BREVITIES.

Evening Star, Issue 13090, 24 October 1908, Page 12

BREVITIES.

' J outrage occurred' on October $ 1904, , _TBe-KCW kut providing a reading test in English for Chinese arriving in the Dominion came into force yesterday. ( The Salvation Army self-denial appeal in Auckland realised over £I,OOO. A Christchurch message states that a ahief named Robert lies, while playing on the bank of the river Styx, led into the water and was drowned. Battle of Balaclava, October 25, 1854. i’wo thousand people are employed in the-trade of France A German inventor has patented a new shirt front' made of’ enamelled tin plate. In England and Wales law and order is maintained by a police force of 45,202 men. Gropes are’ still trodden with the bare feet in many of the vineyards of Spain and Italy. There is not an illiterate person in Iceland, although the population is nearly 80,000. The professor °f chemistry and physics at the University of Berne is a woman only twenty years old. The battle of Agincourt took place October 25, 1415. Bellows were in use over 2,500 years ago. In Paris the first poet office was opened m 1492. The bagpipe was invented in Greece 200 * years b.c. Parchment used on tho best banjos is made from wolfskin. About on© in twenty of London’s inhabitants live on charity. The strength of tho European Cossack armies is 160.000 men. Tim steam printing press was invented by Richard Hoe in 1842. Sooth African Republic annexed October 25, 1900. At Leeds (England) the other day William Lajidles, who at one time was an architect in comfortable circumstances, and a man of unusually brilliant pa its, was found dead and half-naked at the bottom of a flight of steps attached to a boardinghouse. Drink was responsible for a clever man’s downfall and untimely death. In the end he became a street loafer. Oh the pity of it! The Castle liner on which President Roosevelt will travel from Moilthaunpton to South Africa will be fitted with a special shooting gallery on deck, so that the exPrrsident may practise- his favorite sport. The future of the Crystal Palace (London) is now assured. An agreement between tho present .authorities and a wealthy syndicate of influential business men in the City has practically taken the palace and grounds over. Under the agreement entered into the Palace is to become a permanent exhibition and Demonstration Bureau of inventions, in which the general public, the nannfacturer, and the inventor tv ill work for mutual benefit. There is trouble brewing between the Soutldand Centre and the Executive of tho Athletic Association. If tho latter do not alow the elections to proceed an appeal will bo made to tho Australian Union, and if that be unsucessfnl Southland will favor secession. Tiie Southland Centro of tho Athletic Association protest emphatically against the ruling of the president (Mr w. G. A tack) that candidates arc not eligible because- thsv arc not Christchurch residents. They also favor the removal of the headquarters' from Christchurch to Wellington .