WAIFS AND STRAYS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume II, Issue 102, 10 April 1875, Page 9

WAIFS AND STRAYS.

Bio Fiotbbs. — According to a correspondent of the Cincinnati 'Enquirer,' who fully investigated the. subject, the average receipts of the New York dailies for advertising amount annually to £1,781,000. Of this sum the ' Herald receives upwards of £400,000, or about £1,600 a day, the ' Staats Zeitung' £365,000, the 'Times' £252,000, and so on down to the most obscure sheets, none of which, receive less than £20,000. The weekly papers take nearly half a million annually as their share of the advertising patronage, and perhaps fully £1,000,000 is spent in posters, circulars, steamboat, and_Btreet car advertising, &o. The writer also shows when this immense revenue comes, and quotes the following figures from the ledgers of some of the leading business firms :— A. T. Stuart, for instance, is eaid to spend £100,000 a year for printer's ink ; Lord and Taylor £45,000 ; Arnold and Constable, £37,000 ; Robert Bonner, £40,000 ; Babbitt, the soap man, £45,000 ; while Barnum pays out every year about £80,000, and all have made their fortunes largely through this instrumentality. The Opeba.— Regarded in the light of reason, Italian opera is monstrous and even ridiculous. At best it exists at the very'poriphery of rational coherence, a hair's breadth beyond which sends whirling in the fragmentary fashion into the abyss of unfathomable nonsense. A reasonable creature, taken in stark unpreparation and set down in an opera-house while the business of a high strung scene was going on — a tenor stabbed to death, and dying with such effusion of musical noise as would tax the capacity of an organ bellows ; a lovelorn prima donna raving about the Btage in the very ecstacy of melodious hysterics ; a dozen or two of lookers on, who offer the man no^ aid and the lady no hartshorn, but who simply " stand around " and sing, while before them two or three score musicians give themselves up to fiddling and tooting, and blowing and thumping, among whom, perched high, a man beats the air with a little ■tick; and yet more wonderful, most wonderful of all, a vast assemblage, dressed on purpose in their best clothes, look down upon the scene with breathless interest, and when the noise stops for noise it simply is, not one distinguishable word being heard by any creature present— break forth into such extravagant and tnmultuoiiß expressions of delight as he can never have heard before (for it is remarkable that no such outbursting and manifestly Boul-ielieving applause as greets the most admired passages in a favorite opera is elicited by any other act done in earnest or performed in makebelieve by any human creature on any other occasion, or in any other place whatever), the reasonable being, having this spectacle set before his unprepared, untutored eyes— would he not say that these people, pruna donna, tenor, chorus, fiddlers, were mad— all lunatics together? — The ' Galaxy.' Pbintebs' Work.— The Poughkeepsie 'Eagle,' on 'How Mistakes Happen m Newspapers,' says that it is very rare that type f urmshed by two separate foundries can be used together without a good deal of trouble, though they try to make it after the same standard. We read once in a while of a wonderful piece of cabinet work or mosaic work, containing ten, twenty, or fifty thousand pieces, the maker of which has Bpent months or even years of labor in producing it, and people go to see it as a great curiosity ; but the most elaborate and carefully fitted piece of work of this kind ever made does not compare with that which the printer does every day. The man who does the first is looked upon as an artist — a marvel of skill, and if a hundred of his pieces are put in wrong side up, or turned wrong way, it is not observed in the general effect ; but if the printer, in fitting ten times as many pieces together in the same day, puts one where another should be, or turns one the wrong way, everybody sees it, and is amazed at "the stupid carelessness of those atupid printers." Two Wbinklßß.— The ' Amorioan Builder' says : — "Tery often a screw-hole gets bo worn that the screw will not stay in. Where glue is handy, the regular carpenter makes the hole larger and glues in a large plug, making a nest for an entirely new hole. But this is not always the case, and people without tools, and in an emergency, often have to fix the thing at once. Generally leather is used, but this is so Lard that it does not hold well. The best of all things ia to cut narrow •trips of cork, and fill the hole completely. Then force the screw in. This will make as tight a job as if driven into an entirely new hole. . Another hint' of a similar character may ie useful.

