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THE COURT. -..--

POLITICAL GOSSIP.I

LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 0…

EISTEDDFOD AND WELSH MUSICAL…

EXTRACTS FROM" PUNCH " FUN.'…

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BELIQUBS OF BERNARD PALISSY.

OUR MISCELLANY.

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OUR MISCELLANY. A Duel at the Grecian.-lu 1710-11, Addison, starting the Spectator, tells us his own grave face was well known at the Grecian; and in No. 49 (April, 1711), this great observer describes the spleen and inward laughter with which he views at the Grecian the young Templars come in, about eight a.m., either dressed for Westminster, and with the pre-occupied air of assumed business, or in gay cap, slippers, and parti-coloured dressing-gowns, rising early to publish their laziness, and being displaced by busier men to- wards noon. Dr. King relates a story of two hot blooded young gentlemen quarrelling one evening at this coffee-house about the accent of a Greek word. Stepping out into Devereux-court, they fought, and one of them, being run through the body, died on the spot.—Thornbury' s Haunted London. Liberty of the Press in the Sixteenth Century. Some old manuscripts in the Biblio- theque Imp6riale include a decree signed by Charles IX., on the 10th September, 1563, which gives an excellent idea of the situation of the press at Lyons in the sixteenth century. It is as follows: "It is forbidden to publish or print any work, or writing, in rhyme or in prose, without the previous authorisation of our lord the king, under pain of being hanged or strangled." Another clause says: Three times every year a visit shall be made in the shops and printing- houses of the printers and booksellers of Lyons by two trustworthy persons belonging to the Church, one representing the archbishop and the other the ohapter of the said city, and they shall be accompanied by the seneohal of Lyons." An Industrious Squaw.—Milton took the op- portunity, afforded by the visit of an Indian and his squaw, to engage the latter for general washing and house-cleaning. Although it was night when they arrived, the woman set to work immediately, diligently melting snow at a roaring fire for hours. And when about midnight she had obtained a sufficient supply of water, proceeded to scrub blankets and clothes. Milton expostulated, and suggested she should retire to rest, but in vain. The splashing and scrubbing still went on without cessation, and sleep was impos- sible. At length Milton, driven to desperation, jumped out of bed, threw away all the water, ana put out the fire. The squaw thereupon retired to rest in muoh astonishment, and for a time all was still Presently, however, when Bhe imagined Milton had fallen asleep, she quietly got up, and recommenced her labours..The unhappy retainer of her services was fairly beaten, and compelled^ to resign himself to his fate, venting many maledictions on the untimely industry of his servant. -Tlie North-West Passaqe by Land. An Arabian Laughing Plant.-For the first time I met with a narcotic plant very common further south, and gifted with curious qualities. Its seeds, in which the deleterious principle seems chiefly to reside, when pounded and administered in a small dose, produce effects much like those ascribed to Sir Humphrey Davy's laughing gas; the patient dances, sings, and performs a thousand extravagances, till after an nour of great excitement to himself, and bystanders, he falls asleep, and on awaking has lost all memory of what he did or said while under the in. fluence of the drug. To put a pich of this powder into the coffee of some unsuspeotmgjidua is anot uncommon joke, nor did I hear that it: was ever follo wed by serious consequences, though an <1 itymight perhaps be dangerous. I <» two individuals, but in proportw^.ifnot absolutely homoeopathic, still sufficiently minute to keep on the safe side of risk, and witnes^d its operation laughable enoueb but very harmless, i he plant that bears these berries hardly attains in Kaseem the height of six inches above the ground, but in Oman I have seen bushes of it three or four feet in growth, and wide- spreading. The stems are woody, and of a yellow tinge when barked; the leaf of a dark green colour, and pinnated, with about twenty leaflets on either side; the stalks smooth and shining; the flowers are yellow, and grow in tufts, the anthers numerous the fruit is a capsule, stuffed with a greenish padding, in which lie embedded two or three black seeds, in size and shape much like French beanstheir taste sweetish, but with a peculiar opiate flavour the smell II .heavy, aud almost sickly.—Palgrave's Central and Eastern Arabia. Destructive Lightning.