All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, 15 October 1908, Page 38

All Sorts

Don't always be hunting for a bone to pick with your neighbor. Such a habit gives one a hideous, hungry look that is not at all inviting. ' Little girls should be seen and not heard, Ethel.' — ' I know, mamma ; but if I'm- going to be a lady when I grow up, I've got to begin practising talking some time, you know.' When one does a worthy- deed there is no need to cry it from the housetops. That robs it of its value. Besides, it—possesses the peculiar power of making itself known, thus enhancing the good opinion of the doer. What a weary weight that individual carries who harbors a malicious design upon his neighbor. Think of the malediction he invokes on himself when he prays, ' Forgive^us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against .us.' The cat's eye stone, .now prized as an ornament, is a very different thing from the ancient cat's eye, or eye stone of India, an agate cut so as to show the so-called eye or eyes. It is supposed by some that this latter was used as money in some part of -India four centuries ago, and specimens found to-day have an interest to numismatics. By ' the high seas ' referred to in international law is meant the open — that is, the waters outside the civil jurisdiction of any country whatever, which, according to the law of nations, is limited to one marine league, or three geographical miles, from the shore. Even the great lakes of America beyond the limit designated above are regarded as 'high seas.* A certain 'Bishop was out driving one day, when a man on horseback stopped him, and, thinking to have a joke, asked .• ' Excuse me, Bishop, but could you tell me the road to heaven?' ' Certainly, sir,' the Bishop answered; ' turn to the right and keep straight on.' Archbishop Ryan once concluded a brilliant defence of the Irish cause when a listener shouted : 4 But the Irish are guilty of treason.' * ' Perhaps,' replied the Archbishop, ' but please remember that what is treason elsewhere becomes reason in Ireland because of the absentee (absent I).' The assistants at a large linen draper's shop were preparing for the yearly sale. 'What shall I mark that lot of black silk?' asked the assistant of the employer. 4 Mark, the selling price 15s a yard, was the answer. 4 But it only cost 10s a yard,' said the astonished employee. • ' I don't care what it cost. I am selling off regardless of cost,' retorted the shopowner. Baalbec, or Baalbek, is the name given a ruined city, lying in ancient Coele-Syria, forty-five miles north-west of Damascus. - There is nothing particularly remarkable about a ruinedcity being found in the locality mentioned, but the size of the blocks of stone used by the ancient builders of this particular city is some- • thing that has puzzled- the Vnodern engineers since the day when Baalbec was first made the Mecca of the Oriental traveller.

The first sailing club was probably the Cork Harbor Water Club, now known as the. Royal Cork Yacht -Club, established in the year 1720. 'The vessels were small, and from that period until early in the nineteenth century yachting developed but slowly. In 1812 the Cowes Yacht Club was founded with some fifty-five yachtsmen. Since that date yachting associations have rapidly grown in numbers and strength all over Europe and' America.A Prague printer extricated himself fronT an unpleasant dilemma by the use of his native ingenuity. He was once called upon to print a report of the Board of Trade for his native city in the" two languages of his country, German and" Czech, and the repVesentativeg of either nationality strenuously desired that their tongue should occupy the first of the parallel columns on each page. - The wary printer got cut of his dilemma by turning one column -upside down throughout the book,- and arranging the titles accordingly, so that each language had a front column on every page.