Bolingbroke’s Favorite Desk
Among the satirical prints brought out in connection with the famous Treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, was a picture in which was represented what was said to be a very remarkable incident in the life of Lord Bolingbroke. In this picture he is seen sitting up in bed in a sort of dressing-gown. Leaning over the bed is a female as scantily attired as a Venus, and upon that part of her figure from which the Venus Callipyge took her name, Bolingbroke is signing a paper. This incident furnishes a strange picture of the manners of the times and of the recklessness of Bolingbroke.
Fourth of March
Several years ago an English journal, The Owl, published the following singular paragraph:
“It is not perhaps generally known to our readers that the reason which the founders of the American republic had for selecting the fourth of March for the inauguration of their President, was to avoid the occurrence of a dies non by the incidence of that date on a Sunday. By calculation it was ascertained that for many hundreds of years the quadrennial recurrence of that day in the year of election invariably falls on a week day.”
In the face of this absurdly incorrect statement, and before it was written, the fourth of March fell twice on Sunday,—in 1821 and in 1849,—so that Monroe’s second inauguration and General Taylor’s inauguration each took place on Monday, March 5.
The Powwow
The mysterious performance known as the powwow among the North American aborigines dates back to time immemorial. David Brainerd says, in his Indian Narrative, “At a distance, with my Bible in my hand, I was resolved if possible to spoil their spirit of powwowing, and prevent their receiving an answer from the infernal world.” Elsewhere, speaking of the Delaware Indians and their medicine men, he says, “They are much awed by those among themselves who are called powwowers, who are supposed to have a power of enchanting or poisoning them to death.” The Esquimaux also have a sorcerer or diviner who conjures over the sick. Dr. Kane, in his “Arctic Explorations,” says of this Angekok, as he is called, that “he is the general counsellor who prescribes or powwows in sickness and over wounds, directs the policy of the little state, and is really the power behind the throne.”
The Flowering Dogwood
A correspondent wrote to the New York Sun urging the claims of the dogwood flower (Cornus florida) to be chosen as the national flower, and in support of the claims told the following story: