The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-11-19


practice medicine now in quite differ
ent Manner
How many know that the familiar
child's praper.
'Now lay me down to Sleep"
is the famous white Paternoster, some
what modified to meet Protestant require
ments? In olden times it ran as follows:
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
Bless the bed that lie Oh,
And blessed Guardian Angel, keep
Me safe from danger while sleep.
/ lay me down to rest me
And pray the Lord to bless me-;
II I should sleep, no more to wake,
pray the Lord my soul to take.
1t is this prayer that Chaucer men
lions in his ''NightSpell," when he
sings:
Lord Jhesu Crist and Seynte Benedyht
BlesSe this houS from every wicked wight,
Fro nyghteS verray. the white Patre NoStre
When Wonestow now Seynte Petre's so ter.
Professionalism was compelled, by the
limitations of it's creed, to drop the saints
and angels from the invocation, and re-
duce it to the simple quatrain familiar to
our,childhood.
If it be asked whence comes this dis
play of useless crudition, as little to any
apparent purpose as some of the speech
es delivered during the political cam
paign just closed, the reader is referred
in reply to a stout octave just put out by
Philadelphia publishing house and to
be found on the shelves of our local
booksellers, The Handy Book of Liter
airy Curiosities, by William S. Walsh;
the author who did so good service to
inquiring minds by his Paradoxes of a
Philistine. Mr.. Walsh at first had it in
mi d to call his work A Dictionary of
Things Not Worth Knowing, which
would be misnomer and sad mistake,
for though the matter therein contained
is deemed below the dignity of dictiona-
ries and encyclopedias and literary manu-
ais it meets the wants of the multitude,
and answers questions that are constant
ly arising in conversation and compost
ton both. Indeed, all things considered
it is the most entertaining book of the
season, and to many minds one of the
most useful. 1t should take a place on
the book shelf or library table beside the
Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, the His
torical Note Book, and works of that
kind-indispensable volumes in good
working reference library as supplying
the laches of the more pretentious CYCLIC
pedias and special dictionaries.
The preceding excerpts are but faint
indications of the wealth of the contents.
Would one care to know of the famous
cryptograms that have puzzled the
world; of the famous literary imposters
that have fooled it; of the oaths that
have befouled the lips of its great men;
of the famous parodies Of its more IA
nous poetry; of the puns and quodli-
bets that people. otherwise sensible,
have stopped to make; of vulgar errors
and curious epitaphs; of the mistakes of
authors and critics; and Of much delight
full nonsense in verse and prose that has
heretofore escaped collection-let him
turn to this volume, packed to the covers
with out of the way information. That
all the knowledge is not ancient is evil
denced by the fact that Col. Dudley's
Blocks of Five figure in its pages with
a definition. Doubtless revised edition
will treat of Mr.. Fred Emery Beane's less
famous but no less laudable, though far
less successful, Blocks of Ten.
The reader can open this amusing
big book at almost any leaf and find
something to interest him. Let us open
midway, to the melange entitled Humors
of Ignorance, and there find news from
home in the funny list of miscalled titles
furnished by the librarian of the Port
land Public Library. A small boy made
his appearance there one day, in search
of tone of Oliver Twists books about
Little Dorrit.'' Another, as Maine boy
naturally might, asked for ''Prohibi-
tion," meaning probation" Yet an
other sought for s'Little Lord Phantom"
having "Fauntleroy'' in mind; and an
other, child of larger growth, called for
'Boots and Shoes and got "Boots and
Saddles"
But not one of these mistakes is half
so funny as that made by the library it
self, and to be seen in it's Finding Lists
for 1877, where Charles Dudley War
ner's s'My Summer in a Garden" appears
under the head of Agriculture" The
failure to forward this to the Philadel-
phia collector is doubtless an omission.
The fact is funny enough to go with the
following, given by Mr.. Walsh in his ar
ticle on the blunders made in index
making:
Mill on Liberty
on the Floss.
Sheet after sheet might be covered
with quotations from this handbook,