RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 31, 31 October 1938, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights on Current

Events

(By Kickshaws).

Well, well, could it be worse if politicians regulated the weather as well.

Great waterfalls, it is contended, can be created by the effect of light on water. Mix the stuff with a bit of something and there is no end to it. ♦ * *

Mayibe people in time will be delighted with the possibilities of air travel, as suggested. Just at present the chief possibility seems to be the certainty of putting a Id. stamp on a lid. airmail. *

Two magpies kissing one another on a power line in the Waipukurau area are said to have caused a power failure that lasted seven hours. Possibly the moral is to space power lines so that magpies and other birds cannot sit on separate lines and touch one another. Nevertheless, the escapade of these magpies has been equalled elsewhere by creatures even more insignificant. One of the biggest railway hold-ups in Britain was caused at Hounslow when an earwig crawled into the signalling apparatus. All signals were instantly set at danger by the earwig aud all trains stopped. They could not be started again until after a careful overhaul of each piece of mechanism and the errant earwig removed from its newly-found home. Cochineal insects incidentally caused a rather curious hold-up on the Morelos Railway, Mexico. The driver of a train saw a red light suddenly appear ahead. He stopped the train. A following train ran into his stationary train and killed three passengers. The red light, it was discovered, was just an ordinary signal lantern on which had settled a swarm of cochineal insects. The light shining through their bodies had caused the signal to appear a vivid crimson. * » *

It is reported that a monument is to be raised over the grave of the Unknown Warrior in Westminster Abbey. Maybe this gesture is timely before we forget. Indeed, many of the millions who have stood before this tomb have forgotten the circumstances that brought this dead soldier from the battlefields of France to his tomb in Westminster Abbey. The Rev. G. Kendall, senior Chaplain 63rd Naval Division in 1920, was placed in charge of the proceedings by which the Unknown Warrior was selected. On six different sectors of the fighting area Ypres, Marne, Arras, Cambrai, and two points further south, bodies were exhumed. Nobody knew whose bodies they were nor their rank, or whether they were soldiers, sailors or airmen. Each of the six bodies was placed in a coffin of identical size and shape. The coffins were placed in a row in a hut draped with Union Jacks. The door was then locked. Next morning a general who had not seen the arrival of the cortege was asked to unlock the door and place his hand on a coffin. The coffin he touched contained the body of the Unknown soldier. The other five were reburied.

The body- of the Unknown Warrior was placed on the deck of the British destroyer Verdun and conveyed across the Channel. The salute at Dover equalled the guns fired for a Field-Marshal. The King himself led the procession to Westminster Abbey attended by bis sons, Cabinet Ministers, statesmen, generals and admirals. Troops lined the streets. After an impressive service the Warrior was lowered into his tomb. A black marble engraved stone seals the tomb. The inscription reads: —'’Beneath this Stone Rests the Body of a British Warrior Unknown by Name or Rank Brought from France to Lie Among The Most Illustrious of the Land And Buried Here on Armistice Day 11 Nov. 1920. In the Presence of His Majesty King George V. His Ministers of State, The Chiefs of His Forces And a Vast Concourse of the Nation Thus are Commemorated the Many Multitudes Who During the Great War of 1914-1918 Gave 'The Most That ?<irn Can Give —Life Itself —For God, For King and Country, For Loved Ones, Home and Empire, For the Sacred Cause of Justice And The Freedom of the World, Because He had Done Good Toward God and Toward His House.” In view of recent events tlie inscription makes strange reading.

Almost as great a mystery as the identity of the Unknown Warrior is the identity of the man who first suggested tlie idea. The question was raised in tlie House of Commons when Sir Harry Brittain asked Lloyd George if it was possible to record for future history the name of the individual who first made this very beautiful and appropriate suggestion. Lloyd George gave no definite answer. Sir Harry Brittain then asked, “Might I ask whether the suggestion was not first pultlicly made by Mr. J. B. Wilson, news editor of one of the great Metropolitan dailies?” It seems that Mr. Wilson suggested, at an informal talk in the offices of the “Daily Express,” that it would be a splendid symbol of our dead soldiers to bring back a body of an unknown warrior. It has also been suggested that the idea was first suggested by tlie Rev. David Railton. He went into a garden behind tlie lines and there saw a tiny wooden cross tliat marked the grave of an unidentified soldier. The idea was referred to the Dean of 'Westminster, who took up the matter.

Thanks for your reply to my question re Slocomlie.” says “Mariner.” “When you first wrote of Sioeombe 1 thought I was to learn of someone I had never heard of, but ‘Slocum’ is another story about which, I am afraid, you know very little, both as to the route lie sailed and the craft lie sailed in. I have been reading your column lint a few weeks, and was attracted by tlie manner with which you ladled out information on all manner of subjects: I thought that you would prove an exception, but it seems that all newspapermen fail badly when commenting on things nautical, they do commit some awful howlers. However. continue on with tlie good work. Best wishes.”

[Kickshaws has never represented himself to be a "Mr. Knowall.’’ He attempts to the best of his ability to obtain the facts from sources as reliable as possible. “Mariner’ complains that newspapermen know nothing about nautical matters, but ■•Mariner” could make a constructive effort toward better knowledge by supplying facts rather titan destructive criticism. Kickshaws would be only too pleased to publish a brief summary by ''Mariner'’ of Slocum's voyages, especially details of bis last voyage.' concerning which very little has ever been printed.! „ » » T.ook to this day. For it is life, tlie very life of life. In its brief course, lie all tlie Varieties and realities of your existence : The Idiss of growth, Tlie glory of action. The splendour of beauty, —Sanskrit.