In Lighter Vein

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 21, 22 May 1902, Page 19

In Lighter Vein

(By < Quip.')

»•• Correspondence, newspaper cuttings, etc.. intended for this department Rhould bo addressed ' QUIP,' N.Z. Tablet Office, Dunedin and should reach this office on or before Monday morning. ' There's nothing like a little judicious levity.' R. L. Steveksox.

Peace Prospects.

Sir Joseph Ward, in a ppeech which be made during the week, said something to the effect that he wouldn't be surprised if peace were proclaimed when tha Premier landed in South Africa. Contrarwise, as Tweedledee of Looking-glaps Land would pay, I should be surprised if it weren't. It is spoken of as certain among those who are in the know, you know, that the Peace Conference at Vereeniging is the direct outcome of Mr Seddon's threat to visit the country. The Boera didn't care a button for our ten contingents, but when they heard that an eleventh was coming in the person of the Honorable Richard, they wanted to throw up the sponge there and then. They have been persuaded, however, to keep it down until the aforesaid Honorable arrives at the capital, and the limelight man gets his apparatus fixed up. What a glorious day for New Zealand will be that Peace Dt y ! Our Premier will strike an attitude in the middle of the Pretorian square like a statue that has Been a spook. The sunbeams will ,pour down upon our Premier and make the gilt buttons in his court dress shine like an eruption of policemen's lanterns. Milner and Kitchener will hold our Premier's horse. The biograph men on the adjoining roof will all be focussing our Premier. De Wet and Delarey will approach and lay their Krupps and Pompoms and kopjes in the ralm of our Premier, and our Premier, like the character in the Casino O'ui, will give them his ' benedictine and tell them that he forgiv. s them. To follow this, the Imperial Parliament has arranged a long series of banquets and kindred ' shivoos ' with the view of keeping Richard as long as possible out of England. The Kiug Lus heard that Richard wants to anuex England. This is not true, however. for the present. All he wants now is Au b tialia. Hence Lord Hopetoun's resignation.

Concerning Fowls.

The Beef Trust, we are informed, is endeavoring to square the oval— the next best thing to squaring the circle— by forming • corner in eggs. If it succeeds, eggs will keep going higher and higher, and they will be just about ' high ' enough for ordinary electioneering purposes by the time the general elections arrive. To save expenses, then, everybody should provide himself with a 'fowlery.' Besides, it is nice to have fresh eggs eight days a week, and to wake up about dinner time and hear the feathered denwena of your own back yard caroling their simple ' lays.' Moreover, if you have a bit of a garden, there is nothing like a few fowls to make the seeds come up. And it is so easy to make a beginning. A few birds will do to start with. Late on a moonlight night', when you are sure the owners are asleep, is the best time to get them. In Huck Finn's theology it was always an act of charity to remove any chicken that didn't seem to be ' roostin' comfortable.' He used to take a chicken whenever he got the chance because, as he said himself, ' If you don't want him yourself you can easily find somebody that does, and a good deed ain't ever forgot.'

It may be safer on a dark night, but it is more pleasant and more profitable when the moon is up. This isn't superstition. On a dark night you Btumble over things and knock your head against the perches and lose your bag and your temper. And you can't tell what kind of a bird you are getting. You may secure what seems to you to be a Speckled Leghorn, or a Windydot, or some other nationality that has won the belt in its time, and when^ou get home you find out that it is only a Berkshire or a Shorthorn. Berkshires and Shorthorns are not good layers. They are about as good at eggs as governors are at foundation stones. Some say the roosters won't lay at all. But I twisted the neck of one once, and threw him into a corner, and he lay there all the afternoon. It is one thing to get a hen to lay in a corner, and another to get her to lay in advance. But even this can be done. A White Island man has been experimenting and has succeeded, by perseverance and judicious feeding, in establishing a formula by which an egg, whose birthday was really last September, will be tound just as healthy aa if born only this morning. ' Wonders will never stop ceaßing.'