The Sun.
London, England, 1870-12-26 00:00:00

OLD-FASHIONED FAIRY TALES.

THE HILLMAN AND THE HOUSEWIFE.
The good people cannot abide meanness. They like to
be liberally dealt with when they beg or borrow of the
human race ; and, on the hand, to those who come to them
in need, they are invariably generous.
Now there once lived a certain housewife, who had a
sharp eye to her own interests in temporal matters, and
gave alms of what she had no use for, for the good of her
soul. One day a Hillman knocked at her door.
" Can you lend 113 a saucepan, good mother?" said
he. " There's a wedding in the hill, and all the pots
are in use."

Si" Is he to have one ?" asked the servant lass who had
opened the door. _ _ _ ...

Ay, to be sure," answered the housewife.

"One

must be neighbourly."

But when the maid was taking a saucepan from the
shelf, she pinched her arm, and whispered sharply, " Not
that, you slut ! Get the old one out of the cupboard. It
leaks, and the Hillmen are so neat, and such nimble
workers, they are sure to mend it before they send it home.
So one obliges the good people, and saves sixpence in
tinkering. But you'll never learn to be notable whilst
your 'head is on your shoulders."
Thus reproached, the maid fetched the saucepan, which
had been laid by till the tinker's next visit. and gave it to
the dwarf, who thanked her, and went away.
In due time the saucepan was returned, and, as the
housewife had foreseen, it was neatly mended, and ready
for use. _ _

At supper-time, the maid filled the pan with milk, and
set it on the fire for the children's supper. But in a few
minutes the milk was so burnt and smoked, that no one
could touch it, and even the pigs refused the wash with
which it was mixed.

•• Ah, good-for-nothing hussy !" cried the housewife, as
she refilled the pan herself ; " you would ruin the richest
with,your carelessness. "There's a whole quart of good
milk wasted at once."

"And that's twopence !" cried a voice which seemed to
come from the chimney, in a nasal, whiney tone, like
some nattering, discontented old body going over her

grievances.
The housewife had not left the saucepan for two minutes
when the milk boiled over, and it was all burnt and
smoked as before.

"The pan must be dirty," muttered the good woman,
in great vexation ; " and there are two full quarts of milk
as good as thrown to the dogs."
" And that's four-pence I" added the voice in the
chimney.
After a thorough cleaning, the saucepan was once more
filled and set on the fire, but with no better success. The
milk was hopelessly spoilt, and the housewife shed tears
of vexation at the waste, crying, " Never did such a thing
befall me since I kept house ! Three quarts of new milk
burnt for one meal !"

" And that's sixpence/' cried the voice from the
chimney. " You didn't save the tinkering after all,
mother?"

With which the Hillman himself came tumbling down
the chimney, and went off laughing, through the door. •

But thenceforward the saucepan was as good as any
other.

THE FIRST TELEGRAPHIC INSTRUMENT.I
An interesting relic of the early days of telegraphy has
been discovered at Morristown, New Jersey. It is the
first instrument by which messages were received and
sent by the aid of the electric current. When Professor
Morse was experimenting on the power and capability of
electricity as adapted to the transmission of words, he
spent a large portion of this time at Morristown, where
he was assisted by Alfred Vail, Esq., a practical ma-
chinest and inventor. At the Speedwell Iron Works of
that town, then owned by the father of Mr. Vail, the
experiments on the wires and on the construction of suit-
able instruments took place. On the completion of the
experiments and the removal of Mr. Morse to Washing.
ton to bring his invention before Congress, Mr. Vail
accompanied him, and, receiving the appointment of
Assistant-Superintendent of Telegraphs, was stationed
at Baltimore, at that, end of the experimental line. The
instrument now at Morristown was one of two taken from
Morristown by Morse and Vail—Morse using one at
Washington, and Vail the other at Baltimore. The first
message sent was the now well-known " What has God
wrought," which Morse transmitted to Vail ; but the first
public message was the news of the nomination of Polk
to the Presidency by the Baltimore Convention of
1844, sent by Vail to Morse. These instruments
were in constant use for six years, when Mt.
Vail, returning to Morristown, brought his with him, and
where it has still remained in. the possession of his family:
Mr. Vail dying soon after, his instrument was specially
left by a clause in his will to his eldest son as an heirloom,
while parts of instruments made during the experimental
trials were left to Professor Morse, with a request that he
would give them at some future day to the New Jersey
Historical Society. The old instrument works as well
as when first made, and lately a message was sent
to New York, and a reply received at Morristown. An
excellent photograph of the instrument was also taken,
and with this a visit was made to Professor Morse in
New York. The Professor was delighted to see the re-
presentation of the first instrumentf having destroyed, as
he said, the fellow instrument which he had used in
1844. He readily recognised it, and wrote a certificate
across the picture as to its being a true photograph of the
first instrument ever used to transmit public messages.
He also expressed a wish that the photographs might be
generally distributed, that it might be seen how little in
essential points it differed from those now in use. With
the exception of size and clumsiness, the instruments are
almost exactly similar. The dimensions of the instru-
ment are sixteen inches in length, seven inches in height,
six inches wide, with two magnets of three-inch diameter.
The paper used was 2i inches in width, three pens being
proposed to be used. The weight of the instrument is
201 b.

A. Yankee who had just come from Florenc-,
being asked what he had seen and admired, and whether
he was not in rapture with the Venus de Medici, replied,
" Well, to tell the truth, I don't care about those stone
gals." _ _

An eastern editor writes thus about a display of
the Aurora Borealis : " Last evening, as soon as
Tithonus had retired for the night, and was enjoying his
first snooze, his sponse, the rosy-fingered Aurora, daughter
of the morning, snatched the saffron-covered coverlet from
his bed, and wrapping it about her, danced a jig in the
northern sky."

NOTICE.—KINAHAN'S I.L. Whisky Depot. Kinahan
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Can be obtained all over the kingdom, in the well-known
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the London Docks. Wholesale Agents to Messrs. Bass,
Guinness, and Younger, and Dealers in Foreign Wines
and Spirits.