bumour. FABLES.

Waikato Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1556, 24 June 1882, Page 2 (Supplement)

bumour. FABLES.

BY GEOEGE WASHINGTON .33 SOP.

THE INTRUDING CAMEL. As several Arabs were sitting in their tent upon a rude autumnal day, a camel, who had left his umbrella at home, humbly craved permission to shelter his nose hi the interior. The children of the desert, moved with compassion, would have admitted the thin end of the camel, had not one of their number (whose motto was ever " Up and Bedouin "), with the cry, " I know what a mother-in-law is myself 1" remonstrated with the dromedary through the medium of a tent-peg and compelled it to seek shelter elsewhere. Moral. — Ge nest que la premi&rc Ma gui Coiite. (Resist the Mother-in-Law and she willjly from you.)

THE PHILOSOPHER AND THE SIMPLETON. A simpleton having had occasion to seat himself, sat down on a pin ; whereon he made an outcry unto Jupiter. A philosopher, who happened to be holding up a hitchmgpost in the vicinity, rebuked him, saying, " I can tell you how to avoid hurting yourself hy sitting down on pins, and will, if you will set them up." The simpleton eagerly accepting the offer, the philosopher swallowed four fingers of the rum which perisheth, and replied, " Never sit down." He subsequently acquired a vast fortune by advertising for agents, to whom he guaranteed £3 a week for light and easy employment at their homes. Moral. — The wise man saith, " There is a' nigger in the fence," but the fool sendeth on twenty stamps for sample, amd is taken in.

THE KIND-HEAKTED SHE ELEPHANT. A kind-hearted she elephant, while walking through the jungle where the spicy breezes blow soft o'er Ceylon's Isle ? 'heedlessly set foot upon a partridge, which she crushed to death within a few incties of 'the nest containing her callow brood. " Poor little things 1" said the generous mammoth, "I have been a mother myself, and my affection shall atone for the fatal consequences of my neglect." So saying, she sat down on the orphaned birds. . Moral. — The above teaches us what home is without a mother; also, that it is not every perspn who should be 'entrusted with the care of an orphan asylum.

, , IHB FOX AND THE GBAPBS. , A thirsty fox one day, in passing through a vineyard, noticed that the grapes were hanging in clusters from vines which were trained to such a height as to be out of his reach. ," Ah," said, the *f ox, with a 'supercilious smile, fl've heard of this before. In the twelfth .century, an [ ordinary fox of average. culture,' would, have ?wasted l his energy-and strehgth-in, the vain attempt to reach yonder sour';grapea., tiThanks to my knowledge of, \ vine^culture; h'ow,ey£r; I at once observed* that; l the,f great. heighl;r>n,d of,the,yine, the ,;,diram\4upon^ther sap through 1 increased <nutaber,i n of^iten J drils. and) leaves |muat j6f , fneces^^/in%ove^sh,4he,,gr^pe, s and«rfin^ titlftuiMEthy/tte vpoiyiidgra^oni* ,o£ .4ftn^tel|i-',. 4 ftn^tel|i-', geiitaniinja^v^ot:an^fp!c ? me,'a»nk^oji."joV

With these wordd, be coughed slightly, and witMrew. ,^j; t •* * fable teaches that an intellig^||^cUs(saflBion, ,and some botanical knowle^f are of the gfeatest'iniportance in grape crMte.

PBINTERS 1 MISTAKES. A delicious piece of bamboozleruent was served up to the readers of ft provincial paper the other day, due in all probability to some wag of a sub-editor. The previous evening, the reporter for the paper had to attend a meeting at a Wesleyan Chapel, for the conversion of tho Jews to Christianity ; after which he reported an address given to a local Sooiety on the Conversion of Sewage into Lime and Cement. In the compositor's hands, the manuscript got mixed up, and the printed report read as follows : " The chairman, after the meeting had been opened with prayer, explained that the 'Conversion of the Jews was one of the greatest works that could engage the attention of our sanitary authorities. Filtration was the most perfect method that could be adopted for purification ; but a filter had its limits. There was a popular notion that the sewage contained avast amount of wealth ; but the sludge must be taken out of it for purposes of irrigation, as it otherwise choked the pores of the land ; and they were a wandering face, spread over the whole face of the habitable globe. They were denied the inestimable blessings of Christianity, which might be counted by thousands of tons per year being allowed to run to waste, when, by a judicious admixture of lime and clay, the benighted Hebrews who sat in the darkness might easily be converted into lime and cement for building purposes ; and if deodorised, after being first dried and burned in a kiln, this ancient race would once more take its proud position among the nations of the world. Subscriptions were earnestly solicited for the purpose, though he — the speaker — disclaimed any idea of making a profit out of the process; and, in conclusion, he urged increasing efforts in the good work, showing that thus deodorised, by a very novel process of evangelisation, in large tanks constructed for the purpose, the greatful Hebrews might flow over the land without injury to vegetation ; while the expense of conversion, which was progressing as rapidly as the best friends of Christianity could wish, would be more than repaid by the sale of the phosphate of lime and valuable cement for building purposes." — Chamber's Journal.

