WAIFS AND STRAYS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume II, Issue 74, 26 September 1874, Page 13

WAIFS AND STRAYS.

-«?«-ni THE » S OM^ E ? ITy o OP SociAL *«>Biants.-In his « Sfudy of rebukes the folly of the political quacks who believe that the evils of .eocietr are to be remedied by some cheap specific they have invented : r«Mi 1 ** w , roll g l^- lr °n Plato is not quite flat jit sticks up fli lM : 7 e A°K W?rd8 i the left - <co^^' as we\ay. How shall we nanfJ I w V ?,° U i 7> ?° U r eply ' by luttin « down on the P arfc that is prominent. Well, here » a hammer, and I give the plate a blow as .you advise. Harder, you say? Still no effect. Another etroke? Well, there is one, and another, and another. The prominence remains, you see ; the enl is as great as ever- greater, indeed But that U? m •? ' th ° arp - WW h ich the P late ha 3 Bot near the opposite edge. Where it to flat it is now curved. A pretty bungle we have made of it. Lisfcead ot curing the original defect, we have pro<lueed a .second. Had we asked an artisan practised ia * planishing » •as it .is ca led, he would have told us that no "good was to le done, but only mischief by hitting down on the projecting part. He would have taught us how to give variously-directed and specially adjusted blows with a hammer elsewhere ; so attacking the evil not by direct but by indirect actions. _ The required process i 8i 8 less simple than you thought Even a sheet of iron is not to be successfully dealt with, after those common-sense methods in which you hare so much confidence. What then, shall we suy about society? 'Do yon think lam eaß ier to be played on than a pipe ? asks Hamlet. Is humanity more readily *traigntened than an iron plate ?" reauuy Beiatxvb Sizes of Countbibs and SEAS.-The 'Country gentleman lately gave the comparative latitudes of some prominent places on the globe. It may be well now to furnish some compara•tive sizes, in round numbers :-The Red Sea would reach from Wash•ington to Colorado, and it is three times as wide as Lake Ontario Madagascar is as large as New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont] •Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland Virginia, and North Carolina, all put together. Palestine i 3i 3 one-fourth the aize of New York. Uindostan is more than a hundred times as r rg £ w? aIC - 8 me ; J^T* Brifcain is tw o-^irds the size of Japan, one2^J e r of Hindostan, one-twentieth of China, and one-twenty-fifth of the United States. Greece ia nbout the size of Vermont. The English Channel is nearly as large as Lake Superior, and Lake Huron as large as the Sea of Azof. The great Desert of Africa has nearly the present dimensions of the United States. The Caspian Sea would stretch from New York to St. Augustine, and it is as wide as from New York to Hochester. The following bodiea of water are nearly equal ra size : German Ocean, Black Sea, Yellow Sea j Huiison'g Bay w rather larger; the Baltic, Adriatic, Persian Gulf, and JE*ean Sea about half a» large, and somewhat larger than Lake Superior. The Mediterranean, if placed across Worth America, would make sea navigation from San Diego to Baltimore. The Gulf of Mexico is about ten times the «ze of L«ke Superior, and »bout as large as the Sea of Kamschatka, Bay of Bengal, China Sea, Okhotsk Sea, or Japan Sea Lake Ontario would go into either of them more than fifty times! Great Britain and Ireland are about as large as New Mexico, but not as laree as lowa and Nebraska. They are less than New Tork, Pennsylvania and Ohio. ' Laughter Analysed.— Most of the philosophers who have set to vrook to define mental sensations insists that laughter supposes a feeling of superiority in the laugher over the laughed at ; but they seem to overlook the great distinction between laughing at and lauehins with any one. Doubtless a feeling of contempt often raises a laueh and the absurdities of men and women are a constant food for

