The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-08-09 00:00:00

JOTTINGS FOR THE CURIOUS.

A LUCKY PLANT.—Celery is regarded as a lucky
plant by the modern Greeks, and is hung up in rooms,
placed on silkworm frames, and given to children.
Tk,e plant is said to have been introduced into England
in 1704 by the French Marshall TAllard, while a pri-
soner-of-war, after the battle of Blenheim at which
he was defeated by the Duke of Marlborough
TERMINATION OP AFGHAN WORDS.—Stan, a termi-
nation often found in Afghan words, means " country "
—thus, Afghanistan "country of the Afghans;"
Gulistan, "country of the roses (gut, " rose"). Dagh
means " mountam ; " Tchatir Dagh, "mount of
Tchatir ;" Daghestan, "country of mountains," In
British India numbers of towns have their names
ending in patam, which means "garden," Hindoo
towns covering in general a vast surface with pleasure-
grounds—thus, Seringapatam, "garden of seringas,"
&c.

ROUND THE WORLD,—MauufactUrea travel the
world round rapidly, preceding our most enterprising
travellers. In the interior of Africa, pewter dishes,
with the London stamp, are used at the royal table.
The cotton of India is conveyed by British ships
round half our planet, to be woven by British skill in
the factories of Lancashire. It is again set in motion
by British capital and transported to the very plains
whereon it grew, and is repurchased by the lords of
the soil which gave it birth, at a cheaper price that
that at which their coarser machinery enables them to
manufacture it themselves. At Calcata, whence the
cotton cloth called calico derives it name, the price of
labour is a fraction of that in England, yet the market
is supplied from British looms.
THE SERJEANT•SURGEONOY TO THE REIGNING
MONAROW—The office of eerjeant-surgeon is one of
great antiquity, One of the duties was to be in at-
tendance on the king when he ventures to battle, and
the earliest record of this appears when John of
Arden, in 1349, acoompanied Edward 111. to the
Battle of Crecy. The office of serjeant-surgeon was
was not, however, confirmed until 1461, when William
Hobbys was appointed, with a salary of forty marks
yearly. There were several perquisites attached, such
as drawing a certain amount of wine from the king's
cellars, the right to all the fine linen stained with the
royal blood, and during war to take prisoners, retain-
ing the amount of ransom paid for them. The
surgeon to the sovereign was, moreover, the twelfth
person in rank, and took precedence accordingly.
ORIGIN OF THE MAY•POLE.—The leisure days after
seed-time had been chosen by our Saxon ancestors for
folk-motes, or conventions of the people. Not till
after the Norman conquest the Pagan festival of Whit-
suntide fully melted into the Christian holiday of
Pentecost. Its original name is Wittentide. the time
of choosing the Wits or Wise Men to the Wittenage-
motto. It was consecrated to Hertha, the goddess of
peace and fertility; and no quarrels might be main-
tained, no blood shed, during this truce of the goddess.
Each village, in the absence of the baron, at the
assembly of the nation, enjoyed a kind of innocent
Saturnalia. The vassals met upon the common green
round the May-Pole, where they elected a village
lord, or king, as he was called, who chose his queen.
He wore an oaken, and she a hawthorn, wreath, and
together they gave laws to the rustic sports during
these sweet days of freedom.
Husaaßs.--Hussars, as cavalry soldiers, were at
first confined to Hungary. In 1445, when the neces-
sities of the defence of Hungarian territory imp:pied
thearselvts on the authorities, the Crown passed a
law compelling the peasants to supply one MALI out of
every twenty of their number, arm that man a horse-
man, to the army of the State. There is a popular
fallacy that these bold riders got their name from the
loud " huzza" with which they charged; in reality
they were so called from the word houtzar, which
means "the twentieth" in the Magyar tongue. These
firet Hussars were recruited from the inhabitants of
the immense Hungarian plains—strong, hardy fellows,
with sinews supple as steel, who spent their lives in the
saddle, roaming from pasture to pasture in charge of
large droves of cattle, and occasionally amusing them.
selves by capturing and taming wild horses. The
British Hussars were enrolled in 1759.

CHURCH-GOING IN LAPLAND.—LapIand mothers are
not in the habit of staying at home with their babies.
The Laps are a very religious people, and take long
journeys to hear their pastors. As soon as the family
arrive at the little wooden church, and the reindeer are
secured, the father shovels a snug little bed in the
snow, and the mother wraps the baby in skins and do-
posits it therein. Then the father piles the snow
around it, and the dog is set on guard, while the
parents go decorously into the church. Often as many
as thirty babies may be seen laid away in the snow
about a church. _ _

