Silent Man.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 10 July 1914, Page 8

Silent Man.

The late Mr. Pierpont Morgan w"as always a silent man, and he would sometimes champion the silent with a story. " Old John Bates, an upholsterer," so the story began, " was renowned for his silence. People who had been his customers for a generation had, many of them, neTer heard a word from him except ' Good morning. Five dollars. Thank you. Good day.' Old John" in fact, cultivated silence as a genius cultivates his art. "A patron one day said to John: " ' What's the best kind of mattress ?' " 'Hair,' was the reply. "The patron, some twenty years later, had occasion to buy another mattress, and again he asked :— " ' What's the best kind, John ?" " 'Cotton.' " 'Cotton !' the patron cried. 'Why, you told me twenty years ago that hair was the best !' "The old man gave a qaaint s'gh. " 'Talking has always been ny ruin,' he said."

While travelling over a bridge between Holt, and Tro\7bridge on « light engine, a railway guard noticed a boy struggling in the •••ater of the River Biss below. The engine wns "slowed up," and the guard plunged from the foot pla'e •.-•■»*». the river and, rescue^, tbe boj.