langhtcr ; but humorists often laugh at themselves. Nothing will illlustrate better the absurdity of the wholesale statement that laughter implies contempt than Charles Lamb's relation to Coleridge. He constantly laughed and joked at the preaching of the philosopher, but he reverenced his friend of fifty years, and looked up to him with clDldisu lore. A • Westminster Keviewei-' defines the cause of laughter ns the representation of objects with qualities opposite to their Swn • bnt all incongruities do not cause laughter. Ludicrous incongruity is opposed to dignity, and this is why those who have little wisdom to lall back upon hate a laugh. Lord Bolincbroke said that gravity is the very essence of imposture ; and Joe Miller is the authority for the assertion that as the gravest beast is the ass, the gravest bird is an owl and the gravest fish is an oyster, so that the gravest man is a fool If any one is inclined to doubt Joe Miller's dictum, we can corroborate it by the authority of Plato, who, when indulging in- the gaiety of his heart, used some times to say, "Silence, my friends! let us be wise now ; here is a fool coming." Lord Chesterfield was no fool, and he disapproved of laughter ; but he allowed his son to smile, for he did not advocate gravity. He considered laughter as ill-bred, not only on account of the disagreeable noise, but because of the '♦ shockin" distortion of the face that it occasioed ! " ° A Misused Titub.— The title of esquire (with us frequently abbreviated squire) originated in chivalric times, when sons of gentlemen from the age of seven years, were brought up in the castles of superior lords— which was an inestimable advantage to the poorer nobility, who could not otherwise have given their children the accomplishments of their station. From seven to fourteen these boys were called pages, or valets ; at fourteen, they bore the name of esquire. They were instructed in the management of arms, in the art of horsemanship, in exercises of strength and activity, so as to fit them for tournament and battle, and the milder glories of chivalrous gallantry. Long after the decline of chivalry the word was only used in a limited sense for the sous of peers and knights, or such as obtained the title by creation or some other legal means. Blackstone defines esquire to be all who bear office of trust under the crown, and who are styled esquires by the king in their commissions and appointment ; and being ouee honored by the king with the title of esquire, they, and only they, have a right to that distinction for life. TJsis ok Waste Paper. — Few housekeepers are aware of tiio many uses to which waste paper may be put. After a stove ha* been, blacked, it can be kept looking well for a long time by rubbing it with, paper every morning. Rubbing it with paper is a much nicer way of keeping the outside of a tea kettle clean than the old way of washing it in suds. Eubbing them with paper is also the best way of polishing knives and tinware after scouring them. If a little soap be held on the paper in rubbing tinware and spoons, they shine like newsilver. For polishing mirrors, windows, lamp chiranies, etc., paper is better thau dry cloth. Preserves and pickles keep better if brown, paper instead of cloth is tied over the jar. Canned fruit is not apt to mould in a piece of writing paper, cut to fit each can, if hid directlyupon the fruit. Paper is much better to put under carpets than straw. It is thinner, warmer tmd makes less noise when one walks over it. Two thicknesses of paper placed between the other coverings on a bed are as warm as a quilt. If it is necessary to step upon a chair, always lay a paper upon it, aud thus sa7e the paint and wood-work from, damage. Skin-Gratting.— Dr. Bell's method of skin-grafting, as performed in numerous cases at the Eoyal Infirmary, EdinbLrgh, has proved very successful. In procuring portions of skin for this purpose lie takes tlimn from some sound portion of the patient's body, preferably from the arm. A piece of skin is pinched up by a pair of common catch-forceps, and cut off to the required size with a pair of scissors. This piece is divided into smaller pieces about the size of a grain of rice, and is planted among the granulations of the ulcer by means of a probe, one small piece being sufficient for about a square inch of surface. _ Over each of the grafts ia laid a gutta-perelia tissue, half a square inch in size, previously dipped in some antiseptic solution. The ulcer is then covered by two layers of similar pieces of guttapercha tissue, placed on each other in an imbricated manner, and over these a dressing of antiseptic gauze and a bandage ; this dressing ia not removed for two or three days, when it is replaced as at first. To insure success, before grafting the ulcers should be free from fetor, and the dressing changed under spray. Exertion. — Exertion is the price of a noble life. The pursuit of a noble object adorns and elevates and ennobles and revives life. Without a definite aim, life is like a rudderless ship drifting about between life and death, buffeted by the winds of circumstances, and entirely at the mercy of the waves. While one with folded arms waits for future opportunities, another makes the meanest occurrence* subservient to a golden result. One labors to find something to do ; the other labors to do something. When the Alps inte-cepted his line of march, Napoleon said, 'There shall be no Alps!" When difficulties from poverty and difficulties from opposition of friend* beset him, Franklin resolutely determined there shall be no difficulties. Greatness has in its vocabulary no such words as fall. Happy is ho who, at the sunset of life, can recall the years that have gone swiftfooted by without bringing before him a fearful array of squandered opportunities. Preventing Fxies from Annoying Hobses. — According to> Kochard, a French veterinary surgeon, a simple method of preventing flies from annoying horses consits ia painting the inside of the ears, ot any other part especially troubled, with a few drops of empyreumatio oil of juniper. It is said that the odour of this substance is unendurable to flies, and that they will keep at a distance from the parts co anointed. If this treatment should accomplish the alleged result, it may perhaps be equally applicable in repelling mosquitoes from the faces and hands of tourists and sportsmen, when passing through woods and meadows. Only seven Popes have lived beyond the age of his present Holmess — eighty-three. Eighteen thousand English women attached their signatures to the memorial for woman's suffrages presented to Mr Disraeli.