The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-05-10 00:00:00

VARIETIES.

" GOODNESS ME !" cried a nice old lady, the other
day, " if the world does come to an end next year, what
shall I do for snuff."
NOBODY likes to be nobody; but everybody is pleased
to think himself somebody. And everybody is somebody;
but when anybody thinks himself to be somebody, he
generally thinks everybody else to be nobody.
A NORTHERN DARKEY says "dey isn't gwine to
cotch him away down south, for dey make poor nigga
work 25 hours ebery day !" " How, when there are only
24 in a day ?" " Why, dey makes him get up in de
mornin' an hour before day, and dat makes 25."
ABSOLUTION IN THE GREEK CHURCH..—The priests
of the Greek Church read a long list of crimes to the
penitent, who nods his head at every item of which he
has been guilty, and the priest puts a mark of his thum-
nail against it accordingly. At the conclusion the whole
is summed up, and a receipt in full given for the total by
absolution. In some places people abouner themselves for
some one favourite vice for six or eight months to come.
ANECDOTES FROM Tom MOORE'S DIARY.—Denon
told an anecdote of a man, who having been asked
repeatedly to dinner by a person whom he knew to be but
a shabby Amphitryon, went at last, and found the dinner
so meagre and bad, that he did not get a bit to eat.
When the dishes were removing, the host said, " Well,
now the ice is broken, I suppose you will ask me to dine
with you some day." " Most willingly." " Name your
day, then." " Aujourd'hui, par exeniple," answered
the dinnerless guest. Lord Holland told of a man
remarkable for absence, who, dining once at the same
sort of shabby repast, fancied himself in his own house,
and began to apologise for the wretchedness of the dinner.
Luttrel told of a good phrase of an attorney's in speaking
of a reconciliation that had taken place between two
persons whom he wished to set by the ears, " I am sorry
to tell you, sir, that a compromise has broken out between
the parties." August 23rd. A good thing was told about
Sir B. Nagle's coming to George IV., when the news of
Buonaparte's death had just arrived, and saying, " I have
the pleasure to tell your Majesty that your bitterest
enemy is dead." "No! is she, by Gad ?" said the king.
Put this into verse afterwards. Went and eat an ice at
Tortoni's in the evening.
LOVE OF LAW PLEAS IN DONEGAL.—My friend told
us of the love the people had for litigation, and how the
quarterly advent of the assistant-barrister was looked for
with longing expectation as well by the processor as by
the processed party, each expecting a good tough argu-
mentation at what they called the " la' " (law). His own
steward, Jeaky M'Quirk, having lately buried his wife,
was, in the idiom of the country, " a wuddow," or a
"wuddow man" (my readers may smile at this strange
outrage on gender and grammar, but so it is). Jeaky
had got into a paltry dispute concerning some of the dear
deceased's assets with her brother, whom he "processed
to the la'," spending twice the value of the disputed
articles, and that twice over, in loss of time, and loss of
temper, and loss of work, and in hard cash, and getting
soundly beaten at last by the judgment of the court ;
which, however, Jeaky communicated to his master with
a grin of real satisfaction—" Thon mon has Let me in the
la'-shoot, sir. I ped ten shillings to get wee Sam Sproule
out o' Ramelton—the 'torney ; and my oh ! but wee Sam
gave it them in the talk for better nor sax hours. Ech,
but he bates a' at the la'; and so, sir, though I lost the
shoot, it's a comfort to think it was sowed wrangled."—
Dublin University Magazine for May.

