NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 39, 15 February 1930, Page 3 (Supplement)

NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

I THE GREAT ILLUSION. "In the days of hansom cabs street accidents were mostly due to them," paid Mr. H. R. Oswald, the coroner, at a Fulha:a inquest. "They "were the fastest things on the road. Some of them went at 15 miles an hour." Mr. Oswald added: "If you tried to go past the Mansion House at 15 miles an hour these days, you would find yourself at the OM Bailey charged with manslaughter." BAD TEETH FINE. Albert Roach, of Warwick Road, Twickenham, Middlesex, wafi summoned at Brentford by the Twickenham Borough Council for causing suffering to bis child by neglecting to have his teeth attended to. Dr. Dupont, the medical officer, said that in 1924 Roach's attention was drawn to the state of his child's .teeth, which later became so bad that some of them could not be saved. Roa-ch was fined £1. BRIDE'S PAGE RUNS OFF. A two and a half year old page took fright and ram away at the wedding at St. Margaret's, Westminster, of Miss Frances Doble, the actress, and Sir Anthony Lind-say-Hogg. The boy, Reresby Sitwell, nephew of .the bride and son of Mr. Sadieverell Sitwell, the poet, was in charge of a coloured nurse and was one of those supposed to look after the bride's train. The nurse walked with him down the aisle, but when they reacted the altar steps and she turned and left, Reresby was overcome by fright and took refuge in the front pew. NEWLY-MARRIED GIRL'S FATE. A 22-year-old wife, Mrs. Winifred Kennedy, was found dead with her head practically burned to a cinder in a house at Brandon, Durham. A neighbour found her in a kneeling position with her head in the fire grate. < There was an overturned chair near By and it is thought that she had dozed, fallen forward into the grate, and been stunned. When her husband, a miner, left the house earlier in the afternoon to play for the local football club - she was seen waving him good-bye from the window and was perfectly happy. The couple were married in October,. A KING'S FIRST TIPPING EXPERIENCE. The tyranny of the tip was one of the first things to impress George I. when he came to claim the throne of England. "This is a strange country," Horace Walpole reports him to have said. "The first morning after my arrival at St. James' I looked out of the window and saw the park, with walks, and a canal, which they told me were mine. The next day Lord Chetwynd, the Ranger of the park, sent mj a brace of fine carp out of my canal, and I was told I must give Lord Chetwynd's servant five guineas for bringing me my own fish out of my own canal, in my own park." v ADVISED TO MURDER. Pleading that she thought her husband would die and she would be unable to support her child as well as herself, Mme. Litot was acquitted at the Seine Assizes of a charge of murder. She admitted that One night she intended to kill her husband, her child, and herself. After they had retired for the night she shufc all the windows and turned on the gas, but only the child died. The husband said his wife was perfect in every way except that she had listened to the evil counsels-of another woman who told her when he was ill that he would die, whereas a doctor said he would get better. There was scarcely a dry eye in the court when the husband appealed for leniency to be shown to his wife.

