The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-11-05
MENTAL STUMBLING BLOCKS.
Little Things That Most People Do
 Not Know.

From the New York World.
 we grown-ups have no business to smile patronizingy at the ignorance Of little children" said a man who tries to keep up in everything. They have an excuse for not knowing things, because of their lack of experience, but we men and women can plead no such excuse and often our dearth of general knoWi- edge is really shocking. It is nothing re- markable that child thinks dog may grow into a horse, as little friend Of mine did. but 1t is certainly astounding that a. woman of 35 should ask Is hen turkey one that has been brought up by a henY But I actually heard woman ask that question the other day.
 "My wife's mother came home from
 the zoo the other afternoon. bursting with information. Did you know, she asked that an elephant does not eat with its trunk?' of course,' we said ana listened for an explanation. Well, I've lived all these years and have just found If out she said TO be sure l never saw elephants so very much, but sup posed that when you dropped peanuts in it's trunk they dropped way down the whole length of the trunk into the stom- ach And I never knew until today that an elephant had a mouth.
 "A school teacher confessed to me the l adenoids were, although she had heard the | school physician speak of them in con
 nection with her pupils many time.
 was too proud to ask what they were she
 said, and I didn't know how to spell the
 word to look 1t up in the dictionary l l finally found out by overhearing him ex- l plain to another teacher Another teach
 CT told me that she went straight home l from a newspaper bulletin board to a | dictionary to find out the meaning of the
 word indicted. There 1t was on the
 bulletin board she said, and people with | half the education I have were reading 1t
 understandingly, and I hadn't an atom
 of an idea what it meant The queerest
 part is that I've used the word again and
 again myself, but have never read 1t or l tried to spell 1t. Consequently 1 had no | idea that 1t was word perfectly familiar | to me-
 My daughter amused herself very much | over the ignorance of her college room mate, who came from inland. The girl l thought that clans were caught with n
 net. But my daughter stopped laughing
 when I asked her if she knew that oak
 leaves did not tumble off in the fall with | other leaves, and that cherry foliage
 was the first to come out and the last | to fall. And then her roommate had q
 chance to laugh.
 'I heard a small boy get the better of his mother the other day by asking her if all the common varities of birds hopped. | She answered at once in the affirmative l Look at that robin out there he com manded triumphantly. for the bird was running along, with never hop about | him.
 There is some excuse for a woman not l knowing how United States senators and congressman are elected, but have men | friends who do not know. One is an artist who cares for nothing but pictures. another is a violinist and the third Is public school superintendent And the
 worst of 1t is, when I asked the super intendent if he did not not think 1t would | papers more thoroughly, that they might | If. my teachers have any extra time for | reading I should prefer that they put | 1t on books of pedagogy
 How many housekeepers know that when recipe calls for cup of any l thing, 1t means a teacup. and not cof- | fee cup? How many know that "a spoon | ful means teaspoon filled up level? | How many. when a recipe calls for two | tablespoons of melted butter, know | whether to measure the butter before 1t
 is melted or afterward? A young bride
 interpreted the instructions, Beat six eggs separately. by beating each egg by
 itself instead of separating the yolks | from the whites.
 | "I have seen women who think the | world of their children slap a piece of | court plaster on a burn on the little finger, running tho risk of blood poisoning: and IA havs sssn intslligant men piaoe .