SITTING ON A RAIL.
In a New Zealand township there is a corner section unoccupied out fenced. On that fence sat habitually the ancient inhabitants. Here they sat and spat. Conversation there was .sometjiues—expectoration always. The civic fathers, to show their consideration for the trains of the gentler sex. met in conclave and made a by-law. And then the police requested the gentleman to get off aud move on, but in vain. They still sat fast. Now there was some technical difficulty in enforcing the bylaw, but the overseer thought he could make it operative. He went to no lawyer, but he painted the top rail liberally with a pigment of soot and suet. Next day the constable, like the Lcvite, passed by on the other side and troubled nobody. And thus it was that the wives of several old inhabitants wanted to know of (heir husbands, that evening, why they had been using their apparel lo clean frying-pans—apparently on both sides. There is now no by-law more rigidly obeyed (except in Parliament) than that against silting on the rail.
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Bibliographic details
Patea Mail, 23 October 1880, Page 3
Word Count
180SITTING ON A RAIL. Patea Mail, 23 October 1880, Page 3
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