Chapter 10

For many years there has been an impression that the linguistic bull is a distinctively Irish animal. The fame of Paddy Bull is world-wide, but the fact is he often is compelled to answer for the sins of his neighbor, Johnnie Bull, who, as a perpetrator of mixed metaphors, is without a peer.

In no deliberative body in the world is the mixed metaphor so much in its element as in the British House of Commons. As examples of its activity in that institution, London _Tit-Bits_ submits the following list:

"Sir, we are told that by this legislation the heart of the country has been shaken to its very foundations."

"Among the many jarring notes heard in this House on military affairs, this subject at least must be regarded as an oasis."

"The interests of the employers and employed are the same nine times out of ten--I will even say ninety-nine times out of ten."

"Our tongues are tied, our hands are fettered, and we are really beating the air to no purpose."

"I will now repeat what I was about to say when the honorable member interrupted me."

"The West Indies will now have a future which they never had in the past."

"A thorny subject which has long been a bone of contention among us."

"A slumbering volcano which at any moment a spark might set aflame."

"The honorable member would denude us of every rag of the principles which we have proclaimed from the housetops."

"Ah! The honorable member opposite shakes his head at that. But he can't shake mine!"

A well-known member of Parliament informed the House that an "oral agreement is not worth the paper it is written on."

Barristers are usually credited with possessing accuracy of speech, but some expressions recently reported indicate that they are capable of a blundering use of words. A member of the bar, in his opening speech for the defense, said:

"Gentlemen of the jury, the case for the crown is a mere skeleton, for, as I shall presently show you, it has neither flesh, blood, nor bones in it."

But a Leeds barrister outdid his competitors when he said fervidly:

"Gentlemen of the jury, it will be for you to say whether this defendant shall be allowed to come into court with unblushing footsteps, with the cloak of hypocrisy in his mouth, and take three bullocks out of my client's pocket with impunity."

In his "One Thousand and One Anecdotes" Alfred H. Miles records some exceptionally amusing bulls. Among these are the following:

Sir Boyle Roche described himself on one occasion as "standing prostrate at the feet of royalty"; and, in the days of threatened rebellion, wrote to a friend: "You may judge of our state when I tell you that I write this with a sword in one hand and a pistol in the other."

Even worse than the foregoing was the climax of an honorable member's speech in the House of Commons: "I smell a rat; I see it floating in the air; and, by heaven, I'll nip it in the bud!"

A Scotchwoman said that the butcher of her town only killed half a beast at a time.

A British magistrate, on being told by a vagabond that he was not married, responded: "That's a good thing for your wife."

A Portuguese mayor enumerated, among the marks by which the body of a drowned man might be identified when found, "a marked impediment in his speech."

A Frenchman, contentedly laying his head upon a large stone jar for a pillow, said it was not hard because he had previously stuffed it with hay.

An American lecturer solemnly said one evening: "Parents, you may have children; or, if not, your daughters may have."

Two Scotchmen were discussing the relative merits of churchyards and cemeteries when one of them boldly expressed his aversion to the latter in the remark, "I'd raither no dee ava than be buried in sic a place"; to which his companion retorted, "Weel, if I'm spared in life an' health, I'll gang naewhere else."

The Part of Chance in Progress.

Fortunate Accidents Frequently Have Opened the Way to the Discovery of Important Truths Before the Searchlights of Science and Invention Were Brought Into Play.

Nature has her own ways of telling her secrets to man, and the commonest of those ways is what man chooses to call chance or accident. The words are convenient names and that is about all we know of the phenomena which they are used to describe.

Below are given the stories of a number of important discoveries made by accident. Perhaps it will occur to the reader that none of the discoveries was really accidental, since in each case it was the witnessing of the accident by an intelligent human being which aroused in the mind of that human being the train of thought leading to the discovery. An Australian black might watch a swaying chandelier for ten years, and he would never discover the pendulum. As a rule, special knowledge is required to make "discoveries by accident."

But the apparent working of chance in the incidents told here is obvious:

The power of lenses, as applied to the telescope, was discovered by a watchmaker's apprentice. While holding spectacle-glasses between his thumb and finger, he was startled at the suddenly enlarged appearance of a neighboring church spire.

The art of etching upon glass was discovered by a Nuremberg glass-cutter. By accident a few drops of aqua fortis fell upon his spectacles. He noticed that the glass became corroded and softened where the acid had touched it. That was hint enough. He drew figures upon glass, with varnish, applied the corroding fluid, then cut away the glass around the drawing. When the varnish was removed, the figures appeared raised upon a dark ground.

The swaying to and fro of a chandelier in the cathedral at Pisa suggested to Galileo the application of the pendulum.

