All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVI, Issue 1, 2 January 1908, Page 38

All Sorts

Milkman : ' It looks like rain this morning, rria'am.' " Customer (examining contents of jug) : 'Yes, it certainly does.' We are fond of giving away that which is of no use to ourselves. Perhaps that is why we tender our advice so freely. - n , Glass brushes 1 are * used by artists who decora,te china. p They are- made of glass fibres- so thin that they seen i like spun silk. No Arctic explorers have ever had colds until they returned, to civilisation. Then, one and all they are prostrated by severe influenza. Statistics show that, though fair-haired people are as , a rule less strong than those who have dark hair, yet the former live longer than the latter. The Norwegian Government is considering the advisability of putting, adyertiserrents on the back of postage stamps, the proceeds to go to some national charity. Sheep with a green fleece are a novelty, but they are to be seen in Germany near some copper works. They live in the dust and fumes and drink- water contaminated by copper. A correspondent- of the London ' Mail '- says thatwomen always rode astride - till Queen Elizabeth, in order to show a magnificent dress upon a certain state . occasion, rode side wise and so set the fashion. Probably the most cutting thing President Lincoln ever said was the remark he made about, a very loquacious man : ' This person can compress the most words into the -smallest ideas of any man I ever met.' Brain workers are proved to be long-lived. Five hundred and thirty eminent men and women were taken as a basis, and their duration of life gives an average of about sixty-eight and a half years. Sir Charles Napier's witty despatch, ' Peccavi ! ' 'I have Scinde !, '- is familiar to us. Not so welL known is the happy phrase attributed to Sir Colin Campbell, 1 Nunc sum fortunatus ! ' ' I am in Lucknow ! ' The neatest town in the • world is Brock, in Holland. So tidy are the inhabitants that they will not allow horses in the stree# It contains a population o£ 2700, and the chief industry' is the making of Edam: cheese. The report "from Turkey is thas the ban which has existed' against the telephone has been raised,, and that the matter of a system for the city of Constantinople is being considered. l't will probably be -done by an American company. ' An inspector visiting a school, put a few questions: - to the class. • ' Now, /then, children, what did Samson arm himself with to fight the Philistines ? ' - None of the children cciuld tell him,, so in. order to help them he put. his hand to- his chin and said : 1 Well, what is this ? » - ■ This jogged their memories" effectively, and they all called but in -chorus : ' The jawbone of an ass ! ' ' You never see a broken-winded horse in Norway/" said a hoise doctor, ' because the horses are allowed to drink while they feed, *as mankind does. Our hor-, ses, however thirsty, must eat their dry fodder, their ', dry hay and corn, with nothing to wash them down ; but in Norway every horse has a bucket of water be- ■ side . his' manger, and as he eats he drinks also. It. is interesting to see how a Norwegian horse relishes his water* with his meals. Now they sip from the bucket, then a mouthful of feed, then another sip, then another mouthful. - Yoir never see a broken-winded horse in Norway, and the 'Norwegians say it is because' they give them' water with - their feed.' The position of librarian in some of our public libraries often calls for qualities whtich would at first* thought, occur to ' one as indispensable to persons 1 of the Sherlock "Holmes persuasion, rather than to those busy in the field of library worki. For example, in one of .these a little 'boy appeared at the desk one morning: and -demanded a ' book by a feller named Dirt.' Suspecting a discrepancy somewhere, the librarian searched the catalogue in vain, then had recourse to crossquestioning.. - This proved equally futile, and a note was: sent to the boy's mother, asking her if she would b^ kind- enough to write the. name of the book she wanted. In about half an hour he returned with a slip* of -paper on which was written : ' Please send some* "thing by George Sand.'