NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 237, 7 October 1933, Page 4 (Supplement)

NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

BAGPIPE BOOM. ' Scottish bagpipes are enjoying a boom. Never before have so many instiument & been required for the home trade, while the export to foreign countries has aihO shown a huge increase in the past lew months. The growing interest in bagpipe music is demonstrated by the fact that it is now being broadcast by wireless to South American listeners. WHALING 1000 YEARS OLD. Whale fishing dates back a thousand years to the voyages of the Basques in the 12th century. Until about 1800, although the industry grew enormously, extermination did not even seem possible. J. nor to 1868 whale catches were mainly taken from the snerm, bow-head, and other slowmoving species, the capture of which was possible with hand-thrown harpoons_ and rowboats. The swift blue, finback, set and humpback whales were only taken alter the harpoon gun was invented and when an air pump was employed to Wow up the carcase to make it float, lastnamed species sank after being killed instead of floating like the sperm or bowhead. SNEEZING REMOVES BLINDNESS. Recentlv an 84-year-old man named Griswold, of Dallas, Texas, sneezed. Then he looked about at a vastly different world than he remembered 50 years ago before he went blind. The aged pencil-seller had a pain in his head. He took snuff for the pain. The snuff brought on the sneeze, and lie saw an electric fan in his room. Startled at the device, he tumbled back in his bed and called the landlord. "I can see," lie shouted, "and look, the flowers on the wallpaper." The new world on which he gazed is not without its_ complications, .Griswold soon learned. ISTo longer blind, he faces revocation of his city license permitting him to sell pencils on the streets. FIGHTING ALL HIS LIFE.. Staff Sergeant John J. Van Dusen, who has " spent 05 of my 83 years in the United States army," was one of the notables at the convention of Spanish-American War veterans at Los Angeles. He ways: ' I have been in seven wars and have had seven wives, so —War or peace —I've been fighting all my life." Van Dusen fought in the Spanish-American War in Cuba, the Philippines, the Boxer rebellion, twice in Mexican border wars, and in the World War. " In 1924, after having completed a half century in army service, he was j granted a special enlistment by General John Pershing. He has received 6C service medals and decorations as a result of his many campaigns, and is looking forward to another war. " Things were getting too peaceful, so I married my seventh wife just eighteen months ago," he said. " I've had three children of my own, but my wives presented me with 17 more by their former marriages."

FRATERNITY OF SPORT. The French Minister of Education has ■ shown appreciation of the efforts of the Arsenal Soccer Football Club in playing matches in Paris on behalf of French wounded and gassed soldiers. It has conferred on Sir Samuel Ilill-Wood, chairman of the club, and Mr. Herbert Chapman, the secretary-manager, a Diploma of Merit, "for services rendered to the French nation." For several years past the Arsenal have taken a team to play in Paris on Armistice Day. Last November, it, will be recalled, the players and officials made the journey by air. A ROYAL RENDEZVOUS. A good story has reached Paris from Stockholm. While opening his post on his 75th birthday, which was recently celebrated in Sweden, King Gustaf came across a letter which, being marked "strictly private," had been left unopened by his private secretary. His Majesty opened it and lead the following note: "Darling,— Can y6u meet me this evening at the usual rendezvous?" Somewhat surprised, he looked at the envelope and saw it was addressed to a sailor on board the warship Gustaf V. Having a sense of humour as well as a kind heart, His Majesty thereupon dictated a telegram to the captain of the ship, instructing him to grant the sailor leave for the evening. Needless to say neither the captain nor the sailor had the least idea of the reason for this Royal bounty. CASES OF WAR BLINDNESS. Official figures issued by St. Dunstan's show that there are now about 2000 cases of .men who have lost their sight as a result of active service during the Great War, and all of them are under the care of St. Dunstan's. Although it is nearly 20 years since the war began, new t'ases are still regularly coming in. Almost invariably. it is stated, these arc men whose eyesight was slightly affected us a result of the war and who have now, after all these years, gone completely blind. At the end of the war there were about 1500 cases. By .1021 the nulnbers had risen to 1772. and since then there has been a gradual increase each year, until the present figure of nearly 2000 has been reached. The average age of the men under the care of St. Dunstan's is now a little over 40 years, and. on this basis, it has been calculated that in 20 years' time, in 105,' i, there will still be -more than 1300 warblinded men living, and in 1073 no fewer than 415. It is possible that there will

still be a few war-blinded men to be looked after between the years 1990 and 2000. ABOUT THUNDERSTORMS. Everyone is familiar with the fact that some thunderstorms will make it cooler and more comfortable, and others only increase the discomfort. Dr. \V. .T. Humphries, of the United States Weather "Bureau, explains this phenomenon by the fact that some storms are "wind hatched" and others "calm brooded." Wind-batched storms, also known as "cold-front" or "squall-line" storms, are caused by the cooling of the air from above. In this type of storm the humidity, or amount of moisture in the air, is greater in the warm air before the storm than in the cooler part behind it. The decrease of absolute humidity therefore helps the evaporation of body perspiration, and one feels cooler. In the calm-brooded storm, however, the storm cause is the heating of air near the ground, which rises as a giant chimney. These air chimneys < exist, only when no wind is present to break them' up. The absolute humidity on all sides of such a storm is about the same: thus, when evaporation of part of the raindrops occurs, as they fall, still more moisture gets into the " r. The added humiditv increases human discomfort.

