VARIETIES.

Temuka Leader, Issue 281, 24 August 1880, Page 2

VARIETIES.

Everybody wishes to be well off, including the man on a vicious horse.

A peculiarity of the clock is that as soon as it strikes it goes on with its work.

An old lady, hearing someone say the mails were very irregular, said ' It was just so in my young days—no trusting any of them.' Counsel (to witness) : " You're a nice sor of a fellow, you are! " Witness : " I'd say the same of you, only I'm on oath." At the marriage of a widower one of the servants was asked if his master would taka a bridal tour. " Dunno, sah. When ole missus was alive he took a paddle to her, dunno if he take a bridal to the new one or not." A clothier has excited public curiosity having a large apple painted on his sign. When asked for an explanation he rep'dsd. 'lf it hadn't been for an apple, where would. the ready-made clothing be to-day ?' The Latest Discovery.—The latest discovery ia a spring in Michigan so strongly magnetic that a man who drank from it and went into a blacksmith's shop found the anvil on which he sat stuck fast to him and had to have it amputated. 'Mistress : Why, what is that smell Jane. ' Please, m'm, the brandy got spdt, and —I I done my best with the pudding; bu I am afraid it djn'tflu,ra mucli with parrafin.' A mob of Chinese at Penping-foo recently attaoked the Rev. Nathan Sites, an American Methodist missionary, and were on the point of stoning him to deatn, when a local magistrate interfered. The mob said that they were only treating Americans as Americans treated Chinese in California.

At a recent religious ceremonial, at the ' Holf burg in Vienna, 12 old men wer<j presenfed to the Emperor of Austria whose collective ages amounted to 1082 years, giving an average of 90 years and two months each. 36 old people exhibited at the same time aggregated a total of 3165 years. From February 1878 to February of the present year, the number of mursuphials destroyed in the Warwick (Queensland) district were 247,313 kangaroos, £8678 Is 9d 50,915 wallabies, £936 8s 9d ! 4680 wallabies, unpaid ; total 302,908 marsupials at a cost cf £931410s 6d.

The consumption of cigars in the United States last year amounted to the enormous total of 2,082,356,362, being an average of 50 cigars for every head of the population, or two fifths of the value of the entire consumption of wheat. An exciting billiard match took place at the Coffee Palace Hotel, Sydney, lately between Messrs Nesbit and Davis—two well known players. The game was 650 up. The player* kept well together for some time, but Nesbit by a series of grand breaks of 91, and 50 and small ones secured to win. The export of horned-cattle from the United States has increased from less than 700,000 dollars in 1873 to 8,379,200 dollars in 1879. Of the latter amount stock to the value of 6,616,114 dollars found its way to Great Britain. " It isn't the spots on the sun that trouble* me, " said a mother, " it's the freckles on my daughter. " " Sam, why don't you talk to your and tell him to lay up his treasures in heaven '• "What's de use ob him laying treasure up dar !" replied Sam ;" he neber see urn again." An old bachelor said he once fell in love with a young lady, but abandoned all idea of marrying her when he found that she and all her family were opposed to it. The Cincinnati Enquirer thinks that Ere must have been a very unhappy woman* there was no other woman to pass her on the Street, that she might look round and see how that d ress fitted in the back. Mrs O'Bralaghan. : "Shure and it's the truth Oi've ben tellin' year, Mrs. ve. never catched a lie coming out ofmy _j mouth." Mrs. M. No, endeed, Mrs. O Bralaghan ; they comes out so fast nobody couldn't catch' em." "What are you in gaol for? " asked » prison visitor of a negro. ' For bor wm sah. « Why, they dont put man in gaol for borrow ing money!" '< Yes, but, you see I had to knock the man down free or four times afore he'd lend it to me," exclaimed Afric » chiW,