The art of lithography was perfected through suggestions made by accident. A poor musician was curious to know whether music could not be etched upon stone as well as copper.

After he had prepared his slab, his mother asked him to make a memorandum of such clothes as she proposed to send away to be washed. Not having pen, ink, and paper convenient, he wrote the list on the stone with the etching preparation, intending to make a copy of it at leisure.

A few days later, when about to clean the stone, he wondered what effect nitric acid would have upon it. He applied the acid, and in a few minutes saw the writing standing out in relief. The next step necessary was simply to ink the stone and take off an impression.

The composition of which printing-rollers are made was discovered by a country printer in England. It was the established custom to ink the type on a printing-press with a pelt-ball--an ink-soaked roll of sheepskin. Having mislaid his pelt-ball, the ingenious Englishman inked the type with a piece of soft glue which had fallen out of the glue-pot. It was such an excellent substitute that, after mixing molasses with the glue to give the mass proper consistency, the old pelt-ball was entirely discarded.

The shop of a London tobacconist, by the name of Lundyfoot, was destroyed by fire. While he was gazing dolefully into the smoldering ruins, he noticed that his poorer neighbors were gathering the snuff from the canisters. He tested the snuff for himself, and discovered that the fire had largely improved its pungency and aroma.

It was a hint worth profiting by. He secured another shop, built a lot of ovens, subjecting the snuff to a heating process, gave the brand a peculiar name, and in a few years became rich.

The Origin of Tinted Paper.

The origin of blue tinted paper came about by a mere slip of the hand.

The wife of William East, an English paper-maker, accidentally let a blue-bag fall into one of the vats of pulp. The workmen were astonished when they saw the peculiar color of the paper, while Mr. East was highly incensed over what he considered a grave pecuniary loss. His wife was so much frightened that she did not confess her agency in the matter.

After storing the damaged paper for four years, Mr. East sent it to his agent in London, with the instruction to sell it for what it would bring. The paper was accepted as an attractive novelty, and was disposed of at quite an advance over the market price.

Mr. East was astonished at receiving an order for another large invoice of the paper. He was without the secret, and found himself in a dilemma. Upon mentioning it to his wife, she told him about the accident. He kept the secret, and the demand for the novel tint far exceeded his ability to supply the article.

A Brighton stationer took a fancy for dressing his show window with piles of writing-paper, rising gradually from the largest to the smallest size in use; and to finish his pyramids off nicely he cut cards to bring them to a point.

Taking these cards for diminutive note-paper, lady customers were continually wanting some of "that lovely little paper," and the stationer found it advantageous to cut paper to the desired pattern.

As there was no space for addressing the notelets after they were folded, he, after much thought, invented the envelope, which he cut by the aid of metal plates made for the purpose.

The sale increased so rapidly that he was unable to produce the envelopes fast enough, so he commissioned a dozen houses to make them for him, and thus set going an important branch of the manufacturing stationery trade.

Asphalt as a Street Pavement.

All forms of bituminous pavements, whether manufactured from natural or artificial asphalt, are, in fact, artificial stone pavements. The industry started with the use of the natural rock asphalt from the mines in the Val de Travers, Canton Neuchatel, Switzerland.

The mines were discovered in 1721, but it was in 1849 that the utility of their product as a road covering was first noticed. The rock was then being mined for the purpose of extracting the bitumen contained in it for its use in medicine and the arts. It is a limestone, impregnated with bitumen, of which it yields, on analysis, from eight to fourteen per cent.

It was observed that pieces of rock which fell from a wagon were crushed by the wheels, and under the combined influence of the traffic and heat of the sun, a good road surface was produced.

A macadam road of asphalt rock was then made, which gave very good results, and finally, in 1854, a portion of the Rue Bergère was laid in Paris of compressed asphalt on a concrete foundation. From Paris it extended to London, being laid on Threadneedle Street in 1869, and Cheapside in 1870.

HATE FOR NAPOLEON TURNED TO LOVE.

Curious Effect Produced on French Newspapers By the Series of Successes That Attended the Emperor's Progress from Elba to Paris.

There are instances on record of cases in which distance did not "lend enchantment to the view." Of these instances Napoleon's advance to Paris after his escape from Elba affords a striking example.

