All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 7, 18 February 1909, Page 278

All Sorts

r + «°? Ul ]O ady < CO( l uettislll y> : ' H ™ old are you, little boy?' 'Four years.' 'And can. you guess how old laffl f No, I can only count up to thirty,' 'Pa!' 'Yes, my son? 'What is a harpsichord?' 'A -harpsichord, my boy, is an instrument which when heard makes a man feel sorry that he ever said anything unkind ' Yes,' he said musingly, 'it is strange how much men grow old than women. - When. I was married I was 28 and my wife was 24; now I am 48 and my wife is 64: — at least, that is the age she says she is. 3 An American newspaper' offered a prize for the best definition -of bravery. Here it is: 'Taking back for exchange a pair of gloves that your wife has worn twice.' > It is a well-known fact that in those countries where oxen are used for labor they take great pleasure in tho singing of their driver. They work* bette.i at the plough when stirred by a cheerful song. Arabs sing to their camels, during long journeys across the desert. ' Doctor: 'Well, my lad, I think you're well enough to have solid food now. How would chicken do— nice stuffed chicken, eh? And what would you like it stuffed with?' 11l Lad (hungrily) : ' Just have it stuffed with another chicken, doctor.' Picture books for the benefit' of" travellers are kept in the Paris police stations. It frequently occurs that foreigners lose things which they are unable to describe because of their unfamiliarity with the French language. Ihe .picture books representations of various articles, and the inquirer has only to turn to the leaves and point out the illustrations which resemble the property bo has lost. J The exasperatingly leisurely manner in which the train travels on a certain North Island branch "railway line ia the cause of much annoyance to a commercial traveller who goes that way pretty regularly. When the train arrived at its destination the other day, and the commercial traveller who was the only passenger, had taken hi§ departure, the guard found the following notice posted up in the carriage : ' Passengers are requested not to pick ilowers while the train is in motion. 5 A new boy had come to the school from the country and the ready 'sir' and 'miss' of the city child was. quite unknown to him. ' What's your name P'ljueried the master. ' George Hamilton.' 'Add "sir" to that, boy.' ' fc>ir George Hamilton,' came the unexpected reply. Everyone roared, and even the schoolmaster relaxed into a smile, and the boy from that time remained ' Sir George.' The sea lion displays no .little skill and cunning in capturing gulls. When in pursuit the sea lion dives deeply under water, and swims some distance from where it disappeared; then, rising cautiously, it exposes the tip of its. nose along the surface, at the same time giving it a rotarymotion. The unwary bird near by alights to catch theobject, while the sea lion at the same moment settles beneath the waves and at one bound, with, extending jaws,, seizes its screaming prey and instantly devours it. In a single block in New York there are 1400 people of twenty distinct nationalities, so writes Mr. W^ Z. Ripley in .the Atlantic. There are more than two-thirds as many native-born Irish in Boston as in the capital city, Dublin.. With their children, mainly of Irisli blood, they makeBoston indubitably the leading Irish city in the -worldNew York is a larger Italian city to-day than Rome, having 500,000 Italian colonists. It contains no fewer than 800,000 Jews, mainly' from- Russia. Thus it is also the. foremost Jewish city in the world. Unless sorely pressed by hunger, a lion, fit and capable,, never takes to killing human beings, as he has a wholesomedread of this biped, particularly so after he has once becomeacquainted with a mounted and armed hunter. The lion is; by no means the noble, courageous, fearless animal manyauthors, poets, and bards make him out to be. He fiercely attacks and slays other animals weaker than' himself, orwho possess weapons of offence and defence of a very inferior order to his. The hunter, trader, and traveller intothe wilder parts of the 'Dark Continent', is dreadfully pestered by the lion's fondness for bullock, horse, and don* key meat. - " • * .