All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, 10 March 1910, Page 398

All Sorts

, Blotting-paper was discovered in 1465. Since then few people have been able to find any when they want it. uJ Don’t I give you all the money you need? her husband complained. , ‘Yes,’ she replied ;■ ‘but you told me wanted'' 6 Were marned that you would give me all I Provincial doctor to a peasant: ‘Do you sleen with your mouth open?’ Peasant: ‘l’m sure Y don’t Vow. to-night > ° ked at myself when I was asleep, but I’ll see A bright little girl who had successfully spelled the word that, was asked what would remain after the t had been taken away. ‘ The dirty cups and saucers,’ was the reply. . Butcher: ‘ I need a boy about your size, and will give you four shillings a week.’ Boy: ‘Shall I have a chance to rise? Butcher: Yes, for , I shall want you to be here at four o clock in the morning.’ Palmist: You will be very poor until you are thirty years of age. J Silly Client: And after that?’ Palmist: ‘You will get used to it.’ By falling from a cart, a Chinaman, whose life was insured for a large amount, was seriously hurt. There was some doubt as to his ever getting better, and at length one of his friends wrote to the insurance company: Hong Wang Lee half dead; likee half money.’ A man with a donkey for sale, hearing that a friend wanted to buy one, sent him the following, written on a post-card: ‘Dear Jack— you are looking for a really good donkey, don’t forget me.’ J & , ‘ Yes, the cold was so intense at the Pole we had to be very careful not to pet our dogs.’ ‘lndeed! Why was that ‘ You see, their tails were frozen stiff, and if they wagged them they would break off.’ . Uncle James, said a city young lady who was spending a few days in the country, ‘ is that chicken by the gate a Brahmin?’ No,’ replied Uncle James, ‘he’s a Leghorn.’ ‘Why, certainly, to be sure!’ said the young lady. ‘How stupid of me! I can see the horns on his ankle.’ ‘Say,’ queried the party with the conundrum habit, ‘ what is the difference between an overcoat and a baby ? ’ ‘ I pass,’ responded the old gentleman. ‘ What’s the answer?’ ‘The one you wear; the other you were,’ replied the conundrum fiend. Mrs. Granger ‘Silas, I saw a beautiful French clock in the jeweller’s window when I was in town to-day. I do wish you would buy it for my Christmas present,’ Granger: ‘Now, Mandy, there ain’t no use of wasting good money on a French clock. Neither of us understands French, and we’d never be able to tell what time it was by the thing.’ Farmer (watching motor-car): What’s that thing stuck up on the side ? ’ Chauffeur: ‘ That’s a spare tyre in case one of the wheels goes wrong.’ Farmer: ‘ Well, I’ve driven horses for a quarter of a century, an’ I never carried a spare leg for one of them yet.’ The name ‘ aviation ’is misleading. Even the most birdlike of these new aeroplanes do not, in the proper sense of the words, fly or aviate.’ Their movement and their mode, of propulsion are not similar to those of a flying bird nor of a flying insect, nor of a bat, nor of a pterodactyle. They do not strike the air. with a wing. The propeller is quite distinct from the expanse of surface by means of which they float or glide. Their movement may be compared with that of a bird not. when it is flying, but when it is gliding without stroke of the wing, with a very slight fall, through the air. In important respects the poising and gliding of an aeroplane is more like that of the toy called a ‘kite’ than like the flight of winged, creatures. It is true that many winged creatures avail themselves of this gliding poise’ from time to time, but many birds do so very little, ■ and many not at air whilst few insects do so, anG, I believe, none of the bats. The essential feature in the mechanism of flying animals is the stroke of the wing, and it. has a most important relation even to the use of the ‘ gliding poise,’ for it enables the bird with great rapidity and ample power to maintain the' attitude necessary for gliding, to .resist the overthrowing force of wind-currents, and to turn and adjust itself to new and sudden displacements—so that it is rare (though it does happen) for a bird to be blown ‘out of its balance,’ - and fall to the ground; a thing which, indeed, cannot happen if the bird is at sufficient distance from the ground and injured, because it will recover its poise by a few strokes of the'wing as it falls. ■ - ' >' ■ • -v • -