All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 9, 4 March 1909, Page 358

All Sorts

There are 5265 joint-stock companies, with a nominal share capital of £137,907,836, registered in the United Kingdom. • Youth, which is forgiven everything, forgives itself nothing; age, which forgives itself everything, is forgiven nothing. There are 55 Labor M.P.'s in the House of Commons, of whom 30 have hitherto been receiving payment from the Labor Party. ' I had quite an argument to-day with my butcher over the quality of a roast.' ' Sort of a joint argument, eh?' If the demands of the Women's Social and Political Union of Great Britain are conceded, about a million and a half women will be given the vote. It has been proved by experiments that if fish get beyond a certain depth in the sea they die, being unable to support the pressure of the water. The little child from the city was enjoying her first visit to the country, and was enthusiastic in her admiration of the farmyard. ' Just look at the chicklings V she exclaimed, in ecstasy. ' They're all running about raw!' The Angler : 'Is this public water, my man ?' The Inhabitant: 'Aye.' The Angler : ' Then it won't be a crime if I land a fish ?' The Inhabitant: 'No; it'll be a miracle!' Some plants are starch factories, as, for instance, the potato ; some are medicine factories, examples of which are camphor, opium, and castor-oil ; other plants are gum factories, as India-rubber ; others are perfume factories ; and still others are color-makers, not for themselves only, but for man's use. ' Well,' said the lawyer for the defence to his client, ' I was certainly surprised at your convictioin.' ' I wasn't ; it was all your fait.' c All my fault? I put up a magnificent fight for you.' ' Yes, an' you kep' yellin' at the jury that you demanded justice for me till they went an' give it to me.' 'Friend,' asked the traveller who had lost his way, ' where is Mugg River ? I expected to find it somewhere along here, but I don't see any signs of it.' ' Mugg River, sir,' said the man in the doorway of the log cabin, pointing to a dry gully a short distance ahead, ' has been postponed this year on account of the weather.' The teacher was expounding to the best of his abilities the difference between an atom and a molecule. 'An atom,' he explained, 'is the smallest particle of an element that can take part in a chemical combination. Now, can anyone suggest an illustration ?' One small hand shot up. 'Well, Johnnie, what is it?' 'Wellington at Waterloo, sir. Up, Guards, and atom !' Mme. Curie, one of the discoverers of radium, was busy in her laboratory the other morning, when a scrubwoman rushed up to her, crying : 'Madame, madame, I have just swallowed a pin!' ' You don't say so,' said Madame Curie, wholly absorbed in some scientific problem. And taking a pin from a tray she added, ' Here is another.' The Chinese pitcher-plant is very singular-looking. The end of the leaf extends like a tendril, and has an appendage shaped like a pitcher with a regular lid. This is generally closed down, though it may be raised. Even when the rain can not get in, the pitchers always have water in them; some hold about a tumblerful, others even more. The water is a part of the sap that comes to the leaf. In the island of Ceylon this plant is called the monkey-cup, because the monkeys sometimes raise the lid and drink the water.' ' Great living authorities on social, statistics, Mr. Chas. Booth and Mr. R. A. Rowntree, declare that from ten to twelve millions of people in England are subsisting upon or below the ' poverty line;' which is the minimum upon which, a bare existence can be maintained. Another economist estimates that 8,000,000 are in "dire poverty, and that 20,000,000 more are poor. At any moment the number in receipt of poor-law .relief approximates a million. On the other" hand, the total income of the United Kingdom in one year is £1,700,000,000. . Of this sum, according to recent calculations, two-thirds ~is divided amongst 5,000,000 well-to-do people of the upper and middle classes, and the other third amongst 35,000,000, or seven times the number of poor people of the working class.