OFFERINGS, THE POOREST
In the middle of the summer season tails of sick cattle are principal native offerings at Saint Herbot, a small parish not far from Paris, France. The annual cattle fair brings together a great number of dealers from all parts of Brittany. Business goes on from early morning until three o’clock in the afternoon, when every one adjourns to the church and joins in the service, at which the benediction of heaven on the worshipers’ heads is implored. The custom is for the breeders to cut off the tails of sick animals and lay the tails on the altar, the idea being that this ceremony will restore the sick animals to health. The tails are afterward sold and considerable money realized from the sale.
Many people are just this way toward God. The poorest products of their life they give to God, and make themselves believe that is giving. To give the tailings of the threshing floor is to give chaff. To give the tailings of the reduction mill is to give the low-grade ore. To give the tail ends of anything is to give the poorest.
(2237)
OFFERINGS, UNWORTHY
At the heathen festivals in India, the traffickers in sacrificial goods resort to all sorts of devices. Low-caste men have baskets containing little pigs from two days to a month old. These they sell to the high-caste worshipers, cutting the throat of the pig in the presence of the buyer and smearing some blood upon his pious forehead. But by a trick known to the salesman, the windpipe is not severed, so he sells the pig over and over. In the same way coconuts are sold whose milk has been dry for years, and rotten fruit and blind animals are bought at bargains—anything is good enough for offerings to the gods!
(2238)
OFFICE-SEEKING
Some Missouri Republican, hungry for an office, resorted to rather a novel method of attracting the attention of Governor-elect Hadley. He cut away the sole from an old shoe, carefully removed the pegs, and then, with a lead-pencil, addrest a letter on the worn side of the surface. Unfortunately, his signature could not be deciphered, nor was the address legible.
Curiosity on the part of those who handled this missive may have been in part responsible for its condition when it reached the attorney-general’s office. This much could be made out: