Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 December 1879 — SENSE AND NONSENSE. [ARTICLE]

SENSE AND NONSENSE.

The dress circle—The belt. Most of our misery comes from our fearing and disliking things that never happen at all.—Good Company. “The balance of trade” is that portion of patronage which ia waited for in vain by the business man who dees not advertise.— Rome Sentinel. When you see a callow youth with a wooden toothpick in his mouth, it is not circumstantial evidence that he’s selling lumber by sample.— N. Y. News. How quietly flows the riFer to the sea, yet it always gets there. This is a good* point to remember when you are trying to rush things. Nan Haven Register. The manager of a church fair not far away, when asked if there would be music each evening, replied, “No,” and then added, ‘*Dut there will be singing.” If a hunter will only hunt long enough he will be sure to pall his gun over the fence by the muzzle, and the day he does that he quits hunting— Detroit Free Press. A band of 1,500 sheep was burned to death by a brush fire near-Ventura, Cal., the other day. The fire surrounded the stock before the herder could drive them out of danger. When a man in Connecticut is killed by a buzz saw they arrest his family and hold them until the State chemist has examined the man's stomach in search of arsenic. — Boston Post. The Alta Californian claims 1,266,000 inhabitants on \he Pacific slope now, against 821,058 when the last census was taken. The returns of votes cast at recent elections seem to justify this claim.

It is strange how the sudden opening of a parlor door will send two people to the ends of a sofa, and set them to counting the figures in the carpet. There must be something powerful in the draft of air to blow numan beings around In that way. —Providence Journal. President Lincoln once listened patiently while a friend read a long manuscript to him, and who then asked: “What do you think of it ? how will it take?” The President reflected a little while, and then answered: “Well, for people who like that kind of thing, I think that that is just tho kind of thing they’d like.” There are three persons in Augusta (Me.) jail for debt. One is a welleducated young man, whose father died twenty years ago, leaving him an estate worth one million dollars; the second is confined by the town of Mount Vernon for non-payment of taxes; the third refuses to pay for a newspaper Which he had subscribed for and read. When Mrs. Shoddeigh read in the paper that the Government had expended $181,000,000 on its Indian service, ■he urged Mr. Shoddeigli to write immediately and ascertain where it was purchased. She said her China service cost only $3,500, and she could never be happy again until she was the owner of an Indian service. —Norristown Herald. Conjugal Affection. —Mrs. Foozle (improving the occasion); “Is it not _sad, my dear, about j’our friend, Mr. Buffles, drinking so, lately? I’m told his only excuse is the loss of his wife.” Mr. Foozle (excitedly): “Only excuse—only excuse, madam! And a very good excuse, too. There are many men who would be glad to have the same excuse.”—Fun. An Arizona judge has just shown his appreciation of modern improvements in firearms by shooting and killing an editor. The editor's partner immediately shot the magistrate and was himself waylaid and extinguished the same night by some parties unknown. The total bag for the day’s sport was a judge and two editors. Altogether it was a great day for Arizona. Three whales appeared off Cape May, N. J., recently, close in shore, going eastward slowly, throwing single spouts about twenty feet into the air. They were probably of the sperm species. Large flocks of sea-gulls surrounded and dived about them. They stopped the gill-nct fishermen, who were after snapping mackerel, and. kept possession of tne sea during the day There is a legend common in Scandinavia that a dishonest hand-maiden of the Blessed Virgin purloined her mistress’ silver scissors, and that she was transformed into a lapwing for punishment, the forked tail of the bird being a brand of the theft, and that the bircl was doomed to a continual confession of the crime by the plaintive cry, “ Tyvit, tyvit,” that is in Scandinavian, “I stole them, Tstole them.”

“You see, massa,” said the old colored washwoman, “since dey’s got dese here big crayvats we don’t hab so much to do. De gemmen puts on a big crayvat nowadays, instead ob a clean shirt. You don’t know much about dese matters, but if you take off all de crayvats in this town, an’ make the Semmen show up, landsakes! you’d see e worst lookin’ white men you ebber laid yo’ blessed eyes on ."—Syracuse Herald. A curious thing happened to Deacon Davis Newton, of Woodbridge, Conn. The deacon went to the church lectureroom to start a fire. While inside the room he heard a tremendous knock at the door, which he opened. On the ground before him he saw a plump, young partridge in the agony of death. A moment afterward a sportsman and a dog hove in sight. The bird had probably been frightened by tbe gunner, and flew with lightning rapidity. It struck the door with such force as to break its neck.