th civilization. A missionary
relating his experiences among the South Sea islanders observes how much
he was astonished at their laughing at what seemed to him the most
ordinary occurrences. This was owing to their utter ignorance of matters
commonly known to us. He tells us one day when the sailors were boring a
hole to put a vent peg into a cask, the fermentation caused the porter
to spirt out upon them. One of them tried in vain to stop it with his
hand, but it flew through his fingers. Meanwhile a native who stood by
burst into a fit of immoderate laughter. The sailor, thinking it a
serious matter to lose so much good liquor, asked him rather angrily why
he was laughing at the porter running out. "Oh," replied the native,
"I'm not laughing at its coming out, but at thinking what trouble it
must have cost you to put it in."

But ignorance has often produced opposite results to these, and caused
very ludicrous statements to be made seriously. Thus a French Gazette
reports that "Lord Selkirk arrived in Paris this morning. He is a
descendant of the famous Selkirk whose adventures suggested to Defoe his
Robinson Crusoe." Among the various curious and useful items of
knowledge contained in the "Almanach de Gotha,"--the first number of
which was published 111 years ago--we find it gravely stated that the
Manghians of the island of Mindoro are furnished with tails exactly five
inches in length, and the women of Formosa with beards half a foot long.
I remember having, upon one occasion, visited the Mammertine prison at
Rome with a young friend preparing for the army, and his asking me "What
had St. Peter and St. Paul done to be confined here?" "They were here
for being Christians," I replied, "Oh, were St. Peter and St. Paul
Christians? I suppose they were put in prison by these horrid Roman
Catholics."

We may say generally that any fresh acquisition of knowledge destroys
one source of amusement and opens another. But if our mental powers were
to become perfect, which they never will, we should cease to laugh at
all. Wisdom or knowledge--the study of our own thoughts or of those of
others--has a tendency to alter our general views, and affects our
appreciation of humour, even where it affords no special information on
the subject before us. Upon given premises the conclusions of the highly
cultivated are different from those of others; and intellectual humour
is that which generally they enjoy most--finding more pleasure