In 1815 the French newspapers announced the departure of Bonaparte from Elba, his progress through France, and entry into Paris, in the following manner:

March 9. The Anthropophagus has quitted his den.--March 10. The Corsican Ogre has landed at Cape Juan.--March 11. The Tiger has arrived at Gap.--March 12. The Monster slept at Grenoble.--March 13. The Tyrant has passed through Lyons.--March 14. The Usurper is directing his steps toward Dijon, but the brave and loyal Burgundians have risen _en masse_, and surrounded him on all sides.--March 18. Bonaparte is only sixty leagues from the capital; he has been fortunate enough to escape the hands of his pursuers.--March 19. Bonaparte is advancing with rapid steps, but he will never enter Paris.--March 20. Napoleon will, to-morrow, be under our ramparts.--March 21. The Emperor is at Fontainebleau.--March 22. His Imperial and Royal Majesty yesterday evening arrived at the Tuileries, amid the joyful acclamations of his devoted and faithful subjects.

The Story of the Snow Elinora.

A True Tale of the South Seas That Tells of the Remarkable Experience of an American Trading-Vessel and Its Skipper's Terrible Revenge, More Than a Century Ago.

At the time that Commodore Dewey's squadron hurled its showers of lead and steel upon the doomed ships of the Spanish admiral in Manila Bay, scores of mushroom bards uncovered their lyres and described the sensations of the echoes that had the honor of bearing, "for the first time in the history of the world," the sounds of Yankee guns among the startled islands of the Pacific. But the bards were wrong. The echoes performed that office during the first administration of George Washington as President of the United States.

The incident is one which apparently has escaped the notice of historians, else it would have been recalled shortly before the close of last year when political circles in France were somewhat fluttered by a rumor that as a result of a series of secret negotiations the French government had expressed its willingness to sell to the United States the island of Tahiti.

The rumor was soon denied officially, but in the meantime thousands of Americans had taken down their atlases, looked up the situation of the island, and asked themselves what the United States wanted with it anyway.

But there was a little story concerning the island of Tahiti, formerly known as Otaheite, that the atlases and gazetteers did not give them--the story of a Yankee skipper's revenge. It tells how American guns commanded respect for the flag in the South Seas in the year 1790.

The Yankee skipper was Captain Metcalfe, who then was in command of an armed trading vessel named the Elinora. The Elinora was a snow--which, it may be worth while to explain, was an old-fashioned variety of brig. Her crew consisted of Americans, Portuguese, and some natives picked up at Manila. The account of the remarkable adventure is printed in _The Gentleman's Magazine_, published in London, April, 1791. The writer, who was one of the officers of the Elinora at the time, relates his story with brutal frankness, and his narration resulted in a vast deal of comment abroad that was somewhat galling to the citizens of the new-born republic of the United States.

The account, as published in _The Gentleman's Magazine_, is as follows:

Story Told by an Officer.

Mobee, Lat. 19 N., Long. 168 E.

On or about the 30th of January, 1790, we anchored under Ladrone Mount, and commenced a trade with the natives for hogs, fruit, limes, fish, etc.; but not liking the situation, we weighed anchor and went two miles farther up into a bay, and came to anchor about 4 P.M.

At eleven or twelve o'clock, midnight, some of the natives swam off and cut away the cutter from astern. At 1 P.M. we discovered that she was missing, and immediately called all hands aft on the quarter-deck and found none missing except the man who was in her as boat-keeper. We then hoisted the small boat out to go in search of her, but found, on lowering her into the water, she leaked in such a manner as obliged us to hoist her in again, which rendered it impossible to search that night.

On the preceding evening an old man requested permission to sleep on board, which was granted; but after missing the boat we put him in irons. When daylight approached, no canoes came off as usual, which confirmed our suspicions that they had cut the boat adrift.

The women on board wished to go on shore. Captain Metcalfe told them they might go when they thought proper. They all immediately leaped into the water and swam to the shore, at least three miles' distance. The old man also requested leave to go, but leave was not granted him.

In the afternoon two or three canoes came alongside, with presents from the chief, consisting of hogs and fruit; but they were not accepted. The last that came we ordered immediately away; but they paid little attention to it, until we fired musket-shots at them, which killed and wounded three or four.

Tried to Sink Ship with Knife.

Toward night a man swam from the shore to the cable, with a knife in his hand, and afterward swam under the ship's counter, where we saw him with the knife; he had once or twice dived under water and started a piece of copper off the ship's bottom, imagining, could he get the copper off, the ship would sink. Captain Metcalfe fired a pistol at him from the cabin window, but missed him. Three or four of the people jumped into the boat and caught him. After bringing him on board, Captain Metcalfe fully determined to hang him, ordering a rope to be rove at the fore-yardarm and the rope greased. But, by the persuasion of Mr. Chambers and myself, he concluded to save his life and keep him prisoner.

The next day we observed four or five thousand people to come down opposite the ship, all armed with slings, spears, and arrows. At ten o'clock we hauled the ship within a quarter of a mile of the shore, and fired round and grape shot at them, and dislodged them from the village.

