RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 51, 23 November 1928, Page 10

RANDOM NOTES

SIDELIGHTS ON CURRENT EVENTS LOCAL AND GENERAL

(By

Cosmos.)

Probably the shortness of women s skirts accounts for the number who have ladders in.their stockings. « * « Dr. Adams tells us that a new comet 3s visible in New Zealand. Probably it has just looked in to view the political tangle. « * * A foreign exchange says that the Italians are excellent footballers. They Should be. Look at the shape of their country. “Old Man Mississippi” has wrought havoc on many occasions in those sections of the United States which lie adjacent to it, and according to the cables to-day-further flood damage is causing concern in Missouri. The people of the United States have lost property valued at millions, and innumerable lives through the flooding of the Mississippi, but a determined effort is about to be made to put an end to the trouble for all time. Over £60,000,000 is to be spent in minimising the dangers of this great river in time of flood. In the past, every flood was followed by a strengthening of the levees, with a view of confining the water to the banks of the river. This has never proved satisfactory, and the new scheme, while it also includes the strengthening of levees, provides for a “fuse” in the banks, which will permit an abnormal pressure of water to escape into a second line of levees. This, of course, will mean that the land between the two lines of levees will be temporarily submerged during heavy floods, but in most cases swamps and wooded regions have been chosen as an outlet for the surplus water. In fact, the river will be treated as an electric current in a transmission line. Its normal flow will be insulated, and in time of danger the surplus will be diverted so that it can do no harm. This plan is based on the idea of limiting the amount of flood water carried by the river to its safe capacity, sending the surplus through lateral subways.

New bank-notes, printed in many colours, were issued by the Bank of England yesterday, which are no doubt calculated to make the task of the counterfeiter a still more difficult one. The first bank-notes were simply printed forms on water-marked paper, and although no precautions were taken to prevent fraudulent imitation, forgeries were comparatively t rare. That was probably due to the fact that the notes were of somewhat high denominations. When £1 notes were p.ut into circulation late in the eighteenth century, forgery became so common that over 30Q people were convicted of that crime in England during a single year. Realising, that' something must be done to make the work of the forger more diflicult, new .banknotes began to appear embellished with all kinds of emblems and intricate designs.

With the introduction of photoengraving, however, the counterfeiter found it a simple matter to reproduce the most elaborately-designed paper money. In the war between science and crime the criminal received another set-back when the discovery was made that certain colours will not photograph. Bank-notes then appeared printed in all the hues of the rainbow, until skilful engravers learned how to reproduce the designs and match the colours. The modern banknote, however, cannot be fraudulently imitated with any degree of success, as the method of. printing and care in manufacture of plates makes it almost an impossibility to reproduce every detail. Not only are secret inks and special watermarks used in the production of the ordinary pound note, but even the paper is made by a special process. The modern note-forger has to be an artist of exceptional skill, and must possess an intricate and expensive plant, and even then his chances of success are small indeed.

We take salt so much for granted to-day that it seems strange to read of China raising loans on the strength of her salt revenues. When, however, it is considered that China, with a tax that varies in from four to five shillings a hundredweight, reaps a salt harvest of over a million pounds a year, it is obvious that salt still plays an important role in the wealth of nations. As a matter of fact, but for salt it is doubtful if the nations as we see them to-day would have ever evolved along the lines they have done. Through the pages of history it has been man’s craving for salt that has opened up the caravan and other trade routes of the world, promoting intercourse and trade between distant countries. With the introduction of cooking and ’Vegetables, this craving for salt first commenced. So great was the demand that the oldest trade routes of the Sahara were pioneered in order to tap the rich salt oases of the inland deserts.

Some of this salt arrived on the backs of slaves, and a tax on this commodity went to fill the coffers of many a dark-skinned African potentate who was fortunate enough to find his little community on some important salt route. The salt problem and the abolition of slavery in those areas became inextricably linked, for without slaves the inhabitants feared that their -salt supplies would be endangered. So great was the desire for salt that people made excursions of hundreds of miles to obtain it, and at the worst created an liv ferior grade by pouring brackish inland water on to wood ashes. Along the Mediterranean coasts salt soon became an important article of commerce, and the Via Salaris to the salt mines of Ostia is possibly the oldest trade route in the world. Palmyra owes its prosperity to the fact that in its vicinity holes dug in the ground soon filled with brine which evaporated into salt.

In South Russia, the Persian Gulf and Northern India salt" mining was put on a commercial basin long before the time of Alexander the Great, and well-known trade routes linked Asia and Europe with those far ■off salt mines. Even the sea was pressed into salt production before history began. To-day, in Southern Italy and Malta, it is possible to see salt evaporated in large flat sunken fields, not unlike bowling greens minus grass, by methods that have scarcely changed for centuries. High imposts on salt grew round the trade and they were often oppressively carried out, leading to much adulteration; the salt reaching the consumer largely mixed with earth. Hence the Biblical phrase, “The salt which has lost its savour” probably had a very personal meaning to the busy housewives of those dajs.