RANDOM READINGS.

Matamata Record, Volume II, Issue 66, 24 January 1918, Page 4

RANDOM READINGS.

TO RESTRAIN LUXURIOUS LIVING, ' In the reign of Edward the Third, Haws were enacted to restrain luxury of living. No man, under a hundred pounds a year, was allowed to wear gold, silver, or silk in his clothes. Servants were also prohibited eating flesh meat or fish above once a day. No one was allowed, either for dinner or supper, above three dishes in each course, and not above two courses. THE KILKENNY CATS. The legend of tho famous Kilkenny cats, and tho wonderful combat which' resulted in their destruction—all but the tips of their tails—originated about tho close of tho eighteenth century, when a number of Hessian soldiers were quartered in Athlone, Ireland. Their favourite sport was to tie two cats together by the tails, hang them over a line, and leave them to fight. This being contrary to orders, a soldier, in danger of detection by an officer whom lie saw approaching, cut down a couple of combatants with a blow of his sword, but left tho ends of the two tails in evidence. Asked to account for these, he explained that the two cats had fought so fiercely that they had each consumed the other, all except their tails. Another version is thus given in rhyme—- “ There were once two eats of Kilkenny, Who thought there was ono cat too many; So they mewed and they bit, And they scratched and they fit, _ Till, excepting their nails and the tips of their tails, Instead of two cats there weren’t any I ’ INFLUENZA IN EVERY LAND. Legion are the names that the dreaded “flu.” has been called by those that have fallen under its magic spell. No country will acknowledge that its shores arc tho birthplace of the “flu.” fiend, and the following are a few of the names given this unowned disease. In Russia it is called Siberian fever, and in Siberia Chinese fever. The people of Brazil know it by the name of polka fever, or zamporina; “la grippe” is the term generally in use in France, also “la coquette” and Spanish catarrh. Germans define it as “schafkrankheit” (sheep’s disease). “Malattia tedesca” (German sickness) is the epithet in use in Italy; whilst Spaniards name it “/mfluencia rusa,” and “trancazo (a blow with a bar). Very apt is the Swedish definition— l “snufsjuka” and “snuff-fever.” Our own description—influenza—was taken from the eighteenth century Italian writers, who spoke of “una influenza di freddo” influence of cold). Our own physicians mistook the description for the name of the disease Itself—hence influenza.