—Though the number of persons killed by a single flash of lightning may have been greater, there are, probably, not many in- stances on record of its having covered so great an area as in a family at Eastbourne. The coachman I and butler were outside the house. The former was! struck dead, and the latter was so much affected by the shock that, without being hardly conscious of what I he was doing, he went into the house. Here he found his master insensible, and, as it turned out, very xlg much hurt on the left side. In the pantry he found the footman lying dead on the floor; and a further examination of the house showed that the lightning had been through all parts of it. Everywhere the windows were broken, looking-glasses shattered, articles of furniture torn to splinters, cornices and ceilings cracked, bell wires melted, and so forth. The owner's daughter had a wonderful escape. The electric stream entered into the room where she was dressing, and splintered the bed she had just left, besides doing other damage. It is evident that this was not a case of a small stream passing from one one object to another, inasmuch as the coachman struck dead outside the building. But, large as ttt area was over which this extended, it was not to that at Reichenbach, which town was fired in s maYlY places that the inhabitants had the greatest difficulty in escaping into the country, without beiog able to save any part of their goods; even a of cavalry quartered in the town were unable to save any portion of their ba-,Page.-All the Tear Round. The Origin ot the Art of Cooking.-The art of cooking is as univeiijal as fire itself among tle human race; but there are found, even among savages, several different processes that come under the ral term, and a view of the distribution of these cesses over the world may throw some light on early development of human culture. Boasting broiling by direct exposure to the fire seems the o» method universally knovrn to mankind, but the „ ] some kind of oven is also very general. The V islanders keep fire continually smouldering in h°U° trees, so that they have only to clear away ashes at any time to cook their little .'vi- and fish. In Africa, the natives take PfJ session of a great ant-hill, destroy the 8J> and clear out the inside, leaving only the clay WjL i standing, whioh they make red hot with a fire, so & bake joints of rhinoceros within. But these are usual expedients, and a much commoner form of Søj\"t oven is a mere pit ia the ground. In the # elaborate kind of this cooking in underground hot stones are put in with the food, as in the faBW1^ South-Sea Island practice, which is too well knoWJ* e need description. The Malagasy plan seems to b0^e same, but the Polynesians and their connections v by no means a monopoly of the art, which is pracWr with little or no difference in other parts of the wo'1 The Guanches of the Canary Islands buried meat » I' hole in the ground, and lighted a fire over it, J similar practice is still sometimes found in the i& 3 | of Sardin a, while among the-Bedouins, and in a in North and South America, the process comes C closer to that used in the South Seas.— Tylor's ™ | searches into the Early History of Mankind. The Maids of Merry England.—Mr. Ros^ who is allowed to be a judge of such matters, ø1 t v that the present style of female dress is the IILnl, graceful and artistic ever worn. I quite agree him, and I think it has had almost a magical etfe6 bringing out and setting off the beauty of the of merry England. There are no plain girls days. Positive ugliness ia altogether baniahed the land. All the girls are pretty. Walking ID streets, or driving in the park, or sitting in a bo* the opera, one is kept in a state of continual adn>*j_e tion by the number of pretty girls that meet the^ j on every hand. All this female beauty has of | existed at any time; but I venture to think that > only lately that it has been shown off to the advantage. In these days of economics and art t1: 0f ing we know how to make the most and the b08i-g.; things. Mark what a mine of beauty has oil red I covered in red hair. How many years is it since hair was contemptuously denominated "carrots? ty be carroty was to be a fright, and an allusion to a ca*«"0fy girl, in a song or a play, was sure to raise a \a,nS. derision. But now carrots are the fashion, the The girl with the ruddy looks, instead of plaster J, her hair down, to look like polished slabs of Peters i i granite, combs it out and lets the sun into x J" Btraightway it is a fleece of gold. Golden lock0"7 iif i is to say, the ridiculed •' carrots of another perl°V r are now the admiration of all the men, and the eD all the women. It is no secret. I believe that women are in the habit of bleaohing their dark "1- order co impart to it a tinge of the fashionable mired red. I am informed, too—and I can jj|0 personal testimony to the fact, that red-haired jLjf j who have been on the shelf until they are no I young, are now going off in the matrimonial like wildfire.