Either too Curious. — In the following paragraph, sent us by a clerical admirer, one and the same pronunciation of the syllable " To" will be found repeated sixteen consecutive times in one sentence : — " Young Tom Blowhard did not at first seem to get on very well in the musical profession. The very first afternoon he went out with the band he received more scowls than coppers ; and had to remain in the pouring rain for twenty minutes, from twenty-two to two to two to two too, to ' too-too-too-too' to two too partidular young dandies who did not at all appreciate the efforts poor Tom made upon his new and brightly polished horn. — Exchange. The smallest engine in the world has just been finished in Baltimore. It can be Covered by a thimble. Three drops of water fill the boiler. Duration of "Human Life. — The average of human life is 33 years. One quarter die before the age of 7, one half before the age of 17. To every 1,000 persons, 1 only reaches 100 years. To every 100, only 6 reach 75 years ; and not more than lin 500 will reach 80 years. There are on the earth 1,000,000,000 of inhabitants. Of these 33,333,333 die every year ; 21,024 die every day ; 7,780 every hour; and 60 per minute, or one every second." These losses are about balanced by an equal number of births. The married are longer lived than the single ; and, above all, those who observe a sober and industrious conduct.

PLAYING BAIIN-YARD. Ono day Billy and Sammy were playing in a mud-hole and Bill said : " Now, Sammy, les play we was a barn-yard. You be the pig and lie down and waller, and I'll be a bull and beller like everything." So they go down on their hands and knees, and Sammy he wont into the dirt and wallowed, while Billy bellowed like distant thunder. By-and-by Sammy came up muddy — you never saw such a muddy little fellow — and he said : " Now you'll be tlie pig, and let me beller." But Billy said : " I ain't a very good pig except for dinner, and it'll be time nuff for you to beller when yer mother sees yer close." — Newhaven Journal. Looking to the future : Algy — " They want £6,000 for the lease, Maria, It runs for eighty-nine years." Maria — " Oh, donH buy it, Algy. Only eighty -nine years? Fancy poor baby being turned out of his house at ninety-one, and possibly infirm into the bargain I" — London Punch. A Gentleman sent a copy of Browning's first acknowledged work, " Paracelsus," to Tom Hood, who was then confined to his house by illness, thinking that it might " amuse the patient." The story is told that Hood took up the volume,and, having perused it for a few minutes, handed it to his wife. " Bead, my dear, read," he exclaimed, with a wild look in his eyes. Mrs. Hood soon seemed to be absorbed in " Paracelsus." " Well," asked Hood, anxiously, after a pause, " well?" " Why," replied Mrs. H. in doleful tones, " I can't make out a word of it." A sigh of relief burst from her husband. " Thank God I he cried, " then I have not lost my reason." The fatheb of a St. Louis bride presented his son-in-law with 80,000 head of cattle. " Papa, dear," exclaimed his daughter, when she heard of it, " that was so kind of you ; Charley's awfully fond of ox-tail soup." " No, ma," said a Harlem maiden, l< I don't like Charlie Jones coming every night. But I don't like to tell him so yet. He is so fat and heavy that by placing my Autumn leaves On his chair I'm getting them nicely pressed." A miller in Peru, Ind., fell asleep in his mill and bent forwad until his hair got caught in some machinery and was yanked out ; and of cause, it awoke him, and his first bewildered exclamation was : " Durn it, wife, what's the matter now. — Boston Post. A hungrt lawyer, who was dining at a hotel, shoveled the food into his mouth with his knife till he accidentally cut his mouth, which was observed by a wag seated opposite, who bawled out : " I say, Mister, don't cut that hole in your countenance any larger, or we shall all strave." " Fellow citizens," said the street-corner orator, standing on a dry-goods box admit the glare and smoke of many torches, " my position upon this question is a peculiar one." And just then, when the box caved in and let him down in the shape of a letter V, gripped by the neck and heels, and the crowd rather thought it was. An advertisement reads : " Wanted — A young man to be partly out door [and partly behind the counter;" and the Cleveland Leader asks: "What will be the result when the door slams ?"