RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 306, 22 September 1936, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights on Current Events ; (By Kickshaws.) As regards Spain, it may yet be that necessity will be the mother of intervention. ♦■■* « • . We are beginning to wonder if the greatest enemies of any cause are not the extremists who favour it ••> r ' It is stated that over one million rats have been used id the isolation of vitamins. If only they could find a Job like that for sandflies. « “I see that last Thursday was the Jewish New Year’s Day (0607). Can you tell us, through your admirable column, how they work out the: date? For instance, our system is 'Anno Domini’ ; who fixed their year one?”, asks “Antiquary.” (The Jews date their years fromthe time of the-Creation, computed to be 3760 years before the beginning of the Christian era. The Jewish calendar is somewhat Involved. According to whether the year is ordinary or embolismlc, the number of days in the year varies from 354 to 384. The be- , ginning of the year may fall at any time from September 5 to October 5. Anno Domini was first used by Dionysius about 527 A.D. It was first used in England about 150 years later.) The. King of England has ordered a rabbit-proof fence for his country home, and has Issued an edict that rabbits inside the fence are to be eradicated. There is this for the rabbit —it eats the King of England out of his gardens as well as the humble farmer out of his crops. There is also this to be said for the rabbit—it has cost more than a king’s ransom so far, and yet it is still going strong. Indeed, the rabbit is a living lessen to adaptability, and sets a standard for multiplication that not even an adding machine can beat. Two rabbits, it has been shown, can produce a family in three years that total Just over 9,500,000. Figures vary as to the sheep equivalent of a rabbit. The average seems to be to aUow 10 rabbits to be the equal of one sheep so far as the ability of eating food goes. < Whatever the actual ability of rabbits to multiply, we are confronted 'in New Zealand with the fact that we kill off every decade over 150,000,000 rabbits, each 10 of which has been eating pasture that should have been Uaten by a sheep. Rabbits in New Zealand may have given our pioneers furiously to think, but rabbits in Australia are such that if the Kings of England had given the whole of their fortunes and devoted all their yearly income for eradication of the pest it would not have made much difference to the rabbit problem. Rabbits in Australia were “first fleeters," the first three, in fact, were imported by one of the earlier governors. One amusing tale about these early ■rabbits is how one man, name not mentioned, was fined £lO in court for having killed a rabbit the property of John Robertson. A year or so later the said John Robertson was spending £5OOO in a vain attempt to stamp out his rabbits. Rabbits appear to have spread oyer two-thirds of Australia at a migration speed Of about 100 miles a year. -The pests learned to live and thrive on anything and under any type of climate, from that involving a rainfall of six inches a year to 100 inches a year or more. Despite an expenditure at the beginning of this century running into £6,000,000 a year the rabbit beat the descendants. of the first fleeters for their country.

-* * ♦ - The prosperity certificates in Alberta are proving a failure because the certificates are not circulating fast enough, mostly because the shops will not readily accept them. Probably when one starts to look into the matter there is very little that can be done to improve upon the circulating properties of the average note. The average life of a nofe is under two years, and in that time it has changed hands about 2000 times. When it is pushed through a tote window it is, in fact, exchanged for a prosperity note which either starts to rise in value in a very short time or to fall in an equally short time. This particular prosperity note does not circulate at all, but the note that created it goes on circulating. Indeed, some notes even circulate into other countries. New Zealand notes belonging to the trading banks are finding their way back from America and other countries. Incidentally, about £BOO,OOO worth of these notes seem to have circulated so fast and furious they have never come back. Possibly within the next 40 years they will make their last circulation In exchange for Reserve Bank notes. '* » • The speed with which the average note circulates is largely responsible for the wear that takes place. AH manner of devices have been tried out to make bank notes stay clean. The American authorities have been investigating a strengthening process which makes it possible to fold a banknote SOQO times in two directions without disintegrating the fibres. A Swiss scientist has gone so fir as to produce a “tinned” type of note that is said to be virtually indestructible. Meanwhile we have to put up with the fact that paper money is by no means everlasting. In fact, the more worthless an issue of paper money the longer it lasts. It is, therefore, a test of the ” financial condition of a community to observe in what sort of condition is their note issue. Those old time American "continentals,” which gave rise to the saying, "not worth a continental.” are in many still in an excellent state of preservation. Issued during the American civil war, they became worthless and perpetuated a phrase more enduring than the notes themselves.

An interesting insight to the Circulatory propensities of the average note of small denomination was revealed in the United States of America a few years ago. The Chicago Chamber of Commerce put- a new dollar note in circulation with a slip attached to it, asking every person into whose hands it came to record the use made of it. Within 14 days it was spent 31 times—five times in wages, three times on meals, three times on candy, twice on barbejing, twice on men’s clothing, twice for women’s dress accessories, once for a motor-car attachment, once for provisions, once for washing powder, once for toilet requisites, and 10 times for tobacco. This gives a very •

interesting insight into the wanderings of one note. Perhaps some authority in New Zealand will copy the idea and we will be able to have note races, the note that circulates the most being hailed as the winner. If the average note changes hands at least twice a day. it is obvious that notes must, in the course of a year or 18 months, undergo many notable adventures.

“Aged 76”: Many thanks for the 22 verses of the poem Beth Gelert you have written out and sent along. They are too long for publication in this column. Maybe they will be used elsewhere in “The Dominion.’’