One often desires to put a staple into a block of stone. The hole is made, the staple inserted, and lead, melted and run in. But unless the hole is made with the bottom larger than the top, the lead will in time work out, if there is much jar or side strain on the iron. Besides, the lead is liable to some compression, wMch admits of looseness, especially after becoming subjected to very hot fires. A much better article is sulphur. If this be melted and poured- in around the staple instead of lead, it makes a much more durable job. Besideß, it is often more eisy to procure sulphur than lead, as every Btore keeps it that deals in general variety. Bulls of vabiotts Eaces. — It was a Scotchwoman who said that the butcher of her town only killed half a beast at a time. It was a British Magistrate who, being told by a vagabond that he was not married, responded, " That's a good thing for your wife." It was an English reporter who stated at a meeting of the Ethnological Society> that there were " casts of the skull of an individual at different periods of adult life j" though Dean Swift certainly mentions two skulls preserved in Ireland ; one of a person when he was a boy, and the other of the same person when he grew to be a man. It was a Portuguese Mayor who enumerated, among the marls by which the body of a drowned man might be identified when found, " a marked impediment in his speech." It was an American gentleman who solemnly Baid one evening, " Parents, you may have children ; or, if not, your daughters may have." It was a German orator, who, warming with his subject, said, " There is no man, woman, or child in the house who has arrived at the age of 50 yearß but what has felt the truth thundering through their minds for centuries." "Vitality ov Jews Compabed with .that of Chbibtiaws. — A writer in the Philadelphia Reporter communicates cays the Medical Press and Circular, several facts which are worthy of consideration. He addressed letters of inquiry to all the prominent Jews in the United States, asking the question, "Do the Jews ever have consumption?" From every quarter he received one reply — "The disease is very rare among* them." The writer states that in an extensive practice he never saw a single case of consumption among the Jews. Why this comparative immunity from this disease ? Answer to this is made by quoting (1) tables of vital statistics made up from, observations in the great centres of civilisation — England, Germany, France, &c. These tables reveal the following remarkable facts : — In the first five years of life, of 100 Jewish children, 12 die ; of 100 Christian children, 24 die. Among 100 Christians, 38 attained to 50* years. Thirteen Christians in 100 attain 70 years, while out of 100 Jews, 27 attain 70 years. One quarter of all Christians, attain only 6 years and 11 monthß. One quarter of all Jews attain 23 years and three months. (2) In explanation of these facts, Dr. Neufvill gives the following facts : — There are no proletaries among the Jews, while one-tenth of the Christians live on charity. The difference between the Christian and Jewish merchants is strikingly pointed out by the tables before quoted. These show that among 100 merchants onehalf of the Christians die before 57, while one-half of the Jews live until 67. Why this greater relative longevity, this greater immunity from disease, and tenacity of life among the Jews than among the Christians ? Is it from their rigid adherence, to articles of faith and the hygienic sanitary and dietetic regulations of their religion ? The ' Pacific Medical Journal ' remarks that a careful scientific inquiry into the cause of the above facts would be of incalculable benefit. If it should be found that obedience to physical and other laws was the cause of their physical strength, &c, then we should learn how to rejuvenate consumptive and other degenerate classes. The Delusions ov Smell. — To complete these details, it remain* to e»y something of the delusions of the sense of Bmell. This sense, like the others, has its aberrations and hallucinations. The delusions of smell are hardly ever isolated, or occupy those of hearing, sight, taste, and touch, and are also less frequent than the latter. Insane people, who are affected with them complain of being haunted by foetid emanations, or congratulate themselves on inhaling the most delicious perfumes. Lelut mentions the case of a woman, an inmate of La Salpetriere, who fancied that she constantly perceived a frightful stench proceeding from the decay of bodies in the courts of that institution. Impressions of the kind are usually very annoying. Brierre de Boismont relates the account of a woman affected by-dit-order of all her senses. Whenever she saw a well-dressed lady passing she smelled the odor of musk, which was intolerable to her. If it -were a man, she was distressingly affected by the smell of tobacco, though she was quite aware that those scents existed only in her imagination. Capellini mentions that a woman, who declared that she could not bear the smell of a rose, waß quite ill when one of her friends came in wearing one, though the unlucky flower was only artificial. Such facts might be multiplied ; but, as they are alike, it is not worth while to mention more of them. The observations made in insane asylums, among others, those of M. Prevost, at La Salpetriere, have shown also that these delusions and perversions of the sense of smell are more common than had hitherto been supposed among such invalids, and that if they usually pass unnoticed, it arises from the fact that nothing spontaneously denotes their existence^ — 'Popular Science Monthly. 1

Archbishop Manning, in opening a recent meeting of the Catholic Academia in London, complained that, through the inaccuracy of a reporter, he has been called on to defend a proposition that he never advanced. It appears that he has been reported as Baying that the nations of Europe would never have peace until they returned to their civil allegiance to the Pope. The Archbishop, further, has received from the United States a paragraph in which this grave misrepresentation was printed in parallel columns with an authentic passage from one of his own books in direct contradiction. He was called on to reconcile them, which, it is needless to say; he does not feel disposed to attempt. Mm. Luce Veuillot, youngest daughter of- M. Louis Veuillot, editor of the 'Univers,' has recently, entered, tjhe order of the Visiiandine Nuns in their community of Rue d' Enf er, Paris. Mgr. de Segur gave her the sacred veil. ' ; ' ' ' ' '