News From All Quarters

Auckland Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 143, 16 June 1917, Page 15

News From All Quarters

I TERSE. nent sign in the form of question and answer. The notice, it is presumed, relates io the shortage of potatoes, and roads, "Got any? 'No!' , THE NEW RUSSIA. The famous monument, erected in PetroBrad in honour of Catherine 11. of Knssia has been demolished and recast into shells at. the request of itae committee of soldiers, according t>> .1 message received in New York from retrogran. BRAINLESS BABY. At a Hackney inquest on a male child found under the seat of a second-class carriage on the North London Railway, the medical evidence disclosed thai the baby had no brnin. Dr. llaig said that it was merely hone, aud the child would no! have lived Inns in .my elrcumislanei's. TOO AFFECTIONATE. affertlonate. ■ (ieorge A. Milieu was, liis ! w;re alleged iv a U',l! fur divorce filed recently in Xpw York, "lie squeezed and hugged mc -wit',! the gentility of a bear, until hugging on;y created sore ribs," reads part of her complaint. COST OF CELEBRATING. Joseph Sudbe'-k. 01. former night watchman for a carriage company iv Cincinnati. re-elected that he spent his savings of :ioodol in celebration and lost his job. ISeinß unable to find wort; in tlir last few weeks, lie shot and killed himself. THE THREE HANDS. During the hearing of a ca>e at Westminster the magistrate remarked that tlie writing mi curtain irawntlckcU reuliudei! him of the Mudy of the barrister's clerk, who said of his master that he wrote one hand that he could read, another that lie (the clerkl managed with difficulty to make out, aud a third that neither, nor anyone eke. mulii possibly raid. MUNITIONS GIRLS BEAT MEN. Wheu fuur .Blrminghain uieu were charged under the Defence of the Realm Act willi attempting- lo restrict tlie output of war material, it was stated that there was a strike at the works where the uieu were employed, and that girls took tlieir places. Iv the first week some of the girls were able to top 400 cartridge case* a day, although a man's normal output was 330, -and an attempt liad been made In restrict it to u'T.".. THE NOISELESS CITY. Objectionable noise will he eliminated in Milwaukee, if the Council passes and the police department enforces a proposed ordinance. Some of the provisions:—Xo whistle* shall be blown to start or end the day's work or at noon or other time, except tire boats, fire eugiue or steam boats seeking to pass through a drawbridge. No dealer slinll use any noise devke to attract trade. Persons niaklug deliveries of any kind be--1 ween 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. shall wear rubber lieeis. THE " CHIVALROUS " KAISER. A movement started some time as o to cause the removal from a spelling book used in the Chicago public schools of a page eulogising Emperor William of Germany has met with failure. Tarts or the talnlng possession of "that chivalrous sense of fair play which is the nearest thing to a religion." -that be hates "meanness and favouritism." and continues in his "fundamental bent toward what is clean, mauly. and above board." drew attacks from several. USE FOR COUNTERFEIT COIN. The Tiiited States Treasury Department last month completed deal ruction of nearly v ton of counterfeit coins representinyj a fictitious value of bogus I,'nited States currency of To.OOOdol face value, and about •-'.noo.OOOdol. eonuterfclt Mexican paper money, all seized by secret, service agents within the Inst year. This was tbe largest single quantity of counterfeit money destroyed for a number of years. The currency was burned, and tlie coins, made nriiieipally of lend, were melted and will be used for window weights. PREPAREDNESS. A San l'raui'isco policeman speut a busy half hour at the city prison recently unloading Ilenunii Miller, charged with vagrancy, lie had TBi; articles on his person, In various packs and DOCKers, said pockets covering his apparel from hatband to Rocks. According to an American paper. Miner carried a frying pan. coffee pot, knife, fork, spoou, razor. soap, bacon, coffee, salt, pepper, vinegur. mustard, toothpicks, blankets: In short, everything required for a wanderer who made his home wherever night overlook him. :.:;ller said he believed in preparedness. A MUMMIFIED MERMAID. Tbe mermnid, says the 'Manchester CuartUan." has beeu discovered at last— dead, unfortunately, ns Qheen Anne, aud muiiimltleil—in the samls of the Egyptian ileserls. Slip tins been picked tip by one of our Royal Engineers In the native bazaar at Cairn, but is evidently not of the dangerous syren type. According to our Informant "it measures loin in length, has a human head except that the eyes arc 011 the slant, like a cat's, square shoulders, arms with live lingers on each hand, mouth and teeth well fanned. The upper half of the body is feminine in appearance, with fbo addition of a large tin between the shoulder-blades. •The lower half of the body is that of a fish. In the absen.-c "f a photo it is difficult lo sat how Hie fake i* arranged. PREFERRED HIS VICARAGE TO A THRONE. A defendant .if a lone ]in P of Russian riser* lived anri diet in England .-luring the seventeenth century. says tbe "Daily '

fhrnnlele." He w.i* ..Mickephev (or Mitrhofcn Aiphroy. of ihe ancient wp of Ruric. n-bi<-li. :ift<-r n.-ciipying tlio Rnssimi rhrone for nearly eight centuries. sr:ive place In a new dynasty in 15a' , vith his two brothers lie was sent. pi»r safety in England, at Ihe fall of the dyn st.v.'and entrusted (o Hie care nf an Engi.sh mwchant. trnUlnjs with P.uasla. who ffavr f'he hoys a liberal education, ami finally sent Hiera to Oxford, where two died of small-

pox. Tlip third. Mirkophpr, took orders in the Knsrlish CTinrrt). and was,appointed to the living or Woniiej-. j,, Huntingdonshire, worth under fin a y Mr ; Smnll as tliis was. It npparcntl.v entlcflpd AlphreT. who married and hrotiaht up a mree family on it. AlrhonsrH tempted t>T serpral conspiracies to place him on the throne of •Russia, he declined to leave his humble rectory, where he appears to har e be«D much loved aud respected.

