POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



86i 



backs ; carbonic oxide killed ants, but not 

 Colorado beetles ; prussic-acid vapors and 

 nitrous-acid fumes destroyed everything, as 

 did chlorine everything but Colorado bee- 

 tles ; nitrous oxide exhibited but slight ef- 

 fects ; and illuminating gas appeared to 

 produce death if the exposure was long 

 enough. Mr. Gratacap recommends charg- 

 ing from time to time with illuminating gas 

 as probably, and charging with diluted prus- 

 sic-acid fumes as certainly, an efficient pre- 

 ventive of the ravages of insects in cabinet 

 cases. 



Backsheesh in Arcadia. — " How much to 

 be envied are you Singalese!" says Ilerr 

 Ilaeckel, in his " Indian Letters of Travels." 

 "You are not troubled either about the 

 cares of to-morrow or of the distant future. 

 What you require for your own life and your 

 children's grows of itself at your mouth ; 

 and whatever else you may want in the way 

 of luxury you can get with the slightest 

 exertion. You are, indeed, like the lilies 

 of the field, that grow around your simple 

 huts; they sow not, neither do they reap, 

 and still heavenly Nature feeds them. You 

 are not excited with political or military am- 

 bitions; no anxious thoughts about busi- 

 ness, or the rise and fall of stocks, disturb 

 your sleep. The highest honors, titles, and 

 orders of civilized men arc unknown to you. 

 Yes, I believe it fully, you do not envy us 

 Europeans for our thousand superfluities ; 

 you are happy in being simple men. Nature- 

 men, living in a paradise, and enjoying that 

 paradise. Yes, what care-burdened civil- 

 ized man would not envy you your simple 

 condition, and your paradisiacal content- 

 ment ? " A few moments after indulging in 

 these reflections, Ilerr Ilaeckel reached the 

 last post-station before arriving at Point de 

 Galle, and was still thinking he had come 

 upon a place where the struggle for exist- 

 ence had no being. His porters awakened 

 him from his dream by speaking to him of 

 their " backsheesh." It was now time to 

 attend to that matter, for it might be for- 

 gotten, in the hurry and confusion, if it was 

 put off till they got to the city. Ilerr 

 Ilaeckel had remarked that a native gentle- 

 man had given each of the porters a " double 

 anna," and reasoned that, in consideration of 

 his superior distinction as a " white man," 



it would be proper to quadruple the amount 

 and give a shilling. The porters returned 

 the coins with irritation, and gave their pa- 

 tron a very flattering lecture about the dis- 

 tinction to which he was entitled by reason 

 of his purely white skin. The main point 

 which they presented was, that every white 

 man ought to give double what he had given, 

 or a rupee ; but that as white a man as he 

 was, with his light hair, must belong to the 

 very highest caste, the dignity of which 

 would be suitably maintained by a still 

 larger gift. Without acceding to the full 

 force of this complimentary argument, Ilerr 

 Ilaeckel yielded so far as to give the full 

 white man's backsheesh of a rupee to each 

 man, and had the pleasure of hearing hirascLf 

 pronounced a perfect gentleman. 



The Chinese Saperstition of Serered 

 Qnenes. — Dr. D. J. MacGowan, in a report 

 on the health of Wenchow, has published 

 some facts concerning " epidemic frenzies," 

 or " popular crazes," which frequently pre- 

 vail among large portions of the Chinese 

 population. One of them raged very exten- 

 sively in 1876, when it was believed super- 

 natural agencies were at work cutting oft 

 the queues of the people. A sorcerer, get- 

 ting possession, with the aid of a spirit, of 

 one of these queues, was believed to be able 

 thereafter to evoke at will the soul of the 

 owner and use it as a servile demon, while 

 the man was fated to die. The only remedy 

 within the reach of a person who has lost 

 his queue is to cut off an inch or more of 

 what hair he has left and soak it for eighty 

 days in a cesspool ; by this means the mys- 

 terious connection between the hair remain- 

 ing on his head and that in possession of the 

 sorcerer is severed. Amulets and charms 

 are, moreover, relied on for the prevention 

 of disaster to the queue. A charm for this 

 purpose was invented by the Governor of 

 Kiang-Su, who also recommended an anathe- 

 ma attributed to Tao Tse, which was to be 

 chanted while copying it on yellow paper 

 with the blood of a cock mixed in vermil- 

 ion, after which the paper was to be burned 

 and the ashes swallowed. The panic was 

 created by some revolutionists, who secretly 

 cut off the queues of a few pas.sers-by in 

 each large city, and then proclaimed that a 

 diabolical agency was at worli. 



