The Portland daily press., 1868-07-27
" arieties.

Our English cousins are very fond of
American itterateurs just at this time. They
have feasted and toasted Mr.. Longfellow with
immense enthusiasm, and now they want
Whittier and DIR. Holmes to go over
of Elliott, the painter, this anecdote is
told 1t seems the jovial artist was painting
some divine, who felt it incumbent upon him
to give the painter moral lecture during one
of his sittngs. Somewhat in awe of the ar
tist, he began very nervously; but as Elliott
painted away without any sign of annoyance,
he gathered courage as he proceeded, and a.
BasEe St fepy ana gs9a ssEmSa rs s
never felt so insignificant in his life as when
the artist, with the urbane but positive au-
thority OF his profession, merely said, Turn
your head little to the right, and shut your
mouth"
Sir j. r. w. Herschel publishes in the
Cornhill a new version of the first canto of
Dante's 'Inferno," with an introduction stat
ing that he gives this as a specimen Of what
he conceives should be the form adopted for a
complete version of the whole, if undertaken
by one desirous of presenting in our own lam
guage not merely translation preserving ac-
curately the sense, but faithful echo ESQ far
as is consistent with the resources of our Lam
guage) OF the so Ind of the original. He hopes
he shall mot be held too presumptuous in con-
sdering the latter requisite as unduiy disre-
garded in the two best translations Of the
whole poem with which he is acquainted
those of Carey and Professor Longfellow." ~
"A lady ia New York owns and runs q
large wholesale harness and saddlery estab-
lishment on Pearl street. She transacts her
own business, and is at the store daily.
"A Boston paper relates that one of the
wealthiest families in Somerset, owning two
farms, one of which they improve, not sue
ceeding in getting any one to NOW the grass,
ordered a moving machine from Boston, but
when it arrived the male part of the family
could do nothing with it, but lady, the wife Of
one of the sons, went to work and put the ma
chine together and last Monday mounted the
seat, drove into the meadow and cut four acres
of grass. On Tuesday she cut about five
acres, and it is said by judges it was cut as
well as any man could cut it. Can any town
ia Massachusetts, or Maine beat ttis?
The late extreme heat has brought out the
defects of the asphaltum pavements of Paris.
Whilst walking over them, the foot sinks in,
as it would do on soppy turf in winter; walk
ing sticks and umbrellas take root and stand
upright; and repairs are so constantly needed
that the most frequented streets are chronical-
| ly redolent Of the smell of boiling pitch. A
newspaper correspondent states that he saw
lady, in a most ravishing costume, literally
| stuck fast in the asphalte, and that she had to
| be cut out by the sword of a sergent-de-ville.
| What difference is there between a school
l lirk with
| stick, and the other you stick with lick.
The grand caravan which set out from
| Cairo tor Mecca with the holy carpet, in the
month of January, returned to Cairo on the
| 18th of june 1t included fifteen hundred and
thirty pilgrims.
| "A crazy man in Paris set out to leap from
the top of a column in the Place Vendome.
| He had one leg over the iron railing when
| from the other side stranger who had been
watching him advanced precipitately and seiz-
| ed the poor suicide by the shoulder The lat
| ter turns looks at him an instant, then strug-
giles and with a hollow laugh casts off his
would-be savior. unfortunate" cries this
one, breathless with exertion, "did you not
know that there is fine of ten thousand
francs imposed upon those who leap from the
1 Top Oh LnlS column! ~ Iudt sO9 quoAiCS
| the madman, now slowly coming back to rea-
son. "eh bien, we will go down then," and he
went nationally, if not tragically, down the
| stairs.
value of "cheek:" A soldier, being on picket
| reserye. went to a farm house, as he said, to
borrow a frying-pan but for what his COM
rades could not imagine, as they had nothing
| to fry Preferring his request to the good dame
who answered his knock at the door, the pan
was duly transferred to him. He took it, look
ed in it, turned il over and looked at the BOT
tom, and then turned it over again and looked
into s very hard, as if not certain it was clean.
"Well. sir" said the lady, "can do anything
mora for vou?" "Could-could-could you
lend me a piece of meat to fry in it, ma'am?'
and he laughed in spite of himself He got it.
The various advantages of our recent &C.
QUESTION of the Midway Islands by the simple
process of hoisting flag on them, are thus
summed up by the N. Y. Times: "As they
were uninhabited, no resistance was made. AS
they are unclaimed by any other Power, no
offence has been given. As they are very ht-
tie ones, no one is hurt by our ownership Oh
them. AS they are midway between the oanu-
wich Islands and Japan. they are very nanny
things so have. As we get, by tne", n.e
harhor and a convenient station in the faclnc'
thew will be of high value to u.s. AS lucy oO'.
nothing, nobody will complain o' ''ieif pi'0o'