INHUMAN PARENTS. John Garraway and his wife, Lena, of Westborough Maidenhead, were charged at Maidenhead with crueiiy to their 10-years-old son. Dr. Paterson said the boy's body was covered with cuts and bruises, some of which were eight inches long. The wounds might have resulted in permanent injury. The boy said that Garraway, who was his stepfather, thrashed him with a belt and a cane and his mother with her fist and a cane. Once bis stts®father knocked him down and then trod on his head with his foot. His mother had blackened his eye. One day after he was thrashed he was made to stand in a corner of the room from 1 p.m. until 5.30 p.m. without speaking. The mother was sentenced to three months' hard labour and the stepfather to six weeks' hard labour. £20,f*)0,000 HEIR GETS DIVORCE. Mr. Leonard Kip Rhinelander, heir to the Rhinelander fortune of £20,000,000, has secured a divorce from his mulatto wife at Las Vegas (Nevada). Mr. Rhinelander has been staying under an assumed name at a mountain resort near Las Vegas to fulfil the six months' residence qualification for a divorce action. Mrs. Rhinelander is the daughter of a coloured coachman. The marriage took place in 1924, and soon afterwards Mr. Rhinelander brought an unsuccessful suit for its annulment, the jury holding that he would have married the girl even if he had had full knowledge of her coloured blood. When Mrs. Rhinelander learned of the divorce proceedings she announced that she was taking steps to sue her father-in-law for £100,000 damages for alleged alienation of her husband's affections. WOODEN LEG AS BAftllC, The unusual use of a wooden leg as a savings bank was discovered at the Vienna Polish Consulate. Three years ago a Polish subject, Noah Goldberg, whose uncle is a Rabbi in New York, died in a Vienna hospital. After his death a sum of $600 (£120) deposited at bis hotel was nsed to pay the hospital and funeral expenses. The relatives knew that Goldberg had a considerable fortune, but all effort to trace it proved unavailing. The ■relatives requested a re-examination of the deceased's, trunks and clothing deposited at the Polish Consulate in Vienna. The search only brought to light £60. A Consular official named W'ieder, who wears a wooden leg, was trying on the wooden leg of Goldberg with a view to buying it if he found it suitable. He accidentally touched a spring disclosing a number of thousand-dollar bills, amounting to the large sum of £17,600. The Consulate has informed the American relatives of the fortune that awaits their instructions.

> STORY OF A CHAIN. Practically every milestone in the hifr tory of the Clan MacKay is incorporated in a presidential chain of office which Baron William MacKay, of Holland, presented to'the clan's society in London in the New Year. The chain to of solid gold and interlinked with the most »cred symbol of the clan —the "man of the strong arm." This ifl represented by * closed hand' holding an upright dirk. THE ASS' JAW. "Samson probably used a sickle rather than the jawbone of an ass," said Mr. S. R. K. Glanville, of the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, speaking to children at the British Museum. "The similarity," said Mr. Glanville, "between the sickle as used to-day, the ancient sickle of flint and wood, and the animal's jawbone, leads us to think that the phrase 'jawbone of an ass' may be a name for a sickle." FATE AND A COIN. The spin of a coin had a tragic fate for Mr. Owen Wells' Morgan, aged 22, the son of a magistrate at Petsworth, Sussex. He tossed with Mr. John Gray, a friend, to decide who should occupy the sidecar in a motor cycle combination in a journey to Chapman, near Worthing. Mr. Morgan lost, and when they were at Angmering the combination skidded into a telegraph post. Mr. Gray escaped injury, but Mr. Morgan was killed, and at the inquest a verdict of accidental death was recorded. WHISKY SHARED IN COURT. Sir Basil McFarland, Bart., giving evidence at Londonderry Police Court in a case _in which a boy was charged with stealing a bottle of his whisky, was asked if he could identify the bottle, which was produced. Sir Basil: I could do so better, your worships, if the cork were out. The boy was discharged under the Probation of Offenders Act, and the chairman suggested that Sir Basil should share the contents of the bottle with the magistrates, as the festive season was approaching. Sir Basil: Certainly. I can produce a corkscrew if you can produce glasses. LOOT OF 45 YEARS AGO. Silver forks and spoons stolen 45 yeara ago from the house of Mr. William Griffiths, a Llanelly bank manager, have been dug up by a navvy on a. water pipe track. They were unearthed two miles from the house at Pembrey from which they were stolen, about a foot beneath the surface in marshy land. Despite ths many years they had been under the ground the forks and spoons are in splendid condition and have been returned t® the owner. They were part of a canteen of cutlery presented to Mrs. Griffiths aa a wedding present about 50 years ago. THE GREAT BACH FAMILY. Of the 247 men of the name of Bach who were known as musicians, there were over 50 who were distinguished as composers and performers. In that part of Germany where most of these quiet, homeloving people lived,_ they had been for generations so prominent in local musical affairs that the town musicians were know as "the Bachs" even after there had ceased to be any of the name among them. But of all the Bachs, John Sebastian was "the Bach." He is generally known simply as "Sebastian," for the name "Johann" is found so constantly in the family that to use it alone would fail to distinguish the particular" "Johann" that yas meant.