At twelve o'clock I went on shore with the boat and six men, set fire to the village and _morai_ (a place of worship). Some of them were seen very near, but, by constant firing from the ship, they did not attempt to attack us.

I came on board and took some small water-casks to fill with water. But after landing (that attention not being paid to firing as before) the natives came down--great numbers, throwing their spears and stones, which obliged us to go on board again, our object unaccomplished.

They then all went to the summit of a hill, thinking the shot from the ship could not reach them there. But we fired two guns with such good aim that they were soon convinced of their error, and immediately fled to the mountains and low ditches, where it was impossible for our shot to touch them. We then desisted from firing, hove up the anchors, and went farther up the bay in hope of completing our water.

The Chief Accepted Ransom.

Toward evening we again came to an anchor, and on the next morning two or three canoes came off, who were well treated, so that more came off and engaged to bring us water, and the captain purchased a small boy and girl for two axes and a few beads.

After continuing here three or four days we weighed anchor and stood from the island.

We had been under way about an hour and a half, with a light breeze, when the natives came in a canoe alongside and informed us that the chief of the people who had stolen the boat lived behind a point to the northward. We then hauled our wind, went around the point, and came to anchor.

The next day a canoe came alongside with one of their chiefs. When he came on board we began to expostulate with him in order to recover our boat and the man. He told us that for a reward he would bring both of them. Captain Metcalfe offered him a musket, eight cartridges, one bar of iron, and a piece of Bengal cloth for the man, and the same for the boat, which he agreed to.

The next morning he again came on board and said if we would send a boat on shore, or near the shore, he would bring the man. Immediately, by order of Captain Metcalfe, I armed the boat and went near the shore; but after waiting an hour, paying attention to their proceedings, and their not bringing the man, I returned on board.

The chief then came off a second time and said if the boat went again we might depend upon getting the man. I armed the boat, and again went toward shore, where, after waiting half an hour, they sent a man, who swam to the boat, with the thigh bones of the man who was boat-keeper when they stole the boat.

I received them and came on board, showed them to Captain Metcalfe, and threw them into the sea. A few minutes afterward the same chief came on board for the reward. It was given, and he was also told that if he brought the boat the reward should be given for that also, for he insisted that it was not hurt.

Sacrificed Seaman to Gods.

He then told us the manner in which they had killed the boat-keeper, as follows: That after cutting away the post, and she had drifted a distance from the ship, they got into her and found the man asleep; but he immediately awoke, and, seeing them, drew his knife upon them. They, however, overpowered him and took the knife from him, cut his head off, and took him on shore, and the next night burned him for a sacrifice to their gods.

We judged the night they stole the boat they killed the man, and the next day burnt him (as the mountains seemed to be one continuous blaze), which is their custom on such occasions, but were not then positive of the above.

After relating the story, he desired of the captain that the natives might come and trade as usual. Leave being granted, he went on shore, and just at sunset he came off again in a large double canoe with twenty-five women. But the captain, suspecting they had some design in the night to take the vessel, would not permit them to come on board.

The day following, the canoes, as usual at the other islands, came alongside with hogs, fruit, limes, etc. The chief had told them they might come and trade without molestation.

At 10 A.M. the chief came alongside, with two others, and had in their canoe the keel of the boat which they had stolen. After he came, he called and wanted the reward which was promised. Captain Metcalfe was informed of his being alongside, and of his having the boat's keel. He then came on deck and saw it, and, being then perfectly convinced of the man's being killed and the boat broken, made this expression--that, "I will now give the reward they little expect."

The Captain Was Merciless.

Mr. Chambers and myself endeavored to persuade the captain to entice the three chiefs on board, and afterward to hang them on the foreyard in view of the whole island; which might, perhaps, be sufficient warning for them in future never to attempt distressing any ships which might touch at their islands.

But our persuasions were of no effect. He was fully determined to take the following means of punishing them: First, to decoy those canoes which were on the larboard to come to the starboard side, then to station one man to each post lanyard, and others down to the guns, between decks, while others on the quarter-deck were stationed at the swivels and four brass guns, and, when everything was in readiness, to fire immediately into the canoes all at one command.

The guns that were below had on each of them a hundred musket-balls and fifty langrage nails. There were seven of the above guns, each containing the like quantity. The four guns on the quarter-deck had in them fifty balls each; some of the swivels had ten balls.

Mr. Chambers and myself strongly insisted that this punishment was too severe, and only butchering a number of innocent women and children. But he replied, we were going to attempt taking the command of the ship from him, and that the orders should be obeyed, and immediately ordered every man to his station.