NEWS AND NOTES.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 9, 10 July 1909, Page 12

NEWS AND NOTES.

GALVANISING DEAD LANGUAGES. Of all the futile tasks devised by perverted ingenuity, that of attempting to revive a forgotten tongue is the most hopeless. The spirit having fled, only a kind of galvanic /fiibstitute can be applied — from without. Pronunciation and idiom must be- supplied by guesswork, and the sham Antique, a pale exotic in incong-juous environment, withers and dies. What would be thought of some English patriot who should start a magazine and write prose and verse in what lie fondly thought was the language of Chaucer V Yet in at least two parts of the worJd such an eccentric experiment is being tried. One in Ireland, where a society oi cranks is teaching in the schools ivhat is supposed to be old Irish, and has succeeded in securing handsome subsidies from the accommodating British Government for the fantastic experiment. In Norway a like experiment is in piogress; and here also, faction, and not any idea of public welfare, isbehind ttts movement. In Ireland, the avowed object is to' embarrass the, "Saxon" ; in Norway it is to mirk Ioca) hostility to the Dane, whose literary language is practically identical with Norse. Much as if a Scot's society sought to ban English from all publications North of the Tweed, and to substitute "Kailvaird"! The Westminster Gazette wiites: — "In Norwegian politics the question of the national language has again come to the front, and seems like ly to become the dominant issue. The usual language of official documents and the press — the 'Eigsmaal' — differs little fiom Danish.; but certain 'patriotic' philologists have reconstructed, on the basis of various local dialects, a 'Landsmaal,' which was, or at least might hve been, the national language in the Middle Ages ; it has been industriously cultivated by certain novelists, and since 1906 it has been put on a par with the Kigsmaal, both officially and in the schools. The Conservative Party has now made resistance to the further progiess of the Landsmaal a leading plank in their platform ; but the Landsmaal movement, like that for women's rights and that against alcoholism, began in the Bergen district, and in that district ij tends to split the party. The supporters of th© Rigsmaal maintain the common-sense .view that school-children ear-not well be taught both languages, and may best learn the more usual one ; the patriotic advocates of the Landsmaal declare that the efforts made to maJce the Rigsmaal more Norwegian complicate the current spelling to an, impracticable extent. The strife is so warm, that in some districts the clergy who use the Rigsmaal are losing their congregations." It should be added that with the exception of a clique, tie literary men have no sympathy ■with the movement, which is entirely artificial, and can end only in failure. The Ural Mountains practically supply the world with emeralds. The gems are exported in the rough. Amiens, the former home of Jules Verne, made aeronautics conspicuous in the programme that accompanied the recent unveiling of ,a monument to the novelist. i An inlaid marqueteris secretaire,, with the cipher of Marie Antoinette upon the front, was sold at Christie's recently for 2400 guineas. Charged with having left a horse and cart unattended in one of Darlington's chief streets,' Ernest Almond stated that the horse became restive because it mistook the policeman's bright buttons for lumps of sugar. The duties of the fly and the reason for its existehce appear to be the consumption of those dead and minute animals whose decaying myriads would otherwise poison the air. A prize of £100 has been privately offered through the Daily Mail for the best essay, confined to 2500 words, on Tariff Reform. In the archives of Innsbruck, Professor Andreas Galante recently foimd a large collection of hitherto unknown documents relating to the Council of Trent. The seal of Oliver Cromwell, now in the possession of a prominent family in Wales, is a plain, gold-mounted corundum stone five-eighths of an inch in diameter. It dates from 1653, and was used on several of, his deeds. All the Lord's Prayer is engraved on it. Death has been particularly active in the "ranks of famous Frenchmen. The Parisian press points out that the French Academy has lost one-fourth of its membership in the last two years. Dr. Louis Wickham, the chief of the Radium Institute of Paris, lecturing to the Royal Society of Medicine, Hano-ver-square, said that the idea of curing disease by means of radium was due in a large measure to the interest shown and the support given by England's great King. There are five American States where capital punishment does not exist — Maine, Michigan, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, and Kansas. In the last-named State the death .penalty may be inflicted upon a warrant of the Governor, but such a warrant never is bigned. The trip can now be made by rail, with the exception of a small gap over the summit of the Andes, from Buenos Aires to Valparaiso, Chile, in fortyeight hours, and one can travel in a Pullman car from the borders of Bolivia, on tho north, to the borders of Patagonia, or the south. Governor Jared tf'oung Sanders, of Louisiana, was a printer at eighteen, an editor at twenty-one, a lawyer at twen-ty-six, and after twelve years' service in the State Legislature, became lieu-tenant-governor. Last year he was advanced to the highest place among the officials of his Slate. "I think ballooning is the safest way of travelling in the world," said Mr. Percival Spencer, one of the balloon manufacturing firm, at West London County Coiut, and he added, amid laughter, that motor-omnibuses were much more dangerous than balloons. Mr. F. A. Heinze, the American "Copper King," who was involved in the financial panic of 1907, has been arraigned at New ifork on a new indictment charging him with the misappropriation of £450,000 belonging to the Mercantile Nationa' Bank, of which he was president. Slot machines for vending accident insurance policies have been erected in many American cafes and hotels. The purchaser places a ten-cent piece (about sd) in the slot, pulls a lever, and out comes a card with a counterfoil attached. On this counterfoil, which is already stamped, the insured writes his name and address, and after posting it he has the benefit; of insurance for a week dating from the time * tamped thereon by the sending post-office. He letains the card' on which his contract is printed. These policies insure against most perils of the city, provide indemnity for various injuries, and £200 in. the event 2f -death,.

