A SPECIMEN—AND A SPECIMEN!

Evening Star, Issue 3652, 5 November 1874, Page 3

A SPECIMEN—AND A SPECIMEN!

New Zealand has at last got its ‘ Danbury Newsman* in the hitherto quiet and unimpulsive ‘ Colonist.’’ Under the heading of “ a specimen” in a late number we have this specimen of a Nelson imitation of the Danbury school. It out-Snyder’s Snyder entirely :—“ At noon yesterday a small boy walked into this office and gravely deposited a little package and a letter on the counter. He said he had been told to leave them. We thought we knew what the letter was about, but we were doubtful respecting the contents of the package. Therefore we proceeded to examine it. On taking off the outside wrapper we found a pen box. and we immediately concluded that somebody had sent us a rich specimen from Anatori or some other place. Well, we opened the box and we found a specimen, but that specimen wasn’t a specimen of a piece of quartz, nor did it come from Anatori. No {sooner did we get the lid off the pen box than the specimen darted frantically up our editorial sleeve, aud charged straight in the direction of our right ear. In less than half a minute we could feel the specimen trying energetically to bore a hole through our shoulder blade. We protested, and in doing so tore off our garments furiously. That “ specimen ” was about the largest centipede it has been our lot to engage in battle with for some years. The reptile was exceedingly affectionate, and stuck to us like a glue-pot. We managed, however, to shake him off, and he is now at large somewhere on the premises. He was seen going in the direction of the printing-machine, and it is a remarkable fact that everybody connected with this journal gives that machine a very wide berth. A stranger came into the office last night to arrange about printing some bill-heads which he wanted, and we got him to lean against the machine, in the hope that the * specimen' would fasten on him, and that it would thereby be' earried away. We don’t think it worked, however, for, although our 1 devil ’ followed the sti*anger for nearly a mile, in order to see whether he was in any trouble, he came back without any good news. Judging by our own experience, we think it is safe to say that that stranger would not have walked in company with that specimen for an hour without personal inconvenience. Any of our readers j who are interested in specimens are quite at liberty to have the run of this i office if they think they can capture

this one, and so add to their museums' The letter which accompanied the package was from a scientific countrygentleman, who wished to know whether we thought such a large centipede was a native of New Zealand, or whether it had been introduced from Australia. In reply, we have only to say that we neither know nor care; but we think that the sooner it quits our office the better. Some of our readers are somewhat slow in paying up, and, therefore, generally speaking, we are thankful to receive a ‘ cent ’ of any kind ; but whilst we get another description of cent, we don’t want to have anything to do with hundred-legged ones. We don’t like them.”