Here and There

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XL, Issue 8, 22 February 1908, Page 42

Here and There

The New Bayonet. The new Japanese pattern bayonet for the Army, orders for which are about to be placed, is to be exactly five inches longer than the present bayonet, which is one foot in length. With the new bayonet infantrymen will be afforded a thrusting length approximately of 61Jin., instead of 56Ain. as at present. The new weapon will have a slightly tapered point and a cutting fore-edge. At the back it will have a broad, flat edge, and between the back and fore-edge it will be deeply grooved. The cross-guard will on one side have a deeply Curved or hooked terminal, which will facilitate the operation of “piling arms."’ <&<?><s> London’s Morals. The Bishop of London, preaching to a congregation of men at St. Martin’s, Ludgate, recently, said he was an enthusiastic lover of the Church of England; but he must confess that they could not be as .a church self-complacent. Only lately he was kneeling by the body' of a young priest who had been killed in the prime of life by sheer overwork and worry in a slum parish. He was left to himself, and he died of a disease which had undoubtedly been brought on by worry; and, by his body, he (the Bishop) prayed for the foregiveness of the Church which had left him so much in despair. That Church could not be self-complacent, either, when they considered the moral tone of London. He was convinced that they must change the whole tone of men on the subject of morals. Men spoke of the impossibility of purity,- and there was even that abominable lie that it was more healthy to be immoral. That was the kind of thing that was said. Young men growing up /were being corrupted by the tone of the older men. The Church could hardly be complacent when they looked further afield and faced the state of affairs in the Congo, for instance. Great demonstrations of protest had been held in the provinces, and a great protest meeting would be held in the Queen’s Hall, London, early in February. It was intolerable that the population in the Congo should be decimated by the misrule for which, to a certain extent, this country was itself responsible, under its treaty-rights and agreements. <s><s>«> Under-rating; the Enemy. We have always been too optimistic (says “John Bull,” speaking of the Zulu trouble). We have always under rated our enemies and the possibilities of such situations as we have been called upon to face. We have always sent out small handfuls of men to do work that demanded the presence of heavy forces. It will be well to be pessimistic for once, and to look the possibilities of what is ahead of us squarely in the face. The man at home who has never been farther than Margate, or possibly has done a cheap trip to Boulogne, will of course pooh-pooh any prediction of big trouble in Africa in the event of a native rising. But—let him take them or leave them—tho above are a few of the possibilities of the immediate future, and they must be taken into account in reckoning up what is in front of us. Natal may be right and she may be wrong. She may get out of the trouble with a skirmish or two, and she may light a fire that will take as much extinguishing as the Anglo-Boer war took-. We can only hope for the best. To Hnrry Him Up. An experiment is to be made in Paris to expedite the delivery of telegrams by stamping on the,backs of the messages the times at which they arc handed to the messengers. The receivers will thus be able to detect irregularities. Some such plan as this wouldn’t be half bad for the Dominion.

