Bassetts Scrap Book, Vol 3, No 12
Articles in this issue
- p. 1
A February miscellany of aphorisms and quips on finance, fame, social propriety, and love, opening with the observation that you cannot eat life's cake unless you have the dough.
- p. 2
A mathematical note explaining that sixty was chosen as the number of minutes in an hour because it is the smallest number divisible evenly by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30.
- p. 3
A speech by the president of the Paris Academy of Fine Arts urging young artists to avoid marriage, arguing that both a rich wife and a poor wife equally destroy a young artist's capacity for creative work.
- p. 9
An anecdote of a Crimean War veteran who, after entertaining the King of England with blood-curdling bayonet stories, confesses that the most awful experience of his life was simply sometimes not having enough to eat.
- p. 4
An etymological note tracing 'nickname' to the Old English 'ekename' meaning an additional name, showing how the phrase shifted from 'an ekename' to 'a nekename' and finally to 'a nickname'.
- p. 5
A survey of the many folk beliefs and literary references attached to the number nine, from a cat's nine lives to Milton's nine-fold gates of hell and the nine of diamonds as the curse of Scotland.
- p. 25
A comic poem by Nixon Waterman weaving together women's first names — Anna, Isabel, Kate, Fanny, Tillie, Ada, Faith, Hope, Sue, Phoebe, May, Winnie, and many more — into an elaborate declaration of a lover's devotion.