-All the Year Round. i Sportsmen of the Old Time.—Things 1 done very differently in the past century by jL fashioned squire: his twenty or thirty coup' hounds, and six or seven horses, which afforded ^1 real sport than these flashy establishments 0 if time. We have got now into very luxurious pensive habits moderation and economy altogether pooh-poohed. We must hunt four ot or even six days a week—many would hunt on if they could. The master in a crack country.vjsj keep his seventy or eighty couples of kennel, and fifty or sixty horses in his stable—aod*T^j! of the right stamp, too. His men must be well and if the under-whip's horse be a little groggy ° y; fore-legs, he is at once denounoed a screw, and^ pertinent inquiry reaches the master's ears," Jack be expected to do his work on such v*m those? Then as to the appointments aad dress0 staff, everything must be in tip-top fashion and even to the tie of Jack's neckcloth. This is for carrying all these things into absurd We do not, of course, find fault with the appropriate equipments of man and horse, afPj. »l with the old adage, that what is worth doing is worth doing well." I like to see whips tarn out well shaved, well washed, jjW, dressed at the place of meeting; but workmen, in their woollen cords and mahogany* ) boots, as the lamented Will Goodall, of Belvo^^y peared, when I saw him for the last time trotting ^jjl I with his black and tans from the kennel door.. | Goodall," I aBked before he mounted, give me your receipt for boot-top stuff?" ingly, sir; it is simple enough, and don't writing down: just dip your sponge # copper, and wash them well over; it gives j a good polish of the right colour." Abt Will! he was one of the right sort himself, ef i and out, for a huntsman, although hia rivals border would indulge sometimes the joke at his j —a very far-fetched one—" that when runni^^pgi51,, late at night in the Home Wood, he hung up ji"1 the long drive, that he might see how to hol*9^^opB I over." In his estimation, white leathers over." In his estimation, white leathers a.n pØ1". I', looked wishy-washy upon men of business quite of his opinion. They may do very e gucO gentlemen who have sufficient Btook in han» ° y go artioles, to indulge in a clean pair every day L jjjiioM out hunting, but huntsmen and whip3 have I time to devote tothis pipeclaying work.—'S<^ I Lessons on Hunting. IJ The Cholera: How to Prevent Cop^°i\s» -In the first place, the sanitary condition •-jujfl' |; neighbourhood m which they reside should b of the u k of dlately attended to. This is properly the -Oog^ j local authorities, but it can be rendered too M | effective only by the earnest co-operation various inhabitants. These should see that I00&& or decaying matter is allowed to accumulate o | near their houses; that dust-heaps be removed as possible; that ill the house drains flushed; and thtt the various water-clo .j0 o | sewers are kept dsinfected by the use of 1 lime. In the secoal place, the interiors of .nS& should be kept as dean as possible. o0-fv, q-.rt walls should occasionally be well washed w nge(jc„1 lime water. Soap snd water only should b oanees wood-work, a solution composed of two chloride of lime disolved m a gallon of afterwards applied vhere line wood is olc. b<j of cellars, stables, or oatnouses, &c., all « thoroughly limewastea, and the floors kept tree oi bp offensive matter. *0 decaying refuse ;rBj allowed to remain m cupboards or closet8- -in at f passages, and floors should be also well was. faben least once a week. OK paper-hangisgs should t>e_|. down from the wails, VIKCQ should then be eSpe- J andre papered. Ventiktion should b3 attended ft cially in bedrooms, thwindows of which shouta* t open as much as possibe during fine weather, car et*> < SbO 1, taken th-it the variola artioles of bddtt!g- & blankets, &e., are thoroughly exposed jjofc r Overcrowding should b> avoided wberfl « prevented, the rooms sioaid be effi'iisntiy f There can never be too tsv ch fresh sir).;11 -g(, & [ or workshop. Personalclearmness is C)p. p pensable. Bathing should be frequently rc « j Where this cannot be cone, the body^no, ^0gt, j sponged at least once i week. eje'^ -ng ( and others, whose trad^ are n°i-e« of ojy | should have a good wasl daily. « e9Vec apparel should be kept asclean as Pos- ^p. fot the various portions of unlur clothing, f j* repeatedly changed and oleanset. imp11 oPgi? j drinking purposes should >e free fro gu s6r This is a precaution whiih cann°" o ofcbfr_id^ insisted upon. The ciatens, bu'tts, ine(j sh° Jj0lic voirs in whish water thus tied^is c 0f al repeatedly cleansed.^ baj3ltHjnWi1ole5oinftkei» °! liquors should be discouraged. u u" v,e especially diseased meat, sh<pld it js £ {o°i upon any account. Toomu->rawf 0ook&* 10 All utensils used in the preparation" GaSSeU « I should be kept scrupulous!? clew"* trated Family Paper. trated Family Paper.