HERE AND THERE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 9296, 25 July 1901, Page 6

HERE AND THERE.

A man has just given a Reading mason a penny for, finding a lost purse containing £320 in notes and gold. Advertiserueut is the best cure for such meanness, which, says a London paper, is not, unhappily, so rare as it is astounding. An office boy in the city was given a sixpence some time ago for fiuding and returning a lost cheque for £2300, made payable to a mining company ; and a 'bus conductor at Gravesend received a five-shilling piece from a man to whom he returned a lost bag containing £500. A lady who picked up a pocket-book with £10,000 worth of notes and cheques, and searched until she fouud the owner, was rewa ded with half-a-crown for her pains, and a poor woman at Smithfield a few years since received a penny for safely returning a bag with £500 iv gold and notes.

The German Emperor figures in a romance that is attracting the attention of the people in Germany and America. Forty-five years ago Count Edmund yon Larisch, a lieutenant in the 4th Uhlans, then twenty-two years of age, fell violently in love with a German Countess. His Major, Count yon Ponitza, also loved the Countess. One night the two men qua'relied, and on parade next mornins; ihe Major went out of his way to humiliate the young man. Indignant at the treatment, Count yon Larisch threw his glove in the Major's face. The Major drew his sword and knocked out several of the lieutenant's teeth, and yon Larisch inst ntly struck his superior officer dead, rushed from the parade ground, crossed tha frontier, and left for New Orleans, where he arrived iv 1856. Since then he has worked for a living in various ways —as a watchmaker, a soldier, etc. Now, aa a grey-haired man of sixty-seven, he returns, at the Emperors command, to report himself at his regimental headquarters, and afterwards to the Kaiser himself. Count yon Larisch will return to an income of £18,000 a year.

Mr Clement Wragge, of storm fame, is out with an idea that has fairly paralysed the easy-going Queenslanders. He wants to realise the dream of old oxplorers of an inland sea in Australia, which shall modify climate and turn the arid wilderness into smiling pasturs land. Two men alone, in his opinion, can accomplish this great feat— one Mr Andrew Carnegie with his millions, and the other Mr Lindon Bates with his dredges. If it comes to a matter of choice, he prefers the latter. His scheme (remarks a contemporary) is beautiful in its simplicity. The only drawback to it is that the originator seems to think he >s about two centuries ahead of his time. Doubtless he is right. He would connect LakeFardiner with Lake Torrens, and the latter with Spencer's Gulf, and, behold ! the beneficent work would be accomplished. By means of Mr Bates's dredges he would excavate the beds of these lakes, make a gigantic canal to connect them with the oceau, ond then the sea would flow into its ancient channels, and the interior would rapidly bloom like a flower-strewn meadow. There is probably a good deal in Mr Wragge's idea; but ho is not likely to live Lo.see it realised. Who shall say what the years of this joung century will achieve? The weather generally may not be very interesting—and just now it is <old and windy—but it cannot be denied that Mr Wragge makes his pronouncements upon it very diverting, very thought-promoting.

One of the cares of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, dealing in his Budget with tobacco duty, the genial habit of the retailer to refresh the herb' with water. The Local Government Board (writes a London correspondent) are just now endeavoring to deal with an incursion of water in another direction. Au ingenious German chemist has invented a process whereby water can be impressed inio the butter tub, with the result of considerably adding to the weight ot its contents without altering their appearance. Not only is foreign but'er thus treated imported in tons and sold, at full price to the unsuspecting consumer, but machines that will enable the local dealer appreciably to add to the weight of his butter are imported, anil fiud a ready market. Assuming that the water is clean, there is no damaging effect on public health. But, obviously, if the head of a household wants to buy water, he or she can obtain it at a much less price per avoirdupois pound than is demanded for butter. The difficulty is that the Statute Book does not contain any standard for pure butter than would meet this ingenious fraud, tht earliest product of the twentieth century. Mr Hanbury, whose eympathiea are warm on behalf of the agricultural interests, its making inquiries into the matter, and means to devise practical measures for protecting the public It is 88 id that at one establishment in •he East End of London sixty tons of this compound are prepared and distributed throughout the country, to be sod as pure butter.

Mr Edison is reported to have said in au interview that he has iuvented an improved cemetit. All buildings infuiuie aie to be made of this cement An iron framework is put up, the cement poured in, the roof thrown on, and in three or four days the house is fit for habitation. Mr Edison says the cost will be, insignificant, and rents will be reduced enormously.

Two Russian engineers, T, S. Sakowenko and T. Bagiikoff, have, it is reported from St. Petersburg, produced a submarine vessel which combines in itsell the properties of a submarine and in ordinary warship or merchantman The boat is an entirely new departure, and it has the advantage of serving as an express passenger steamer or a cargo boat. It develops a spetd on*the surface of sixty knots an hour. r J?ne passage from Eoglani to America could thus be done in two and a half day*, and it cou'd sink under water if the weather became stormy.