RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 101, 23 January 1940, Page 6

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights On Current

Events (By Kickshaws.) To be happy a wife should love her husband as much as he loves himself. ¥ ♦ A reader asks for the definition of a tourist. Well, a tourist is a person who travels hundreds of miles to get a snapshot of himself standing by the car. $.- * » Through lack of fuel the German people are feeling the present cold snap intensely. But the leaders were shivering in their shoes long before the freeze started. ~ “When does Easter Day fall this year,” asks a ■ correspondent, “1.C.L." “I have seen two different calendars marked March 31 for Easter Sunday, but on two different diaries for March 24. On both calendars there is a note: ‘By ruling of religious bodies Easter may be held a week earlier.’ I have worked the date out by the table given in the Common Prayer Book, which gives me March 31. This table also distinctly mentions that when the full moon falls on a Sunday, the Sunday after is Easter Day; the full moon falls on Sunday, March 24, thus making Sunday, March 31, Easter Sunday. If you can enlighten me I am sure it would also 'be of great interest to all your ardent readers.” “Kickshaws” is grateful to the Ven. Archdeacon Bullock for the following note on the question asked by “1.C.L.”

(1) Easter Day in this year is on March 24.

(2) Easter Day and Easter Sunday are always one and the same—since the fifth century A.D. (3) Easter is fixed always on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon.

(4) The Paschal moon is not the same as the real moon—or even the astronomical mean moon. It is an imaginary moon —very much as a sunset we see is an imaginary one and not a real one.

(5) It sometimes happens that Easter Day is placed on a different Sunday from what would be the case if by “full moon” were meant the astronomical full moon.

The confusion of your correspondent is excusable, but if he wishes to go further he must study not merely the mathematics of the question but also Jewish customs concerning the Mosaicfull moon —which also didn't fall on the day of the real full moon, and for that reason has confused us all ever since. In case your correspondent should think that religious bodies tlx Easter arbitrarily in defiance of natural law, please assure him that such is not the ease. Even the imaginary moon—among all the other moons—is fixed, and operates according to law.

“I notice in your column recently you stated ‘there are no charcoal burners in New Zealand today,’ ” says “A.R.” “ It may interest you to know that a man named 'Horton living at Leigh, North Auckland, does a considerable amount of charcoal burning, selling his product in Auckland. I am not sure of the wood he uses, but from my- knowledge of the locality I should imagine it to be ordinary manuka.”

[Well, well, these charcoal burners, they get in early. It was a charcoal burner who discovered the body of William 'Rufus, and the same family is still on the job.]

News that the Russians are using long range guns firing shells a distance of 25 miles probably refers to a type introduced to Russia by German gunnery experts some years ago. These guns are 42 feet long and have an effective range of 23 miles. They are equipped with a special cooling device which makes it possible to fire rapidly without overheating. These guns were nicknamed “Big Lenins” aud were intended more as a precautionary defence against Japanese attack by sea than for use against the Finns. In fact, it seems mere showmanship to use these guns for such a purpose. Long range guns of this nature are heavy, costly, and require considerable servicing. Their shells have to be made very strong to resist the impact of discharge. This leaves very little space for the bursting charge. In the days before the aeroplane long range guns had a certain use. The aeroplane is in reality a form of long-range gun capable of dropping bombs with a very high proportion of bursting charge to container weight, because of a complete lack of shock of discharge. © Several aeroplanes could be built, moreover, for the price of one 25-mile gun.

The Big Berthas devised by Germany iu the Great War number 1, were of no particular military value. The psychological effect was not to be denied, causing as it did 1,000,090 people to leave Paris. Nevertheless, one wonders if these guns, a specialty of static warfare, served any real useful military ends. The arrival of shells from a distance of 75 miles was a thorn iu the side of Paris, but it did not effect the war issues. The guns fired a shell a maximum of 80 miles ■which represented the limit with the explosives at the command of mankind. Hie guns weighed hundreds of tons.. They required a special railway Hue, and the work of hundreds of men to conceal them. Though seven guns were finally constructed there was no question of a bombardment developing. The guns had a life of about 100 rounds apiece, after which they had to be returned to the workshops for repairs. Though everv care was taken to conceal the design of this gun, by devious methods details were obtained in .Iflho. bei ertheless, to this day the formula for the powder used has never been discovered.

Some idea of the problems attached to the firing of guns with a super long range may be obtained from the trouble that had to be taken with the German Big Berthas. The shell of these guns weighed 2461 b. The diameter was 5.26 Inches. The bore of the gun was smooth, not rifled as usual. Each gun bad a pressure gauge which gave the pressure developed at discharge. From this it was possible to compute to a short distance where the shell just tired would land. Each shell fired had to be placed in a new position in the boie of the gun. Each shell, therefore, required a special calculation before it was fired. There were three power charges. A variable charge in a bag, a standard charge in a si Ik nag. and a huge charge that vepresetitec the bulk of the explosive used Each Miei required adjustments to the charges to allow for the b , air temperature, tempera*u charge Itself, the wear of the bore caused by the Previous disetage am many other minor details. Imlay an aeroplane could fly the io m dron a bomb 10 times more destructive an d five times more accurately than did those freak guns. 1 walked » >mle with , sor ™'y (nd ne’er a word said sue, But. oh! the things I learnt from her When sorrow walked with me. —Hamilton.