CARNERA AT PLAY. Primo Camera, the Italian boxer, visited the toy department of a Olapham Junction stare just 'before Christmas and was persuaded to take his seat dai a "rocket" and be "shot ifco the moon." There waa a struggle among the children to travel with Camera. One small boy was •presented by the Italian colossus with a toy engine, but yben the boxer offered to shake bands the child beat a hasty retreat. Noah, in the guise of Camera, with his sons, Shern, Ham and Japhet, all seven feet in height, and an ark on the lines of a Transatlantic liner, were the main features at the Chelsea Arts Club ball at the Albert Hall, Kensington, W., on New Year's Eve.

PEER ON ALL FOURS. An amusing comedy, in which Lord Banbury was the central figure recently, amused the House of Lords. During an. important debate he began groping under his seat, then conferred with Lord Danesfort, sitting next to him, and both began a search. Not being successful Lord Banbury walked round to the front bench, and on bands and knees began to look beneath the seat on wbich Lord Salisbury was sitting. Tbe spectacle of a Peer on all fours diverted much of the attention from the debate. Lord Banbury was again unsuccessful. He got up, brushed the dust off bis bands, and gave a messenger instructions to continue search later. No one in the 'House understood what was missing.

COSTLY WINES TREAT. William Lewis Butt, 28, no occupation, described as of Kingston, Jamaica, and Ernest George Roberts, 40, traveller, Clontarf, Dublin, were charged at Bow Street with fraudulently incurring a debt to the amount of £24 16/ at the First Avenue Hotel. They pleaded guilty. Detective Fury said the two men met at a Salvation Army hostel and drove from there to the First Avenue Hotel on Christmas Eye. In three days they ran up a bill for £24 16/, most of which was for expensive wines, to which they treated other people at the hotel. Butt arrived in England from Jamaica last July. Butt said that he bad been drinking heavily of late and did not know what he was doing. Roberts said be understood that the bill would be paid by JButt. Roberts, who had a bad record, was sentenced to four months' imprisonment with hard labour. Butt was remanded. LIVED TO 152. An amazing story of a Shropshire man who, after living as a bachelor until he was 80, married twice, taking his second wife when he was 122 years of age, and eventually died at the age of 152, has been revealed. The man was Thomas Pa rr - to the last two months of his life he lived at Albcrbury, near Shrewsbury, but wnen brought to London '"to be exhibited in tne Strand" he "withered away like an uprooted tree." At his death an examination was'made or Parr s body and a issued, which said: The brain was health., verv firm and hard to the touch; hence, ehortlv before his death, althougn he had been "blind for 20 yews, he heard extremely well, understood all that was said to him, etc. Parr was buried at Westminster Abbey under a stone recording that he had lived in the reigns of ten monarchs. When Parr married at the age of 80 his wife gave birth to a boy and girl. BLIND CLERGYMAN. A man of 24 who has been blind from the age of 14 and has yet qualified to become a clergyman of the Church of England was ordained by the Bishop of Bristol (the Right Rev. G. Nickson) on December 22. He is Mr. Charles S. Adkins, of Swindon, Wiltshire. Ten years ago on the beach at Xewhaven, Sussex, he picked up an imexploded bomb. It went off, blinded h'im, and blew off the thumb and two fingers of his left hand. He was sent to the College for Blind at Whittington, Worcester, where he learned to read Braille type. Thence he went to Durham University. The text-books he needed wore transcribed into Braille at the National Institute for the Blind. Great 1 ortland Street, W. They enabled him to take the degree of B.A. in 1927 and a theological diploma last year.