Notes

New Zealand Tablet, 13 February 1913, Page 34

Notes

A Gentle Hint A contributor to the Inland Printer repeats the story, first told by an Arkansas paper, about a man that wa° mrsT+nT?tr *<f*~iA „t „ 4.1,,,* I ' I i uuum „„„,» xi±yj±i<*Li.y »jiwu « a, ujjLuiiueiStorm, and once crawled into a hollow log. The thunder rolled, the lightning flashed, the rain poured down in torrents, and the log swelled up until the poor fellow was wedged in so tight that he could not move. All the sins of his life began to pass before him, when he suddenly re-

membered that he had not paid his newspaper subscription. He declared this made him feel so small that he crawled out of the log through a knot hole without the least difficulty. The Wellington Board and Scholarships Question The original resolution on the St. Patrick's College application submitted to the Wellington Board by the cnairman, Mr. Robert Lee, was as given below. We have printed in italics the portions which have been omitted from the amended version. ' That as this Education Board is administering a State secular system of education, and as free places and scholarships are awarded irrespective of religious beliefs, and in this education district are now tenable in two Wellington colleges (one for boys and one for girls) and in a technical school and district high schools, non-sectarian in their teaching and wholly or in part built and largely maintained by the State, this Education Board would not be justified in allowing scholarship holders to attend sectarian colleges.' The word 'private' has been substituted for the word ' sectarian' in the last line. The principal difference between the two motions is that in the original version the Board showed their hand a little more plainly, and indicated more clearly that their real ground of refusal was opposition to the ' sectarian colleges.' Irish Repartee We take the following entertaining incident, illustrative of Irish readiness in retort, from our esteemed Anglican contemporary, the Sydney Church Standard. ' Canon Shore, in his Recollections, tells a pleasant story of Mr. S. C. Hall, who has often been said to be the original of Dickens's Pecksniff. "Mr. Hall told us one day at dinner that when walking down Church street, Kensington, he had stopped to look at a new building then being erected. He asked one of the workmen what sort of building it was to be. The man replied in a rich Irish brogue, ' A church, your honor.' 'What sort of a church, my good man?' asked Mr. Hall, who was a strong Protestant. ' A Catholic church, sur.' 'I am sorry to hear it,' said Mr. Hall. ' So is the divil,' replied the man." ' * Another excellent illustration of Irish quickness of wit is to. be found in the study of Sir William Butler contributed to the current number of the Corn-hill Magazine by Sir Hugh Clifford. As is generally known, Sir William was very ready, and sometimes caustic, in repartee. On one occasion, when a militant Protestant lady asked him, during a pause in the conversation at a crowded dinner table, whether there was any truth in the report that an unhappy lady, whose mysterious disappearance was at that moment exciting the interest of the whole of England, had, as alleged by some organs of the press, been abducted by the Jesuits, Sir William's answer, without a moment's hesitation, was: 'No, madam. I am in a position positively to contradict that rumor. Perhaps you are not aware that we Catholics maintain a religious Order specially for such services Order of Trappists.'