FRIED WATCHES. How engine drivers "fried" their watches in a gambling game is related in ! a booklet issued to mark the coining centenary of the Shildon (County Durham) Railway Institute, whose first members were the first railway mechanics in the first railway works of the world. A century ago, Mr. John Graham, general nuperintendent of the old Darlington and Stockton line, heard an uproar in a local public house. Investigating, he found an excited* group of railmen gathered round a fire. On the fire was a fryingpan containing watches belonging to engine drivers, who were laying bets as to which watch would stop first. The disgust inspired by this incident resulted in Mr. Graham calling a meeting "to consider what could be done to improve the. moral and intellectual condition of the inhabitants"—and eo a railway institute was built. ROME TRAITORS' ROCK. Excavations will start shortly on the southern slopes of the Capitol in order *o isolate the Tarpeian Rock. It is also desired to clear the hill opposite the Theatre of Marcellus of ugly houses which are not old enough to be interesting, and it is hoped that valuable relics of the Rome of the Kings and the Republic will come to light when the foundations of the houses are dug out. Proofs of a historical basis for some of the superstitions about Tarpeia may be one of the rewards. She is said to have been a beautiful woman who opened the gate of the fortress of the C'apitolinc, Hill to the Sabines and to ha still sitting enchanted in a case in the centre of the hill. The rock was long used as a place of execution for traitors. They were hurled from it into the abyss below. In any ease the hill with the City Hall 011 its summit will become a striking landmark for the first time in centuries. OFFICERS SWAP WIVES. Captain William B. Bradford, cavalry, U.S.A., was introducing to associates at Fort Leavenworth a new Mrs. Bradford, whom they had known as Mrs. Katherine McDonald, wife of Major Stuart C. McDonald, infantry, U.S.A. And it came out that the first Mrs. Bradford, who, had gone " vacationing" in Arkansas several months ago with Mrs. McDonald, is now herself the second Mrs. McDonald. Thanks to the Arkansas !X)-day divorce law, two army wives had traded husbands 011 a perfectly fniendly basis, and their " vacation " turned out to have been a matter of establishing residence. Captain Bradley waa quoted as having said that it was perfectly normal and natural, and nothing could stop people from lulling in love. The wives, whose departure together stopped tlie wagging of tongues, went to Bentonville, Arkansas, rented a house together, and lived there as friends until the chancellor of the Arkansas court granted their divorce.

GIRLS AS DECOYS. Girls wearing brightly coloured frocks were usetl by the police as decoys to track down an ink and paint thrower in London. As the girls paraded the streets detectives followed closely behind in the hope of catching someone who had been despoiling the clothes of girls and women. The ink thrower proved a very elusive person whom the police have been hunting lor weeks. Most of his victims had their dresses splashed in New Street and Westgatc, and the decoys were girls he had previously marked down for his queer attentions. ROYAL MINT PROFITS. The Jvoyal 3Jint in London earns startling profits from the actual making of money. Silver and bronze coins are not, of course, worth anything approaching their lace value. Bronze coins are made of an alloy containing 95 per ctflit copper and costing about £65 a ton. A ton of bronze will make 107,520 pennies, or £44i>. So pennies cost about 2d a dozen. A shilling contains silver worth about V/sd. Work at the Mint is ndturally carried out under the strictest supervision in order to avoid waste of "money." -A given quantity metal supplied at the beginning of a day -must be accounted for in the evening, either in coin or metal. A certain allowance is made for loss in melting. The annual profit from the Mint during the past 50 years has been over £630,000. although in the abnormal war year of J9l i it was nearly £4,750,000. THE KOH-I-NOOR DIAMOND. The action of Queen Victoria in specifically bequeathing the historic Koh-i-noor diamond not (o her successor on tlia throne, King Edward, but to bis wife, was directed l.fy a legend. Should the Koh-i----noor ever be worn by a male ruler ot Great Britain, the legend has it, In din would be lost to the British Empire. This is one of the stories in •'Jewels of Ronvinco and Kenown," by Mary Abbott. Thosa privileged to pass the Royal presence at the first Court of the London season may see this diamond—one of the most famous in the world. For it is then that Queen Mary usually wears the Koh-i-noor. When it. was given to Queen Victoria by the . British East India. Company in 1850. says Miss Abbott, a hint was dropped that India' as a whole would Lip best pleased if the jewel were worn as a personal ornament, and not made a part of the British Crown Kegalia. Queen Victoria accordingly made the "Mountain of Light' [i Boyal hcirlom, to descend to female entail from one reigning monarch's consort to the next.