School in Office Hours. The heads of a London firm of fire extinguisher manufacturers doing extensive business with Germany have decided that all their numerous staff of clerks, from the office-boy upwards, must acquire a knowledge of German. Tuition is provided in the office, and while one-half of the staff is receiving an hour's instruction in German, the other half is busy at work. At the conclusion of the first hour’s study the second half of the staff' quits work for an hour's instruction. The clerks, old and young, are enthusiastically learning their lessons. <?><s> <s> Breaking the Record. Jones: “So the family in the flat next yours have a phonograph, ch? How many records have they?” Brown: "Heaven only knows! But they broke their best previous record last Sunday by five hours and twenty-six minutes!” <S> <S> <s> What’s in a Name? How is it, one wonders, that writers and dramatists with one accord have suddenly fallen upon the name Elizabeth? If a heroine just now is to be of peculiar fascination she must bear this name in its entirety. It seems to be considered a favourite appellation for cousins, and when you see that a heroine of play or sketch or story bears it you may make up your mind at once that she will be arch and witty, or overwhelmed with a burden of misunderstanding. , But why has Elizabeth, after years of obscurity, thus sprung into fictional and dramatic fame? There must be some reason for it; it is a fine but not specially pretty name; it is not quaint like Joan or Bridget or Gillian, or many another old name, and then in it lurks the awful possibility of Eliza. Will there never be a novelist or playwright who will have the courage to call his heroine Eliza tout court? Maybe someone will explain the present eraze for Elizabeth, of whom there will be a plentiful sprinkling in the next generation, for the up-to-date mother is finding it exquisitely droll to call her baby girl by this very big name. <s> <S> <S> Cigarette Smoking. Drastic legislation to put down cigarette smoking by juveniles is to be introduced in the House of Commohs next session. A draft bill contains the following provisions: — 1. Every person, who knowingly sells or delivers or permits or suffers to be sold or delivered any description of cigarettes to any child under the age of sixteen years, shall be liable to a penalty of not exceeding 40/ for the first offence, and not exceeding £5 for any subsequent offence. 2. Nothing in this Act shall prevent the employment by a licensed person of a member of his family or his servant or apprentice to manufacture, or, as a messenger, to deliver cigarettes. 3. Every child under the age of sixteen, who shall be found in possession of cigarettes, or found smoking tobacco in any form, shall, upon conviction, be liable to a penalty of not exceeding 40/ for each offence, and shall be subject to the provisions of the Youthful Offenders Act, 1901. 4. For the purpose of this Act, the word “cigarette” shall include cigarette papers or wrappers, and cigars, cheroots anti tobacco. 5. This Act may be cited as the Cigarette (Sale to Children) Act, 1908, and shall come into operation in three months after receiving the royal assent.

Many of Them All the Samoa 5c A girl of fifteen or sixteen, who cannot enjoy “Rob Roy,” “Waverley,” “The Talisman,” “The Abbott,” and “Tha Monastery,” to whom Dickens is but a name, who has not- read and re-read “Pride and Prejudice” for enjoyment, who has never heard of “Cranford,” or, of Mrs Gaskell's beautiful stories, who has no acquaintance with Miss Thaeks eray, and does not revel in Stevenson, is as much to be pitied, says a London paper, as one who prefers a street organ to the Queen’s Hall Orchestra in London. <&<s><s> An Author’s Book-plate Text. George Iles, the author of various popular books on invention, is a Scotchman, with a sense of humour. Once he had i» large library, but he lost many of his books because his friends borrowed them and failed to return them. He, therefore, adopted this for his book-plate: “Go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.”—Matthew xxv. 9. <s>s>■s> Poor Rickard Junior’s Philosophy. Most comedians are no laughing matter. One client’s misfortune is another lawyer’s practice. Manifest Destiny is the term which men apply to the thing they want to do. Be sure your sins will find you out; the Recording Angel is expert at shorthand. There are few monarchs of finance who are not believers in the divine right of kings. z Your capacity for happiness is precisely proportionate to your capacity for belief. “What one, doesn’t see doesn't hurt one,” said the girl who shut her - eyes when he kissed her. Fine feathers make fine birds—for a while; sooner or later they make fine winter hats. <s><&<s> Mark Twain’s Challenge. At the Engineers’ dinner at New York recently, Mark Twain made the speech of the evening, and in his brightest style poked fun at his fellow-guests. One of these was Mr. Andrew Carnegie, who, says the, correspondent of the “Daily' Dispatch,” came in for a great deal of chaff from the humorist on the ground that he was the financial backer of the Spelling Reform Board, which a year or so ago tried to modernise orthography. Mark Twain genially questioned Mr. Carnegie’s spelling abilities, and suddenly sweeping round on the great provider of libraries, to the uproarious delight of the company, he challenged him to spell “Tetradacty!’’ offhand. Mr. Carnegie laughingly waved the challenge aside, and Mark Twain continued:—“Why your pestiferous simplified spelling attacked orthography at the wrong end. The real disease lies in the vowels of indefinite sound, and consonants of unfixed pronunciation. The alphabet, anyway, was the invention of a drunken thief.” Mark Twain wore his famous white suit, and made a striking figure at the festive board. He said he had one item of good news for them, for he did not intend to speak again this winter.