The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1873-08-15

FRIDAY MORNING, AUGUST Is, 1878,
Gossip and Gleanings.

U0sslp ana GleaningS.
Problem for Financiers.-To convert float
ing debt into a sinking fund.-Punch.
The statistical man proves that person in
the United States is six times as likely to kill
himself as Lightning is to kill him.
A well-known authoress gives it as an item
of domestic felicity that the man of the fami-
ly should be absent at least six hours per day.
Minnehaha Falls will dispel its abnormal
simplicity with a grand suspension bridge.
Where is old Nokomis about these days?
Industry isn't always rewarded. A Sing
Sing convict worked eighteen months on a
false key, and it was taken away from him
the day he had it completed.
Playing cards with black borders is late
nobby convenience to people who have lost
friends and think they know something about
euchre.
Some one tells the story of a steamboat pas
senger watching the revolving light Of a light
house on the coast and exclaiming; "Goshl
the wind blows that light out as fast as the
man can strike it."
Scruples.-Englist. tourist (having arrived
at Greenocl on Sunday moruing): my
man, what's your charge tor rowing me across
the fritz? ?" Boatman, 'iWeel, sir, / was jist
thinkin' / Gamma break tie Sawbath day for
no less than fifteen shulPn'sP' .-Puuch.
The editor of an Illinois paper thinks fish
ing, as general rule, doesn't pay 1--WE
stood all day in the river, last week." he
says, ''but caught nothing-until we got
home.'
It's suggested that if the supply of pigeons
gives out before the next trap shoot-cats
may be substituted in their place. 1t is
happy suggestion, and, if carried out would
make the nights more quiet.
That's what's the matter. The Indians
| have lost their legal status. We have been
| thinking, for some time, that they acted like
| it, and our suspicion is now confirmed by
| competent Government authority,
1t is almost certain to cure man of drunk
enness if he will go to sleep on the railroad
track during one of his sprees. A locomotive
| at Leomister, Massachusetts, last week, cured
young man very quickly. He was buried
| the next day.
A youth of Salisbury, Conn.,, four years
old, and his young sister, saw rat hasten in
to hole in the barn-foor. Said he, ISIS, the
Bible says Watch and pray You pray while
1 watch the hole, and I'll swat him across the
! snoot when he comes out.
A Green Bay merchant put out a sign of
''ice water flee." Another put out a sign of
free lemonade, and third offered every Gus
toner ten cents in money. A fourth man
who couldn't think of anything better, got up
a dog fight down cellar and drew all the
| crowd.
A Sioux City lady went to gallery to have
her picture taken. After putting her in posi-
ton, the artist put the plate in the camera,
| and told her to look at certain place on the
! WALL She wasn't certain of seeing it well from
where she sat, and so got up and walked over
! to it., but failed to discover anything curious
| about it.
"The oldest Mason in the United States'
has died once more. dis name was Fonda,
and he lived and diedin Paterson. It is a
strange dispensaton of Providence that prom
nent Masons should be taken away with such
| scrupulous regard to seniority. 1t is always
the oldest one in the country that dies.
A patriotic Pole informs that considerable
| portion of the world which is not familiar
with his jaw-wrenching language, that the
name of Kosciusko should be pronounced as
| if spelled Kotschewshko. No wonder Free
| man with such name had fallen. 1t would
make anybody shrek.
One of the proprietors of the Petersburg
! (Va.l Hder, in going over the office recently,
discovered that slab used as an imposing
stone was the tombstone of a near relation.
| who had died nearly forty years ago. The
and how it came into use in the office is I'M
explained.
A tale of two Norristown husbands-One,
upon leaving his Office the other night, stop
ped at book store, paid S1.25 Tor new nov
ell, and went home and presented his wifi
with ga Pair of Blue Eyes" The other
after leaving his Office, stopped at saloon
paid slips for whiskey, and went home ant
gave his wife pair of black eyes.
A little boy being instructed in morals by
his grandmother, the old lady told him thai
all such terms as ''by goll," ''by jingo," ''by
thunder" etc.. were only little oaths, and but
little better than profanities. In fact, she
/ said he could tell profane oath by the pre-
| fiS Shy" All such were oaths. swell, then
era, ,dmother," said the hopeful, SIS by tele
graph in the newspapers, swearing?" NO."
said til, y old lady, 'that is only lying.
Emma Black, living in a small town on the
Mississippi, saved a mans life the other day
in a curious way. He was fishing and tunl-
bled out of his boat, and being unable to
swim, would ha We persisted, ha not the mai
den, discovering his danger. swan out tc
him, and thrown ,g into his hands her back
hair, four feet IN length, towed him to the
land.
The Pittsburo Commercial saws that til,