NEWS TIT-BITS.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 36, 10 February 1917, Page 14

NEWS TIT-BITS.

Each t*by is worth £100 to tUOtate, aays Dr. EUrabeth Skmn GbtemtK. A project ia on foot for the email uetton of a tnnnel under the Boephoroe. More then 36,000,000 barrels it oil were used as fuel for locomotive* Iβ the United States last year. All building has been forMdden throughout Germany, with the aVlie exception of houses and other etrt*tures required for military purpoace. Since the war began the emtA-ttled countries of Europe hare paid to American manufacturers more than —ten thousand million dollars. A regular six to 14-hour aeropbinfitiaU service between Chicago and New Work has ■been established by the U.S. ♦oet Office Department. Ten game bantams exhibited at a recent show of the Bromley Fancier*' Association were priced at more than £1000—£100 10/ each. An emerald ring, said to have been the property of Napoleon, reaiieed £150 at a aale of jewellery and old TftnglWA silver In London. Women's boots at £6 a pair, or wtth cloth tops only, and rubber or fibre eolee, are predicted by American boot nranuiaotuTera, owing to the leather scarcity. Since the outbreak of the war the United States hue been invaded by an army of "iwdi rndbemen," some of them posing as "war heroes." Some typewriter. It has been patented in Pekin by a Chinaman, who, most appropriately, received hie education In America. It will "type" 4000 characters in the Chinese language! The representative of an American steel firm over from New York was asked what had interested him most in Lond«L. He replied: "Seeing a girl chauffeur employing her time knitting mufflers while waiting for her mistress." ' Jlietaken for water, a bucket of paraffin, kept for washing gauges, wm thrown over Alice Maud Herman, aged twenty four, when her greasy overall accident ally caught fire at an Acton Vale engineering works. She was burnt to death, and the building was destroyed. During the last three years Australian trad* with America has increased b\ 600 per cent, or in money value by £0,004,000. The baianoe of trade be tween the two countries has been reduced from 59 per cent to i per cent in favour of America. Evidence that the temperature ol Mure is always below zero, and that ■unless some cause not yet understood operates to make it warmer, the exist eiicc of life on the planet is inrprubablu, was the subject matter of a recent pupei published by Professor llenry N. Ruesoil, of Princeton University. According to Mr I'retyman, tho "Out put of IJecr (Restriction) Act" will limit the total brew for the year beginning April 1 last to 2(5,000,000 standard bar rele, ac compared wiUi 30,200,000 barrels in the year ended September, 1915, a reduction of 14 per cent, says an Eng lit>h exchange. Severely wounded French prisoners of war recently itent back from Germany cay that in the camp in which they were eonflnod it was made known that Germany hrni -iimJe-. proposals for.-peace. In the camp at Thuriiigen the prisoners were told that President Poincare had been assassinated and that General Joffre had designed. So successful was the hargo made entirely of reinforced conorete which N. K. Frogner built at Olirintiauia last summer that eight others, tivo of 100 tone and six of 3000 tone burden, are beinjj built in the shipyard at Mose on the fjord at Chrietiania. It takes five weeks to build a 100 ton barge, ami four montlis for one of 3,000 tons. To provide against the dearth of tim ber in ireUind due to cutting for »i work, huidJords and fanners are re planting on a large scale this season. In ( County Cavan 70.U00 trees have been :pltuited, and in WVstiiioata and other counties similar numbere of treea have ibecn put in. Agricultural societies are giving prizes to encourage the work. The exhibition for cole of five sove•reigns on a cajd, rnar!c<vd £ 1 1/, and a half-sovereign, marked 10/0, in the window of an llford pawnbroker and jeweller, led to him being summoned at Stratford under the Defence of the Realm Act, for "using gold coins otherwise than for currency," and being fined 40/. The Chairman of the Magistrates told him he was lia/ble to a fine of £100. German mines made immense profits during the year ended on June 30 last. The Outehoffnungshutto, in Oberhausen, •with a capital of £1,500,000, made a gross profit of £1,681,000, as compared I with lesa than £500,000 in the previous year. The Zypen and Wissener Steel and Iron Company made a profit of £866 000 on a capital of £850,000. Thia was more than three times the profits of the previoue year. By bombarding Auja, or El Auje, north of Beer»heba, our aircraft have penetrated into the regions of air immediately above the little strip of territory that before David's time was known as Philistia. It was almost toe small a patch of land to be dignified by the name of country. Yet before the Philistines were driven out of it they had given their name to the whole and vast district to the north of them. For Philistia ■was Pelesheth, in which ran be discerned the early name of Palestine. El Arish is the inevitable jumping-off place of an invasion of Egypt from Turkey or of Turkey from Egypt. In December, 1798, Napoleon was at Suez, examining the traces of the ancient canal and the reputed scene of the Red Bea miracle, when he heard that the Turks were in El Arish. In February he was there himself, on his way, as it proved, to Gaza, Jaffa, Anere, and no further. But hie designs were more ambitious than any that can be attributed to our Army now. Hβ told Bourrienne that he intended to march upon Damascus and Aleppo, and thence to Constantinople, where he would set up a new Empire—"and perhaps return to France by Adrianople and Vienna, after having annihilated the Hapsburg dynasty." It is practically 80 ywwe ago since the Dominion Premiere first met in conference (says an English writer). They had come to London early in 1887 to represent their respective colonies at Queen Victoria's Jubilee, when Lord Salisbury decided to call them together for an informal discussion on various matters concerning the Empire. So successful was this gathering that farther ones were held in 1897, on the occasion of the Diamond Jubilee, and in 1902, at the time of King Edward's Coronation, under the name of Colonial Conference. The next meeting took place in 1907, when the title wee altered to Imperial .Conference. At the earlier meetings the Colonial Secretary presided, bat with the change of name additional importance ■was given to the assembly by the assumption of the Presidency by the British Minister.