On Something by Hilaire Belloc
page 15 of 199 (07%)
page 15 of 199 (07%)
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"More than 15,000,000 visits are paid annually to London pawnbrokers. "Jupiter is 1387 times as big as the earth, but only 300 times as heavy. "The world's coal mines yield 400,000,000 tons of coal a year. "The value of the pictures in the National Gallery is about L1,250,000." This tickled Capricorn--I don't know why. Perhaps he thought the style disjointed or perhaps he had got it into his head that when this information had been absorbed by the vulgar they would stand much where they stood before, and be no nearer the end of man nor the accomplishment of any Divine purpose in their creation. Anyhow he kept it, and I think he was wise to keep it. One cannot keep everything of that kind that is printed, so it is well to keep a specimen. Capricorn had, moreover, intended to perpetuate that specimen for ever in his immortal prose--pray Heaven he may return to do so! I next find the following excerpt from an evening paper: "No more gallant gentleman lives on the broad acres of his native England than Brigadier-General Sir Hammerthrust Honeybubble, who is one of the few survivors of the great charge at Tamulpuco, a feat of arms now half forgotten, but with which England rang during the Brazilian War. Brigadier-General, or, as he then was, plain Captain Hammerthrust Honeybubble, passed through five Brazilian batteries unharmed, and came back so terribly hacked that his head was almost severed from his body. Hardly able to keep his seat and continually wiping the blood from his left eye, he rode back to his troop at a walk, and, in spite of pursuit, |
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