AMERICAN CLIPPINGS.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2166, 26 February 1880, Page 3

AMERICAN CLIPPINGS.

The Providence “ Journal” says : He occupied one of the car scat and filled the other with a double covered market-basket. Ho ivas an original specimen. His plug hat sat on his cars like a smoked chimney on the prongs of a lamp-top ; his legs were braided together and his shins were sharp enough for can-openers. “ You can’t guess what I’ve got in the basket, “ ’Squire,” he observed to a passenger in the seat behind him. “Yo,” was the reply. “Twins by thunder,” he exclaimed, “ and I’m going to give them an airing.” So saying,"he drew forth a pair of'black and white dolls of unusual proportions and dandled them on his knees, “I’ll tell ye how it is, Captain,” he continued. “Me and the old woman has been hitched up in the holy bonds of hemlock going on these forty years, and there hain’t a chick or child to be seen or heard about the house. So I’ve brought home these "ere twins. She can take her choice —a black Tin or a white Tin. Bet ye, she’ll take to both. Why, if I took home a black snake, she would want it to set up and have some supper, and put a hot brick in the bed where the snake was going to sleep. Gosh ! the old gal has got a heart in her like a red cedar. Great prize pumpkins ! how she will shout when she sees them arc twins !” And then he put them carefully back in the basket closed the cover and beamed benignantly upon the wintry world without. A paper at Manchester, England, spoke of “ the late P. T. Barman.” The great showman promptly seized the occasion to advertise himself by sending the journal a note assuring it of his continued existence and saying : “My highest ambition, professionally, at present, is to pay the British Government £20,000 for the privilege of exhibiting for five years its ‘ white elephant,’ King Cetewayo. I shall be glad to receive a note 'of acceptance by an early post from Lord Beaconslield, who so kindly mentioned me in.his ‘ Lothair.’ ” That would be “ the greatest show on earth.’ Six boys at Henepin, lowa, organized as bandits, on a plan suggested by a thrilling novel which they had read. They could not find a natural cave, and, therefore, dug one in the side of a hill. Their first exploit was to rob all the clothes-lines of the neighborhood on a wash-day night. Great excitement ensued, and several innocent tramps were arrested ; but the mystery was explained when, on the following night, the young amateur thieves stole a horse and wagon, and were caught taking a load of the clothes to the nearest city. “Well,” said the conductor, “there are some queer cases. There was a lady that rides here regularly that offered me a bad quarter, after hunting around In her purse some time for it. I returned it and politely told hcr.it was not good, but I’m blessed if the next week she did not try to shove that identical quarter into me again! Then I was fool enough to' advise her not to try and pass that quarter any more. Well, sir, although she told me that she took the quarter on the horse-cars, the next day she takes it into a store where she trades, and tells ’em she took it there, and how she was insulted by one of them conductors. The storekeeper was smart, he was. lie wanted her trade, so he gave her a good quarter and told her he would write to the company, and I’m blessed if he didn’t, and I got taken off for two days for not taking bad money.” “ Boston Commercial.”

Influence of the phylloxera —ln a. Paris restaurant : “ Here, waiter, I asked you for vin ordinaire, at one franc fifty centimes the bottle, as it is marked on the list, and you charge me two francs fifty. You have made a mistake.” “Not at all ; the wine iias gone up since you commenced dinner.” A Gorman physician, who has given much attention to the subject, has come to the conclusion that the only way to preserve peace among the women of a household when they arc kept withindoors is toobligc them to remain in absolute silence. Oh, yes. To pen half a dozen women up in a house and keep them from talking is one of the easiest things in the world. Amu have noticed this, no doubt. All you have to do is to kill the woman. A r ou might gag them, but the surest and least troublesome plan is to kill them. It is a very simple remedy. —“ Norristown Herald.”

A farm-hand at Lebanon, Me., was engaged to plough a ten acre lot. Wishing him to draw a straight furrow, his employer directed his attention to a cow grazing right opposite, telling him to drive directly towards that cow. He started his horses, and his employer’s attention was drawn to something else ; but in a short time, looking around, he found that the cow had left her place, while the sagacious ploughman was following her, drawing a zigzag furrow all over the field.

Charles Entrope de Laurence happened to be visiting one of the Queen’s Favorites, when a newcomer announced the sudden death of the Bishop of Nantes. “I will wager a hundred thousand livres,” he said .significantly, “ That I am not made his successor.”

“Do you mean that?” asked the Queen’s favorite. “ Certainly, madame,” Three days’ afterward he received a note from the lad}", addressed to him as Bishop of Nantes and containingonly these words. “ A'our Lordship owes mo 100,000 livres that wc wagered.” — French paper.

A convict in the Wisconsin State Prison refused to go to his cell when ordered by the Warden to do so. I'ho Warden held a watch in one hand and a pistol in the other, and said ; “ I will give you three minutes to obey and if you don’t I shall shoot you.” The convict doggedly folded his arms and stood still. Minute after minute passed, the Warden counting them aloud. This was in the workshop, and all the prisoners were spectators to the scene. When the throe minutes had expired, the Warden took deliberate aim at the convict’s heart and said: “ I’ll give you two minutes more, and I swear I’ll kill you then if you don’t go to your coll.” A defiant curse was the only reply. At the end of the extra two minutes the pistol was fired, and the convict foil dead. The officer is sustained by the higher prison authorities, who say that his course was perfectly proper under the circumstances, but the District Attorney) of the country will try him under an indictment for murder.