A SIMPLE TRICK

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 21, 16 April 1927, Page 23 (Supplement)

A SIMPLE TRICK

A simple little instrument can be made out of a piece of bamboo which will enable us to disguise our voice so that our friends will not recognise it. We take a piece of bamboo about the thickness of a walking stick, three or four inches long, and remove any pith there may be inside. Then we cut a notch at each end. on opposite sides of the bamboo. This notch, of course, cuts right through the substance of the bamboo. Over each end of the bamboo we stretch tightly a piece of thin tracing paper. Then, with a large pin, we prick a hole in each piece of tracing paper. The instrument is now ready. Covering one of the notches with our mouth, we talk or sing into it, and our voice will be effectively disguised. The Man and the Bow A man had a pliant strong-bow with which he could shoot far and true. He loved his bow so well that he must needs have it curiously carved by a cunning workman. It was done, well and beautifully done, and at the first trial the bow snapped. PRISCILLA pRISCILLA was a little girl who had a nose as sharp as a needle. She wore her hair in two long pig-tails, and always walked about with her head in the air. „ Priscilla liked to know everything about everybody, and was never tired of asking questions. At first her father and mother were very pleased to find that their little daughter wanted to know so much, but as she grew older they began to get tired of always hearing her ask “Why?” “Take your umbrella with you today, dear,” her mother would say. “Why?” Priscilla would answer. “Because it looks like rain.” ‘Why does it look like rain?" “It’s time for little girls to go to bed,” father would say, looking at the clock. “Why?” Priscilla used to ask. “Because it is not good for little girls to sit up late.” “Why isn’t it good for little girls to sit up late?” Her nose grew sharper and sharper every day, and looked as if it wanted to poke into everything. She asked questions all day long, and often, when she woke up in the morning, the first word she said was “Why?” As she ran down the road to school or played with her little friends in the playground, her two pig-tails, with a bow of ribbon at the end of each, flapping behind her, looked something like this—??—which is another way of asking “why?” At last, even the cat ran away whenever she tried to stroke it. Perhaps it was afraid of a large Y dropping out of Priscilla’s mouth every time she opened it. Very soon Priscilla found that nobody wanted to talk to her at all, and she went about wondering “why?” Her mother tried to stop her—but it was not a bit of good. One day she was walking down the street, and stopped to look at a cart which was laden with coal. Two men were working very hard, carrying sacks from the cart and emptying the coal down a large, round hole in the pavement. “Take care, missie,” said one of them, “don’t go too near or you’ll fall down into the coal cellar.” “Why?” asked Priscilla, taking a step backward—then, before you could say “snap,” down she fell through the hole right into the deep, dark coal cellar. When she was pulled out again she was as black as black can be! Not a little bit of her dress was left clean. “Oh, what a dreadful child you are!” cried her mother when she was brought home again. “Why?” asked Priscilla.