor When teethovltch anuoyski. But it would not ■affect me so If it bad been a boyski.” The Czar walked to tbe palace gate, Unheeding borub and mineski, -. And nailed thereon a very big And boldly lettered signski. The subjects cried the Russian The 'French “Vive le Kolski,” Then read the signski, which announced This: WANTED HEREONE BOYSKI.

Th® Art of Killing:.

Since all Governments recognise the right of society to punish with death a certain elass of crimes, it would naturally be supposed that science would have made researches in the art of official killing that would relieve death as much as is possible of its horrors. It is not, perhaps, desirable that the future of the condemned criminal should be relieved of apprehension, but the human mind revolts at unnecessary torture in carrying out a sentence of death. It is probable that a successful hanging is the most merciful method of legal execution. It is assumed that a broken neck immediately suspends consciousness. But death by strangulation, which often results from a drop from the gallows, subjects the vietirti to several minutes of agony. The electric chair has in America been substituted for the gallows, but there is much doubt if death in the chair is instantaneous.

The French at one time thought, they had discovered a mode of execution which robbed death of other terror than that of apprehension. The victim could close his eyes and await with such fortitude as he could command the descent of the knife. There could be no hitch in the work of the machine. But an eminent French physician now asserts that death does not immediately follow decapitation. The blood which flows immediately after the severance of the head from the body comes from the large vessels of the neck, and for a time there is no call for blood from the cranium. “The brain.” he says, “remains intact, nourishing itself with the blood retained by the pressure of the air. When the blood remaining' in the head at the moment of separation is exhausted there commences a state, not of death, but of inertia, which lasts up to the moment when the organ, no longer fed, ceases to exist.”

The physician who advances this theory estimates the period of inertia at about, two hours. Absolute death might not ensue until three hours after decapitation. To what degree consciousness is retained during this period of inertia the physician does not venture an opinion. He has said enough, however, to surround death by the guillotine with as much herror as death by the rope or in the electric chair.

A Fine Example.

“If I have been able to accomplish anything in my life,” said a woman famous as one of the most kindly and lovable among leaders of the |»est society, “it is due to the word spoken to me by my old teacher in the right season when I was a child.” A newspaper prints the story of the teacher’s lesson, as told by the pupil: I was 1 Ti> only homely, awkward one in a class of exceptionally beautiful girls, and being dull at my books became the derision of tbe

school. 1 fell into a morose, despairing state, gave up study, withdrew into myself, and grew daily bitter and morose. One day the French teacher, a grey haired old woman with keen eyes and a bright smile, found tne crying.

“Qu’ as-tu, ma fille?”—“What is the matter, my child?" —she asked. “O, madame, 1 am so ugly!” I sobbed out.

She soothed me, but did not contradict me. Presently she took me into her room, said, “1 have a present for you,” and handed me a scaly, coarse lump covered with earth.

“It is round and brown as you. Ugly, did you say? Very well, we will call it by your name. then. • It is you. Now, you shall plant it and water it and give it sun for a week or two.”

I planted it and watched it. carefully. Green leaves came out first, and at length a golden Japanese lily, the first I had ever seen. Madame came to share my delight. “Ah.” she said, significantly, “who would believe so much beauty and fragrance were shut up in that ugly, tiling? But it took heart and grew into the sunlight.”

The Road to Castles In Spain.

“If you want. Io know what a man is examine his castles in the air,” said an old, sick pauper in an English workhouse to a writer for the “Spectator.”

The obstacle to following the advice and thus increasing our knowledge of human nature is that these same castles are off the line of, our railways, and that, even if we reach the portcullis, we are all too likely to be without, the password.

What we should like to be is a deeper secret even than what we are. We know that Raphael aspired to be a poet, instead of a painter, and that “Dante once prepared to paint an angel.”

The boy has visions of his triumphs at the bar or in the laboratory. The girl dreams of fame as a novelist or a singer, or of social power and charm. These are natural enough. But the really interesting question is, “What is the air-castle of the man or woman who in the eyes of the world has scored a brilliant success?”

In nine, eases out of ten it would be found to be in the nature of a return to simplicity. The rich banker dreams of the joys of the farmer; the woman of society pictures to herself the grateful solitude of life on a remote ranch. She may even sigh for the quiet of the convent, notwithstanding its stern rules. What seems monotony to the villager promises peace to the weary dweller in the great city. A glimpse of a hundred air-castles would discover in scores of instances that the desire for luxury and display had given way in Hie world of dreams to a new regime of “plain living and high thinking.”

The Strong Man’s Weakness.

