All Sorts

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 11, Issue 10, 11 March 1909, Page 398

All Sorts

The cost of becoming _a. naturalised Englishman is about £6. " - - The British Post Office Savings Bank has over 10,000,000 depositors. Coal for fuel was sold for the first time in the United States about 1830. One must walk up every stair ere ojne can slide down the balustrade. It is estimated that there are about 865 tons of gold in circulation in England. Two million pounds' worth of German toys are said to Ibe sold in London annually. You have 'learnt something. That always feels at first as if you had lost something. About 500,000 tons of silver is produced annually by Mexico, Peru, Chili, and British colonies. German engine-drivers receive a gold medal and £100 for every ten years of service without accident. According to population, nearly twice as much coal is used in Great Britain as in any other country. If a bear were to visit a linen draper'sshop, what would he want? — Muzzlin'. When a small boy refuses a second piece of "pie, it's a sign there is something wrong with him — or the pie. Patient — ' Doctor, I can't sleep at night. What shall Ido for it?' Doctor — ' Get a job as night watchman.' There are in Great Britain 1,440,481 private dwellinghouses over £20 in value, with a total value of £65,681,722. At birth, * a male baby is about one-fifteenth heavier than a female, while the former's brain weighs one-sixth more. \j.— - Without the express consent of his wife, no married Austrian subject can procure a passport for journeying beyond the frontier. The number of sovereigns issued from the London Mint last year was 6,254,000 fewer than in 1907, and the* number of half-sovereigns issued 174,000 fewer. ' Sir Henry Irving served his time as a publisher's clerk on these premises, leaving in 1856,' runs the inscription on a tablet which has been placed outside a restaurant at 87, Newgate street, Dublin. It is stated authoritatively that railway extension in Canada during 1909 will involve the creation of 150 new towns along the lines built west of the Great Lakes during the year. A bright little boy who had been engaged in combat with another boy was reproved by his aunt, who told him he ought always to wait until the other boy ' pitched into him.' ' Well,' exclaimed the little hero, ' but if I wait for the other boy to begin I'm afraid there won't be any fight.' ' I'm sorry we haven't much of a dinner,' said Smith to Brown, whom he had urged to stay for that meal. ' You ought to have dropped in last evening. We had a fine, dinner then.' ' Why, papa,' chirped Smith's young hopeful, ' that's just what you told Mr. Jones at dinner yesterday.' To the moisture of the air we are indebted for the maintenance of an even degree of temperature. But for it night would be colder than Greenland, even at the Tropics. It is the water in the air that holds the sun'a heat, and keeps the earth warm where direct sunlight fails to fall upon bodies. An Irishman, having enlisted in a cavalry regiment, was undergoing all the horrors of learning to ride, when., his horse threw him over its head. According to custom, the sergeant who was superintending the riding lesson called out, ' Pat Murphy, did .you receive orders to dismount?' 'I did, sir,' -said Pat. 'Where from?' bawled the sergeant. ' ' From hind-quarters, . sir I' was Pat's grinning reply. The dull-looking and lumbering old grizzly bear appears awkward and slow of pace, but look out for them when they get to running. At that time Mr. Grizzly seems to be abo_ut three-fourths hind legs and one-fourth head. And how he does run along! He seems to simply roll over the ground like a giant snowball bounding down a steep hill. Bruin can' outrun 'the fastest horse" over a good course, and when hard pressed- he will bounce from fifteen to twenty feet at a jump, and his tracks will be marked by claw holes that resemble the work of a big farm harrow.