MISCELLANEOUS.

Inangahua Times, Volume VII, Issue 1077, 21 April 1882, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

» . A Little Too' Oute. A Yorkshire "boy was absent from school for a day, and on his return, being asked the cause of his absence, he stated that his mother was ill, and that the doctor had brought him a nice little brother. The teacher told him that his excuse was a very good one ; that no doubt he was a dutiful son and so forth. The boy tried to play a like trick on his mother the next day by declaring that the teacher commanded him to stay at home while his mother was ill, as there was danger of his communicating the disease to all the boys in the school A Becent issue of the New York Medical Becord comments on the fact that pet animals can carry contagion, and thus be the means of spreading fatal diseases, is not widely enough Jbiown or duly appreciated. It has heard of uuthentic cases in which scarJet fever has been communicated from one person to another by means of a cat Dr Hewit, of Lake Superior, relates a somewhat similar instance in which diptheria was commnnicated by the animal, two or three of his children dying in consequence thereof. Lately Mrs John Evans, of Sheridan, Montcalm County, U.S.' locked her house and went to a neighbour's, leav-

ing her two children, aged eight months and three years, in the house. It waa discovered in flames, and the children were burned to death before they could be rescued. A New York paper tells this story ; « Not long ago Mr Beecher's door bell was rung by a bright-faced lad who seemed to be in breathless haste as he asked to see the clergyman. He was admitted and at once explained that two gentlemen down the street were holding a debate over the proper spelling of a word, and sent him for Webster's Unabridged to settle the question. The quarto was obligingly handed to the messenger, who hurried off with it Mr Beecher has never learned how the orthographicdifficulty was adjusted, but he is aware that his library is minus one dictionary. The zealous young collector is probably ambitious to establish a book store, as he has been heard from in another part of Brooklyn prosecuting the same industry with local variations." A young nobleman of high hopes and fortunes (Jhanced to lose his way in the town which he inhabited, the capital of a German province. He had accidentally involved himself among the narrow and winding streets in a suburb inhabited by the lowest order of the people, and an approaching thundershower determined him to ask a short refuge in the most knocked at the door, which was opened by a tall man of grisly and ferocious aspect and sordid dress. The atanger was readily ushered to a chamber, where swords, and machines which seemed to be implements of torture, where suspended on the walL One of the swords dropped from its scabbard as the nobleman, after a moment's hositation, crossed the threshold. His host immediately started at him with such a marked expression that the young man could not help demanding his name and business, and the meaning of his looking at him so fixedly. " I am." answered the man. "the public executioner of this city, and the incident you have observed is a sure augury that I shall, in discharge of my duly, one day cut off your head with the weapon that has spontaneously unsheathed itself." The nobleman lost no time in leaving his place of refuge : but, engaging in some of the plots of the period, was shortly after decapitated by that man and instrument. A correspondent of the Northampton Mercury writes : — " I had the good fortune to spend a week in Liverpool during the last autumn, and among the many wonders of that wonderful district, nothing gave me greater pleasure than to witness the universal kindness with which the horses are treated. The whip is a thing of the past in Liverpool. The kindly tone of the human voice is used instead, and the results are something to remember for a lifetime. Everywhere I saw these beautiful creatures doing their work with intelligence and a power that was quite new to me, guided only by the voice and wave of the hand of their attendants, I was almost saying drivers, but iihat would have been a libeL" When, oh when, will this desirable state of things be the rule, and not the exception, of this Colony? The use of charcoal bran for preserv* ing delicate fruit whilst on the road to market, it is stated, bids fair to solve the problem which has long perplexed millers. Converted into charcoal, the light and slippery product of the mill ceases to be unmanageable ', and it is not unlikely that a demand for charred bran will arise in the vicinity of most mills, for packing, not only quickly, perishable fruits like peaches, plums and grapes, but also apples and other perishable fruits for storage, as well as transportation. A Queensland shantykeeper lately found trouble to brew his whiskey hot enough to suit his cuftomers, who made repeated enquiries for somethng that would 'bite all the way down. ' As a last resource and to save his reputation the proprietor mixed up a case of pain" killer, a keg of fusil oil, four bottles of emu oil, and a tub of hair restorer, and then emptied the lot into a barrel Jof real old Bourbon' made in Ipswich. This he called the' Shepherd's delight' and his popularity rose as high as a lawyer's costs on a libel action. The first man who tried it fairly screamed with delight, and actually went home and hugged his mother-in-law; the next one took two drinks, and broke his neck tryingtoturna somersaultover a passing wooklray ; and the third man, who was a travelliug hawker, after drinking one quart, actually stole his own pack, and planted it up a hollow tree. That shanty man is now on the road to fortune ; and perhaps a seat in the Upper House.