A writer in “The Bulletin" on Sandow speaks of his mincing gait, and the peculiarity of some of his movements. This is only to be expected, as Sandow is certain to be badly muscle-bound man. None of these enormously strong men have free muscles. The abnormal development of certain muscles in a certain way inevitably restricts free action in another direction, and Bob. Fitzsimmons, in his interesting book on physical culture, says he never yet met a “strong man," in the sense that Sandow is strong, who was not painfully muscle-bound, and quite useless in a situation calling for agility and smart, action. As boxers, the strong men are hopeless failures, for the reason that they can neither hit quickly nor get about smartly. Hereby hangs a tale. When a former strong man

was in Melbourne he one afternoon met two or three journalists, an actor or two, and a well-known local lightweight fighter in a sporting club room. Somebody asked the strong man if he had ever thought of taking to pugilism. “Yes,” he replied, “but I did not dare. If I hit a man it would kill him.” “Dicken,” said the lightweight. “Look here, you can hit me as hard as you like if you can hit me at nil. And for every time you hit me in ten minutes I’ll stand drinks round.” Talk followed, and at length the strong man donned the gloves. He gave up after seven minutes, panting like u porpoise, never having been able to get his fist within half a foot of the nimble boxer, while the latter hit his big opponent just as he pleased.

A Boy on the Boer War.

Master Allen Dulles, the eight-year-old grandson of Hon. J. W. Foster, ex-Secretary of State, has written a book in defence of the Boers. With-

out assistance or suggestions from anyone he wrote in his leisure hours out of school a naive, half-pathetic plea for the rights of the Boers. The proceeds from the sale of the book were intended for the benefit of the Boer children in the concentration camps, but peace was probably concluded too soon for the carrying out of the charitable plan. The young author divides his book into seven parts: “The Boers and British in South Africa,” “The First Year of Fighting,” “The Farm Burning," “The Second Year of Fighting,” “De Wet’s Escape,” “The Enportment of Horses to South Africa,” “The Last.”

Proof-readers have not been allowed to correct the author’s mistakes in grammar or spelling, and the book is in every respect a faithful record of a boy’s thoughts.

“When tbe Boers came to the land.” he says, “they expected to make themselves into a country;” but the British heard of the gold there, and “began to steal in and spread out.” “Britain did not hear of the gold right, away, but as soon as he did hear he sent trupes.” “England ought to be content if she owned the mines where the gold is, but no, she wants to have the land to. She is all the time picking into little countries, but she never dares fight eather China or Russia.” ■ “The British found that if they could not fight the Boers out of their land they would burn them out, s> they began to burn the laud

They saw that the farm-burning did hot hurt the gold but it did the Boers, they were after the gold and they didn’t care what they did to the Boers just so they got it.” The small boy’s book had a wide circulation in Washington, and the first edition was soon exhausted.

Used the Wrong; Decoy.

That Auckland is as wideawake as the rest of the world is shown by an incident which occurred a few days ago in that town. The woman of the house was called to the door, and found a man there, with whom she held the following conversation: “Madam, I have called for the suit of clothes to be pressed and brushed.” “What suit?” “Your husband's Sunday suit. He called at the shop going down this morning.” “And he said to let you have it?” “Yes, ma'am.” “Did he appear in good health and spirits?” “Why, certainly.” “And look and act naturally?” “Of course, but why do you ask?” “Because my husband. has been dead for twelve years, and I had some curiosity on the subject." “Perhaps I’ve made a mistake.” “Perhaßg you have. The man you saw going out of here this morning is my brother. Good morning.” And the man left. ,

A Runaway Hat-

A frock coat, a silk hat, and an unxusua.l amount of dignity are described as coming to an untimely end one day in Wellington recently. A gale howling when a large, portly man came round the corner. He was erect, and his rotund figure had a military poise, an air of dignity which was imposing.

Suddenly a wild gust seized bis shining hat. and whirled it'off. It shot up into the air, and described circles in the manner of Monsieur SantosDumont’s air-ship. Then it flew across the street, and fell into a puddle of muddy water. The dignified citizen gazed at the flight of his hat in a bewildered fashion. When it fell to the ground he cantered after it with a gentle lope. As he neared it he bent eagerly forward. His hand almost touched the precious tile, when, swoop! came another gust and snatched the unfortunate hat. which went rolling off, churning the muddy waters of the gutter like the screw of a steamer.

The owner of the hat looked wrathfully after it, and then started in pursuit on a mad gallop. Suddenly in the midst of his swift course the pursuer stepped on a piece of banana skin, grasped wildly at the air, and fell with a despairing splash! Shorn of all his dignity, the unhappy man slowly rose, looked round to see if he was observed, then carefully examined his injured raiment. From collar to waist his frock coat had split. Twenty yards ahead, peacefully reposing by the curbstone, lay the innocent cause of all his misfortunes. With an air of grim determination he strode toward it. The hat remained coyly resting on the edge of a puddle. The portly person gazed down at the water-logged, mud-cover-ed tile, and then at his own ruined raiment. Just then, as if inspired by a demon of mischief, the hat began to sway with a passing gust. This was too much. Gathering himself together, the fat man made a mighty leap and landed both feet squarely on the hat. He peered anxiously around to see if he was observed, and then, turning up his coat collar, strode away, leaving the fragments of what bad once been a silk hat reposing in the gutter.