NEWS AND NOTES

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 143, 17 June 1916, Page 10

NEWS AND NOTES

Britain's contribution for the relief of Belgium and Northern France is about £500,000 monthly, said Sir Edward Grey, the Foreign Secretary, speaking in the House of Commons. He explained that this money was not paid directly, but was given by the Belgian Government from funds loaned to it: Sir Ed^vard was asked whether the American Government bad contributed anything to tho fund. He replied: "The United States Government has not, so far as I know, lent any money to the Belgian Government, and is not one of the Allies/

Politics had but little charm for exPresident Roosevelt in his salad, days. Charles G. Washburn, in his biography of Roosevelt, just published, includes the following letter to himself, written by Roosevelt in 1881 : "Too true, too true, I have become a ' political hack.' Finding that it would not interfere much .with my law, I accepted the nomination to the • Assembly, ■_ and. was ' elected by 1500 majority, leading tie ticket by 800 votes.. But don't think I am going to go into politics after this year, for I am not." ■

It was stated at a meeting of the Belgravia War Hospital Supply Depot that over 100 of the most competent carpenters in London promised to work an hour a day for the carpentering section, but. their trade union issued an instruc-tion-that they were not voluntarily to undertake the work of making crutches. The men bitterly resei.i-.ii ('u=, jjufc they could not afford to lose t'i.; benefits'of their society. Two Labour .members had been approached, and had expressed themselves strongly on the matter, bnt they had not been able to get the veto removed: ' ■

The City of London Local Tribunal grhnted six weeks' postponement to serve in the Army to a Jewish baker whose employer declared he was indispensable. Ho was the" only mau in the firm who knew the secret'ingredients used in the baking of-Jewish'bread.

The revival of ancient expedients of warfare progresses quietly. Certain doctors continue to demand that the new helmets should be supplemented by.small pieces of armour protecting the throat, cheeks, shoulders, and the region of the heart. To-day's rediscovery is the j)arachute. For some time.an improved form of the old umbrella parachute has becrr* under trial with most satisfactory results; as, for instance, when a Sauvage balloon near Verdun had its cable cut by an enemy!" : aeroplane j. !'and the '. '..observing officer;was able.; to', come down; safely into the French lines. Parachutes are now being supplied to all the French observation balloons, ' and, according to the Matin, they will also be supplied to aeroplanes along the front. .

Mr. Arthur Henderson, M.P., went to Glasgow to-secure the good-will of the workers in the scheme for adding to the British mercantile fleet. ■. The -Westminster Gazette: sees no need to assump that building for tho mercantile marine has been wholly neglected. It has not. A very considerable number of vessels were launched last year, but the output was below that in normal times, owing to the fact that all the available slips and workmen were being used for the Navy. ■ Side by. side. with diminished building we have had an enormous tonnage taken for national purposes, and very considerable losses by the attacks of cruisers and submarines. A big effort is to be made to finish mercantile ships in process of construction. This demands that the workers shall accept the same conditions as for other war \rrtrif.

Blindness entails so many handicaps that anything which tends to lighten the burden of the sufferers is a boon of untold value. Many people- so afflicted will be interested in the announcement that a riovel invention has just been patented to enable blind persons to learn to play *ny game of cards. Running the finger along the rim of the card immediately enables the player to discover the suit, indicated by crescents cut in the various corners, while the value is recognised by perforations, trje aces by being Brailled, and the court cards by transversal cuts.

Sir William Lever has accepted two bets offered by Mr. Kebty-Fletcher, as follows:—(1) £10 to Id that. 18 months after the war, ends the mark will fall another 20 per cent.. (2) £50 to Id that 18 months af.tear the Avar ends labour in Germany will not be worth more than 20 marks per week. Mr. Kebty-Fletcher proposes that his bete shall be decided by Lord Derby, as President of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce. Mr. KcHy-Flatcher- was Unionist member of Parliament for Altrincham from 1911----.1913.' ■'.-■-•

"This war is deplorable from many points of view, but to jne one of the things that produces the most humiliation is that it has set each a bad example to the native races all over the world," said the British Postmaster-General, Mr. J. Pease, at the annual meeting of the Anti-Slavery and Aborigines Protection Society. "I can-only trust," continued the Postmaster-General, "that the last epochrmakiug and historic speech which tho Prime Minister delivered may' at any rate tend to remove those misunderstandings, those misinterpretations and distortions, to which his previous utterances have given vent in Germany, and tha-t at any rate the Germans may realise that the objects for which we fight are those which we believe to be.,for the cause of freedom and justice.''

The statement that every available roan in ,tlie island of Lewis is serving either in the Army or Navy, or is caned up for service, recalls .a fact whicli Smiles introduced into one of his books, that " no less than a thousand men from the little storm-beaten island of Skye " stood in the ranks at Waterloo. Viewing the grievous depopulation of the Scottish isks owing to the crofter troubles, he asked ■^vhere should we find such': men, and in such numbers, if the call of war were again to come. The call Las come, and it is good to know that the spirit, if not tho numbers, of the descendants of those sturdy soldiers is as high as a century ago.

We leave Germany far behind in the arrangements that-are-being made for settling soldiers on the land, observes tho Daily Chronicle. Bismarck would have eyed with envy Sir Eider Haggard's success in this direction overseas; for, after the Franco-Prussian War, he expressed his regret that the German Government had not colonised with soldiers the outposts of their Empire, particularly sparsely populated East Prussia, which in peace time had to be worked with labour imported every year from Russia. ■Nor at the present juncture- does the Gen-nan Central Committee for ijaldiers' Homesteads seem to be markedly; successful.

Oculists are recommending eye-dri)l to strengthen the ipuecles of tired eyes in. certain cases. Holding a hatpin vcrtipally, the head level •with '..the nose, the patient fizes the eyes on the head and draws the pin in towards the face unti! -two pinheads are seen instead of one. Then the movement is l-epeated. Practising this eye-drill twenty tunes night and vnorning gradually increases ths eyemuscles gower of ooavcrgenca.