[PW] So, when IS ceramic begonias?

[Dennis Lien]

At 02:08 PM 3/4/2007, you wrote:
>Just a note on the mouse question, which is really very old.
>
>   The centrifugal governor on old steam engines had a weight called a 
> mouse.
>
>   To keep the engine at a specific speed, the governor was set so the 
> mouse (on the end of a centrifugal arm) would rise as the centrifugal 
> force increased, forcing the steam valve to close more. The rpms would 
> then drop to maintain a constant speed.
>
>   The higher the mouse rose, the fewer the rpms


I've seen this explanation before, but I don't think I believe it -- it
sounds much more like an explanation-after-the-fact tortured out by
someone who believes a bit of nonsense (or apparent nonsense) "must"
have a logical meaning somewhere, somehow.

For what it's worth, earliest examples I can find in a Google in Book search
include:



The Purple Stockings - Page 31
by Edward Salisbury Field - 1911 - 115 pages
CHAPTER IV AN answering laugh to the grave question, "Why is a mouse when 
it spins ?"
is supposed by many to denote a lively sense of humor. Perhaps it does. ...

Good Boy Seldom: A Romance of Advertisement - Page 175
by Oliver Onions - 1911 - 382 pages
'Why is a Mouse when it Spins?'" . . . He had one day heard it said of a 
certain
drummer (or commercial traveller) that he could swear for five minutes ...

Money Trust Investigation: Investigation of Financial and Monetary 
Conditions in the United... - Page 1629
by United States Congress. House. Committee on Banking and Currency, Arsène 
Paulin Pujo, Everis Anson Hayes, Henry McMorran - 1913
... does a mouse when it spins?" Mr. UNTERMYER. Will you be good enough to 
answer
the question? Mr. PERKINS. I will, Mr. Counsel, to the best of my ability. ...

Fibble, D.D. - Page 260
by Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb - 1916 - 279 pages
... the higher, the fewer I" Upon coming here I cogitated the matter 
deeply, but
I am as yet far from a solution. Why is a mouse that spins? ...

The Cream of the Jest: a comedy of evasions - Page 149
by James Branch Cabell - 1917 - 250 pages
The query has a humorous ring undoubtedly, in so far as it is no little 
suggestive
of the spinning mouse that is the higher the fewer—but, after all, ...


The Freeman - Page 463
by Francis Neilson, Albert Jay Nock - 1920
Why is a mouse when it spins? And what is the ethic of a criticism that at once
confirms the barbarous taste of the public and convinces the author that he ...

America and the Young Intellectual - Page 104
by Harold Stearns - 1921 - 168 pages
Why is a mouse when it spins? And what is the ethic of a criticism that at once
confirms the barbarous taste of the public and ...


The Dalhousie Review - Page 85
by Herbert Leslie Stewart - 1921
... to supper and posing to them the riddle "Why is a mouse when it sings? ...
the question flashed forth the illuminating solution, "The higher the 
fewer! ...

Babbitt - Page 355
by Sinclair Lewis, John Davis Batchelder Collection (Library of Congress) - 
1922
'Cultivating the—' It sounds like 'Why is a mouse when it spins?' That's a fine
spiel for a good Presbyterian to be going to, when you cafi hear Doe Drew! ...


Dennis Lien / U of Minnesota Libraries // d-lien at umn.edu