THE "SORROWFUL" TREE.—In the Island of Goa,
near Bombay, which was formerly the Indian capital
of the Portuguese, there is a singular vegetable, the
" sorrowful " tree, so called because it flourishes only
at night. At sunset no flowers are to be seen, and yet
half an hour afterwards it is full of them. They yield
a sweet smell, but the sun no sooner begins to shine
than some of them fall, and others close up. This con-
tinues throughout the year.
THE PAPAL TianA.—Dainaeus It. was the first Pope
who was crowned with the tiara, which, like the crowns
of other potentates, is sumptuously ornamented with
precious stones and set off with a beautiful diamond.
The cupola is formed of eight rubies, twenty-four
pearls, and an emerald. The cross is composed of
twelve brilliants. The lappets (queues) are of rubies
and pearls. Two golden bands retain it in position
when worn. The principal diamond in the tiara has an
eventful history. It once decorated the brow of the
Grand Mogul, of whom it was purchased by Charles
the Rash of Burgundy, and was abandoned by him,
together with other valuables, at the battle of Granson,
1476. Found under a waggon by a soldier, he rejected
it as worthless, but, afterwards altering his opinion, he
again picked up what he thought WAS but a fragment
of crystal, and sold it to a cure for a crown. A cunning
citizen purchased it of the latter for three crowns, and
resold it for five thousand ducats. It again changed
owners for seven thousand ducats, was afterwards
bought by Ludovic, Duke of Milan, for fourteen
thousand, and subsequently acquired by Pope Julius
11, for twenty thousand ducats, In size it is about
that of a small walnut,
CHINESE PHYSICIANS.—The physicians of China, by
feeling the arms of a sick man in three places—to
observe the slowness, the increase, or the quickness of
the pulse—can judge of the cause, the nature, the
danger, and the duration of the disorder. Without
their patients speaking, they reveal infallibly what
part is affected. They are at once physicians and
apothecaries, composing the remedies they prescribe.
They are paid when they have completed a cure; but
they receive nothing when their remedies do not take
effect.
A NOVEL CRICKET MATCH.—Cricket is said to be
identical with the game of "club-ball," which was
played by our forefathers in the fourteenth century.
A novel match of cricket was played in May, 1827,
for a considerable sum, on Harefield Common, near
Rickmansworth. The match was between two gentle-
men of Middlesex, and Mr. Francis Trunoper, farmer,
of Harefield, with the help of a thorough-bred sheep-
dog. In the first innings the two gentlemen got three
runs, and Mr. Trumper three for himself and two for
his dog. In the second innings the two gentlemen
again got three runs, and Mr. Trumper then going in,
and getting two runs, beat the two gentlemen, leaving
two-wickets ataeding. Before the game began, the
odds were five to one against Mr. Trumper and his
canine partner, but after the first innings bets were so
altered that four to one were laid upon Trumper and
his dog. The dog always stood near his master when
he was going to bowl, and the moment the ball was
hit he kept his eye upon it, and started off after it
with speed, and, on his master running up to the
wicket, the dog would carry the ball in his mouth
and put it into his master's hand with such wonderful
quickness that the gentlemen found it very difficult to
get a run even from a very long hit. The money lost
and won on the occasion was considerable, as a great
number of gentlemen came from the neighbouring
towns and villages to see so extraordinary a game.
" OCTONARY."—The number nine has always been,
and still is, remarked as possessing uncommon powers
and producing coinciden :es in an extraordinary degree.
Yet there can scarcely be a greater number of coinci-
dences than were exemplified in the number eight in
the life of the Arabian, Caliph Motassein, called from
his accidental claims, by the name of " Octonary,"
He gained eight battles against the enemies of the
Koran; he was the eighth of the dynasty of the
Abbaeides ; he reigned eight years, eight months, mid
eight days; he left eight sons, eight daughters, eight
thousand slaves, and eight millions of gold.
WILD ANIMALS IN ENGLAND.—Lord Macaulay, in
his account of the state of England in 1685, states that
at Enfield, hardly out of the sight of the smoke of the
capital, was a region of twenty-five miles in circum-
ference in which ceer, as free as in an 'American forest,
wandered by thousands. The last wild boars, which
had been preserved for the royal diversion, and had
been allowed to ravage the cultivated land with their
tusks, were slaughtered by the exasperated rustics
during the licence of the civil war. Edward I. issued
a mandate for the destruction of wolves in 1289, but
the last wolf that roamed our island was slain in Scot-
land a short time before the close of the reign of
Charles 11.
, WHERE IVORY COMES FRJM.—lvory has been an
important article of commerce for many centuries, It
was imported by Solomon from Tarshish about 992 B, C.
It is said that to furnish the ivory which is imported
into England alone, 50,000 elephants have to be killed
every year. The best ivory comes from Zanzibar,
and is the product of the African elephant • it is
opaque, soft, easy to work, and free from creels and
other defects. That from Ambriz, the Gaboon River,
and South of the Equator is called "silver gray ;" it
remains white and never becomes yellow, as is the case
with the Asiatic ivory, and is, therefore, the most
valuable of any ivory in the market. The tusks from
Siam are translucent, and, being soft-grained, are pre-
ferred for ornamental work.

Hew THE PRICE OF BREAD WAS REGULATED IN DAYS
GONE By.—From the sad of the reign of King Henry
111. to the commencement of the present century, a
simple plan was followed in England to avoid the
great fluctuations in the price of bread and obviate the
extortion of the baker and miller. The Assize of
Bread was set every week by the authorities in every
borough and manor. The price of the bread was regm
lated by the then price of the wheat, a sufficient
margin of reasonable profit being left to the baker and
miller. Offenders who sold too dear were punished
by tine and the pillory. On the 17th Jane, 1824,
bread was first ordered to be sold by weight in London;
and an Act which was passed in the reign of William
IV. and came into operation on let October, 1836, ex-
tended the same practi4x to the pr evinces.
WHAT SOME PEOPLE EXPECT THE POST-OFFICE TO
Do.—The following is one of the many curious applica-
tions addressed to the department by persons both at
home and abroad—"l7ennesee' Oct. 4, 1877.—Dear
Sir,-1. want you to do me a kines to hand this to
some good watch reeler and tell him to sea it I can by
a instrument to tell where gold or silver is in the
ground or if there is a instrument mail to tiud tnetwl
, —geld or eilver—that are in the ground. If it wed
attack it—A instrument for that perpos—l uuder!_
stand there are entch a thing naade. If so, be Oeas,to,
"tell me wliere one and-wlaif will coat ,
can be sent to New York to —where I cA,• get it—l
want to get a instrument to hunt gcld and sa‘vtir—You
will pleas write to me as I think ti there are Butch a •
a thing maid I could get one in your country—l send
you a otamp,