OLD CUSTOMS AND MODERN INVENTIONS.—Many
contrivances, which are so familiar and universal that
p people are apt to suppose they must have existed always,
are really of very recent origin. Many customs, also,
the mention of which now excites smiles and wonder-
ment, have only of late become obsolete—so rapidly has
the aspect of the modern world changed. In the reign of
James I. men and women wore looking-glasses publicly ;
the men as brooches or ornaments in their hats; and the
women at their girdles, or on their bosoms, or sometimes
(like the ladies of our day), in the centre of their fans,
which were then made of feathers inserted into silver or
ivory tubes. At feasts every guest brought his own knife,
and a whetstone was placed behind the door, upon which
he sharpened his knife as he entered. In 1564, a Dutch-
man, named William Boonen, brought the first coach
into England ; and, it is said, the sight of it put both man
and horses into amazement. Some said it was eroh-shell,
brought from China; and some imagined it to be one of
the Pagan temples, in which the cannibals adored the
devil. The business of cap-making was ruined in 1591
by the common wearing of hats, which then came into
vogue. Smoothing-irons are of late invention ;in the
reign of Queen Elizabeth and James I. large stones, in-
scribed with texts of Scriptures, were used for that pur-
pose. A Mrs. Isabel Danton, of Leeds, is said to have
first invented hats and baskets made of straw. In 1634
two rich women desired to marry the Larl of Hunting-
don, for the sake of the title. One of them offered to lay
down £20,000 on the day of her marriage. The other
offered £3OO a-year during his life, and £6,000 in cash,
he to go with her to the church and marry her; imme-
diately after the ceremony, they were to take leave at the
church door, and never to see each other again. In Cla-
rendon's papers is the following :—At Henly-upon-
Thames, a woman, speaking against taxation imposed by
parliament, was ordered by the committee to have her
tongue fastened by a nail to the body of a tree by the way-
side, on a market-day, which was accordingly done, and
a paper in great letters, setting forth the heinousness of
her crime, fixed to her back. These curious items sug-
gest another observation. When a philanthropic person
has been distressed by comparing the world as it is with
the world as it ought to be, he may find quick relief by
comparing the world as it is with the world as it was.

THE MORNING OF WATERGOO.—A second express
bad arrived from Blucher, bringing intelligence that
the French were in much more formidable force than
he had imagined ; that the attack was become se-
rious ; they had taken Charleroi, and driven back the
Prussians. It was, therefore, necessary for the British to
march immediately to support them. The Duke had
received the despatches containing this important news
in the ball-room. We were afterwards told, that upon
perusing them he seemed for a few minutes to be
absolutely absorbed in a profound reverie, and completely
abstracted from every surrounding object ; and that he
was even heard to utter indistinctly a few words to him-
self. After a pause, be folded up the despatches, called
one of his staff officers to him, gave the necessary orders
with the utmost coolness and promptitude; and having
directed the army to be put in motion immediately, he
himself stayed at the ball till past two in the morning.
The cavalry officers, whose regiments, for the most part,
were quartered in villages about the frontier, ten, fifteen,
and even twenty miles off, flew from the ball-room in dis-
may, in search of their horses, and gallopped off in the
dark, without baggage or attendants, in the utmost per-
plexity which way to go, or where to join their regiments,
which might hare marched before they could arrive.
Numbers of the officers had been out when the first
order to be in readiness to march was issued, and re-
mained in perfect ignorance of the commencement of
hostilities, until the alarm sounded, and called them from
scenes of festivity and mirth to scenes of war and blood-
shed. As the dawn broke, the soldiers were seen assem-
bling from all parts of the town, in marching order, with
their knapsacks on their backs, loaded with three days'
Provision. Unconcerned in the midst of the din of war,
many a soldier laid himself down on a truss of straw, and
soundly slept, with his hands still grasping his firelock ;
others were sitting contentedly on the pavement, waiting
the arrival of their comrades. Numbers were taking
leave of their wives and children, perhaps for the last
time, and many a veteran's rough cheek was wet with the
tears of sorrow. One poor fellow, immediately under
our windows, turned back again and again, to bid his
wife farewell, and take his baby once more in his arms;
and I saw him hastily brush away a tear with the sleeve
of his coat, as he gave her back the child for the last
time, wrung her hand, and ran off to join his company,
which was drawn up on the other side of the Place Royale.
Many of the soldiers' wives marched out with their
husbands to the field, and I saw one young English lady
mounted on horseback, slowly riding out of town along
with an officer, who, no doubt, was her husband. But
even at this interesting moment, when thousands were
into
parting with those nearest and
adnedarmesyt hearts,tsoortrhoewirturne(i
suddenly
rs
appearance of a long train of
gravity
mirth,
byw the
h e
unexpected
market carts, loaded with cabbages, green peas, cauli-
flowers, early potatoes, old women, and strawberries,
peaceably jogging along, oneafterheaanrod othefr,battotles, and
market.
These good people, who had never
perfectlybwehothweemreeaningofa
atll athilsosusptrooacro, mstparreehdewndithwhaasttocnoiushld-
wmietnhtwaotndthere,
asspethcetayclselowly befomrea(tiheetmhe,iranwdayacitnuatlhlyeirgalopnegd
carts through the crowds of soldiers whicinhexfipllreedtbhlye
Place Royale. There was something so inexpressibly
ludicrous in the contrast which the grotesque figures and
rustic dresses of these old women presented to this
martial hurry and confusion, that really "not to laugh
surpassed all powers of face," and that I did laugh I
must acknowledge, though it was, perhaps, very ill-timed
levity.—he Days of Battle.