All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, 23 August 1906, Page 38

All Sorts

Rakes, hoes, and oilier agricultural implements are represented in the Egyptian catacombs. When a snake sheds its skin, which it does three O1 ' +1 xv tlmes a y ear ' the s^n of the eye comes off with the rest. A Prince of Wales is of age from his birth and a chair is placed for him on the right of the throne in the House of Lords. Imperfect teeth aie a suie sign of civilisation, l erfect teeth are found, as a rule, only among sayMaximin was the only giant, among the Roman Emperors. He was eight and one-half feet in height and very heavily built even for that stature. It was stated recently at the London County Council that 32,000,000 gallons of milk from tuberculous cows were consumed in England every yearr. Father Hennepin, the missionary, was the first discoverer of coal in America, the site of the primitive mine being in the vicinily of what is now Ottawa, 111. It was not until nearly a century ami a half, however, that the' discovery was made of piactical use. At no Court in Europe are expenses more vigorously watched and kept down than at the Imperial one in Germany. Each day the Palace Controller nas to furnish a certain number of dishes for a fixed sum, this sum being that which the Emperor William allows for himself and the members of his family en pension. The nominal head of the Swiss Government is somewhat of an anomaly. As an official he has no ex-officio rank in the army, cannot exercise a veto or pardon a criminal. He has no offices in his eiit aiKl never chooses his associates in the Federal Council. As an individual he cannot declare war or determine the financial policy of his country. It is proposed that the Government of the United States should erect in Washington a suitable memorial to Christopher Columbua. The style of the memorial is to be determined by a commission composed of the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Navy, the chairman of the library committees of the Senate and the House, and the President of the Knights of Columbus. A correspondent of the Christchurch ' Press ' has a distinct grievance against the linotype. In the course of a letter to our Christchurch contemporary the folloAving passage occurred. l I note that the 150 people who maintain a bar on the Coast comprise " the child at the breast, its mother and granddam.' " When the linotype had transformed his words into cold metal the latter part of the sentence read like this :— ' The child and the beast, its mother, etc' As an example of the ability of the juvenile scholar to evolve an unexpected meaning from his text, a correspondent relates that the following question was put to a history class : ' What misfortune then happened to Bishop Odo ?' The reply came quite readily : "Me went blind.' An explanation was demanded, and the genius brought up the text-book ' There, sir,' triumphantly, ' the book says so.' The sentence indicated by an ink-stained digit read : 'Odo was deprived of his See.' Goats are the most surefooted of animals. They can walk upright where the average human being would not crawl. Horses are the daintiest treaders, however, though they cannot climb. No horse will step on a man if it can possibly help it. It is a standing rule in cavalry regiments that if a trooper is dismounted he must remain perfectly still, when tlie whole column passes over him without injuring him. Camels are careless, on the other hand, and the man who came out unharmed from under the feet of a camel corps was not born to he run over by any beast or vehicle. Varno, Italy, is just finishing the excavation ,of its ancient Roman theatre. The digging was begun in 1834. The theatre dates from the time of Augustus Uaesar, and was lavishly decorated with marbles from Greece, Africa and Asia. The theatre was formed of huge steps of granite, above which were rows of private boxes, one of which stands in its original position, in excellent preservation, and with the name of the owner carved on it. Above the tiers of private boxes' rose the places where the plebeians were seated, and from where they looked down on to the stage or away to the water jousts on the river.