RANDOM AT LARGE

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32120, 16 October 1969, Page 17

RANDOM AT LARGE

BL ANKET FINISH

They go in for general knowledge tests in the Indian newspapers quite extensively, and it is marvellous how a few minutes study of one of them can increase one’s command of fact, and even more marvellous how quickly these unrelated and useless snippets are forgotten. But the chap with the paper in his hand can keep three or four companions properly under his thumb by reading them the questions, giving them the alternatives, and then providing his embarrassed audience with the proper answers. Even though everyone knows he is depending for the accuracy of his information on the printed answers given up-

side down at the bottom of the column, it somehow increases his stature. We have been thus engaged these last few minutes, asking people whether the Australian Eucalyptus, seaweed, or California redwoods are the tallest plants in the world. Did you know that seaweed grows to 600 feet? We are all aware, for the moment, that the deerfly is the fastest living being, at 800 miles an hour: that crows do not live for six or 15 but 100 years (according to our information): that the sponge is not a worm, house or a vegetable, but an animal of the sea: and that on a clear night we can see 4000 stars. It seems a bit unfair to discover that man has no more bones

(7) in his neck than a giraffe, but we should be able to trot out, to some advantage somewhere, the fact that a petrosam was a prehistoric flying reptile. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, which we often do, until we were just about thrown out, all because of question 3, which we had deliberately saved to last. This performance was conducted in Bombay, and we asked our audience whether a bedbug could live for 25 hours, 2) months, or six months without food. The answer was six months, and we were quite unfairly blamed for producing this information when there was such ready evidence that the local Bombay breed had not been going short of sustenance lately.