In his preface to the new edition of his "Rome," Professor G. Ferrero declares that in many matters the United States is nearer than Europe to Ancient Rome. Hence, the success of his book in America. Is this intended as a compliment to modern America ? The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught (says Lord Avebury), as that every child should be given the wish to learn. What does it matter if the pupil knows a little more or a little less ? A boy who leaves school knowing much, but hating his lessons, will soon have forgotten almost all he ever learnt ; while another who had acquired a thirst for knowledge, even if he had learnt little, would soon teach himself more than the first ever knew. It is now just sixty years since the khaki uniform was first introduced in the British / Army, being worn by the Punjab Frontier Force in 1849. The Mutiny spread 'its use, and it became general in India during the Afghan War. Though still further employed in the Soudan campaign, it was not until the South African War that khaki became a familiar word to the majority of Englishmen. The new Sultan of Turkey wore khaki on his first public appearance. The use of rat skins in various industries has created a demand in London alone to the amount of nearly £40,000 a year. They are used, among other things, for bookbinding, photograph frames, purses, and for thumbs in gloves. A new branch of work is likely to increase the consumption largely, and as much as 3s 3d to 3s 9d a day was earned by the unemployed in Denmark last year, when the Rat Act was passed. The damage done by rats in England alone is estimated to amount to many millions sterling per annum, and their capture already occupies a large number of persons. On nis present visit to New Zealand Mr. Wragge told his audience at Dunedin, he had been very much struck with a certain feature of colonial architecture. The peculiarity was "spikes." Every house had one — sometimes half a dozen — usually with a little ball on the top. These were specially noticeable in the North Island. Mr. Wragge then said this was a relic of the old sun-worship of the Lemurians, the race of people which once occupied a great continent, of which New Zealand and other islands are the remnants. These people worshipped the sun, and the ball on the spike was the continuation of the custom of worship. Our philosophers seem never at a. loss for a reason ! Dealing with the fact that the 21st June is no longer the shortest day, the writer of "Astronomical Notes" in the Lyttelton Times exjalains that the sun used to reach northern solstice on that date at the end of last century, but the year 1900 was not a leap year, and the omission of the usual extra day has made the present date of equinoxes and solstices one day later. Reckoning in New Zealand time, the shortest day is now 22nd June in leap-year and in the two successive years, and 23rd June in the third year after leap-year. The longest day is 22nd December in leap-year and in the following year, and 23rd December in the second and third years after leapyear. These dates are gradually becoming earlier, so in course of time the shortest and longest days will again bo the 21st of the months, but this will not be in our time. "He carried to Montreal nothing but a common school education and an alert brain, but to-day he is a millionaire newspaper owner and one of Canada's best citizens." That is how Sir Hugh Graham, the first Canadian journalist to be knighted, whose life story is a veritable romance, has been described. Sir Hugh commenced his career as an office boy on the Montreal Evening Telegraph, and in later years started the Daily Star. For some time the paper staggered under a huge load of debt. In fact, at one period Sir Hugh's credit was so low that he bought his coal by the bucketful, and paid for the paper day by day with the proceeds of the street sales of the evening before. And when a neighbour cut off the steam power Graham overcame the difficulty by using horse power. The Cape Mercury doubts whether the fact that truth isl stranger than fiction has often been displayed under more curious circumstances than in the finale to the case in which Forester Smart was robbed of £150 of private money some time ago. It appears that recently a party, while in search of the money in the forest on the borders of which the robbery took place, saw a snake dis appear into a hut. One of the men struck at the snake with a rake, but missed his object, the prongs of the implement entering the earth. When the rake was withdrawn they found the money under the earth that had been removed. Strange as the foregoing reads (remarks the Mercury) it is official information. A novel form of prison labour has been devised by the Pittsburg authorities since they have had under their charge a number of eminent banker convicts. There are at present in the Riverside Penitentiary (convict prison) a trio of notorious bank-wreckers — Henry ' Rieber, who misappropriated some £300,000 from the Farmers' Deposit National Bank ; "Billy" Montgomery, whose manipulation of the funds of the Allegheny National Bank of Pittsburg led to a long term of imprisonment ; and Rinehart, who caused the closing of the Farmers' and Drovers' National Bank at Waynesburg. These eminent financial experts, in the absence of the gaol warden, were instiucted by the inspectors to address themselves to the task of investigating the prison books. The result of their labours is now made known in the discovery of large deficits, which it is expected will result in the compulsory occupation by some of the gaolers of cells adjoining those of the banker convicts. Sir John Gorst, -who has taken a course exceedingly repellant to flesh and blood — the voluntary surrender of a pension of £1200 per annum (says the Daily Chronicle)— might have been a bishop in New Zealand to-day if the Government of that Dominion had not "sneaked" him away from Bishop Selwyn. Sir John was one of several young Cambridge graduates who went out to New Zealand to help in the evangelisation of the Maoris. Most of these catechists blossomed into bishops or archdeacons, but the Government annexed young Gorst and gave him command of the Waikato, the most disturbed district in the colony, where he had some exciting experiences with the rebel "Maoris. After forty years at the London Zoological Gardens, Mr. Arthur Thomson, the assistant superintendent, is retiring with quaint memories of some of the wild animals. "Sally, the chimpanzee, was the cleverest of all," said Mr. Thomson. "She understood every word the keepers said, and could count up to fivo with straws. My worst injury came from the bite on the leg by a llama while trying to get him out of his cage. I thought nothing of the wound until I collapsed in the cardens three weeks later, and went to bed for two months with bloodpoisoning. A \ippopotamus once threw me over a fence, which produced » severe nerve shaking."-