j AN INNOCENT CONSCRIPT. J A man <-h arf ; Pd st the. Thames Folic* .Court, under the Miliur.' Service Act, was jpaid to have told a constable, who arrested war.him that he "did not kucnv there vru a war." A NOVEL SENTENCE. A younE Tvomau employed In a factor! asked the Munitions Tribunal for a clearance certificate, because she bad been put iDto a room and forbidden ti> speak for five hours. It. was stated that, the ynnnt •woman was particularly talkative, and in order lo restrain her volubility she wa* separated from her intimate friends, and placed in another department. She -n-s* ordered back to work. A FIGHTING RECORD. Francis n. Yonns. 74 years old. a ebll war veteran, died at .Toliet, Illinois, last months. In his last moments he called hi« only son. Kdwnrd. to his bedside and said: "Your great-great-grandfather died in the frevolution: you- great-grandfather died In the war of ISU , : I vras iv the civil war with four of my brothers, three of whom were killed. I want you to rniist and keep up the fighting honour of your family." Kdward enlisted that night. VALUE OF TWILIGHT SLEEP. Giving evidence at tbe inquest on Mafcrt Martineau. of Chelsea, who died after child birth. Dr Spilsbury, the Home Oflk-e expert, said that death -was not due to the use of s.'-opolanilne-morphjne. otherwise known as 'twilight sleep." TUo drug win being very extensively used and MT*(I pntients a great deal of pain. It. had come to stay, anil would probably replace tlie UJe of anaesthetics iv such cases. Tlie jury returned a verdict of ileatU from natural causes. A MEAN THEFT. At Hull John Barnetf. who bad b»»a timekeeper in the employ of tbe Ellermajj Wilson Hue for twenty years, vras sent to prison for four months for stealing * considerable quantity of food which was being dispatched through the Central Two prisoners of war cases, marked with the Red Cross, had been broken open at. the docks, aud provisions extracted. Tins of meat, preserved fruit, golden syrup, oats, etc., were found at the prisoner's house.

1 MAN WHO NEVER SWORE. ,, l Edward Brown, a hog salesman at the Kansas City stockyards, and known far and wide among stockmen as the "man who to work at the yards, cowboys and cattlemen who came in from the ranges ot the west were men of broad oaths and picturesque profanity. Contact with these men day after day soon got employees of. the yards into the same habit—all except Brown. No one ever ueard an oath from his lips, and his abstention became marked. Brown, however, suffered nothing in popularity, an American paper adds, in reporting his death. A MUSICAL INVASION. One of the unexpected results ot the. war for Spain is to fill the country with music, from the bands and orchestras of Hungarian gipsies driven out of. France (says au American correspondent). These bands are among the most famous in Europe. They are usually at Paris, Monte Carlo, Nice, and other centres of gay life. But when the war began these, players, beinf enemy Hungarians, had to get out ot France or be interned as enemy prisoner?. Going back to Hungary meant gboulderio? a rifle aud laying dowu the violin, which is not to the taste of these gipsies. And so they all migrated westward into Spain, literally filling the country with music. NOVEL METHOD OF GAOI. BREAKING. A roasted chicken enabled Hany and Richard Nelson lo escape from a county gaol in New Jersey, despite the Inspection of their cells every ten minutes and the armed guards who surrounded the buildinsc.-

To outward appearances the fowl, rtlfh men, was brown, appetising and Innocent. It was learned later that, instead of bread crumbs and spices, its interior held saw» and files. When a keeper made one of hi! inspections Harry and Kichard were snoring loudly on their cots. Ten minute* later lie found that they had disappears by war of Ihe window, from which they had ■n-renjjjicd the bars. Still later the brothel" who brought the chicken, and his high-powered automobile, were also found to be gone. . " " A" UTPSXY TIME. George K. Armstrong, in the Divorce Court at Detroit, told the judge that bis wife. Alice, was both crafty ant] bellicose. This combination of qualities minimised to an extent the calm ot his home life, he averred (says an American papers Her belligerent nature apparently had made a. deep impression on Armstrong, because, he was alfle to relate trippingly all the incidents of several assaults that had been visited upon him by Mrs. Arinstrout;. On July 10, 1016. she hit him with a flatiron. lie said. Before that, on June 22. she hit him with a milk bottle, tliruw a can of sink cleanser at him. and chased him from the house with a hammer. All she is said to have done on July S is curse bilu all day long. But on July 20 sue surpasses herself. The versatile wife this day broke n dish irn Armstrong's head, cut his arm with a glass platter, kicked the glass out of four pictures, torn the shade off a lamp, and hit him with a Iwttle. it was charged. Armstrong obtained his divorce. FIGHT FOR CHILDREN. There was an extraordinary scramble in the Tottenham Police Court recently for the possession of two children. A wife hail summoned her huf.band. alleging persistent cruelty. In ber evidence «hf said thnt she once left her husband: to live with another men. The masn»trate immediately discharged the case, and remarked that, the woman itas unfit, to have ihe custody of the two children of the msrri;>f-p.

The man linstencd tr> where the rhiliivfn TTorn sitting, and picked u\> one. in. Ms anna. The wife rushed forward screaming mill pulled the child from the father's arms, lie then look up the other. The woman, crying aloud that she loved her oMMren, nulled the. second child from him. The public part, of the court became in an uproar. Some took the sidn of the man and others the woman's side. Between the contesting parties the children -weve having a rough time. The police only interfered to put (he ■parties out of court. In the : corridors th* father mado further effort? to act. the children, but the mother held oh to them, and left the court with the children in her arms and surrounded by a of "■omen. , .