NEWS AND OPINIONS

Evening Star, Issue 22364, 13 June 1936, Page 2

NEWS AND OPINIONS

ZUYDER ZEE RECLAMATION The work on the Zuyder Zee reclamation scheme is soon to begin again, writes The Hague correspondent of tlie London ‘ Observer.’ The Senate has now approved a credit of 2,020,000 guilders as a first instalment touards the cost of reclaiming the North-eastern area. The total cost is estimated at 127.000,000 guilders. As is well known, the Zuyder Zee scheme is for the drainage of four areas, called “ polders.” One of them, the North-western polder, the co-called Wieringcrmeerpokler. was completed some years ago. and is now fertile and arable land, provided with villages, roads, canals, and provisions for gas, electricity, and water. The continuation of the project was retarded for financial reasons, but recently it was considered desirable-yone of the motives being the combating of unemployment—to continue the works, in spite of the fact that the financial position of the country has not improved. The dyking-in and the drainage of the North-eastern polder will take about five years to complete, and another 10 years will be required for the full completion of this polder.

A PRECIOUS PSALTER The Earl of Dalhousie has made a very great discovery _ in one of his Scottisa fastnesses, writes Mr A. C. R. Carter, in the London ‘ Daily Telegraph.’ He has found that he owns a glorious illuminated Psalterium, which the authorities declare to be the devoted work of those English scribes and illuminators who worshipped with blue, with purple, and with gold in the early thirteenth century. Although not so wonderful as the famous East Anglican Luttrell Psalter, executed a century later and bought for the nation in 1929 for 30,000g5, it is hailed as a very rare and beautiful example of gifted native art associated with the ancient Abbey of Evesham. It was to be offered at Sotheby’s on May 19. Just as the Marquess of Linlithgow’s father, the Earl of Hopetoun, did not know how a copy of the Gutenberg Bible had been hidden away in an old medicine clipboard at Queensberry, Lord Dalliousio is not precisely aware how his ancestor, the ninth carl, became possessed of this Evesham Psalter. This peer’s bookplate is inside the cover, but there is no family record of the acquisition. WOLVES IN NORWAY Wolves have reappeared in the south of Norway, says the Oslo correspondent of the London ‘ Observer.’ A little while ago skiers reported that they bad seen a number of greyish animals like small Alsatians—and now six ordinary grey wolves have been hunted down and shot by farm boys in the valley of Valdres, not 100 miles from Oslo, and right in the centre of the country. Wolves have not appeared in the south of Norway for a great many years. Up to about 1860 they were common enough, but the steadily increasing population, together with advancing communications, quickly made them very rare. This year wolves have been seen in many places, usually not far from where the reindeer are living. The enormous quantities of snow this winter ■ —the whole country was covered to the depth of 10ft to 12ft—have made their advance easier. As a general rule wolves are considered non-existent outside the province of Einnmark in the far north. OFFICERS' ROYAL SALUTE For the King’s birthday parade there will, I understand, be a striking innovation in the officers’ ceremonial salute, writes “ Peterborough,” in the London ‘ Daily Telegraph.’ Hitherto in the salute at the halt the sword point has been lowered to within a few inches of the ground “and directed to the front, edge to the left, right arm straight, band just behind the thigh, thumb flat on the handle of the sword.” On tho march the same lowering, with the sword directed to the front, takes place at one stage of the salute. In the new salute the sword is now “ turned outward at an angle of 45deg to the body.” This is already being practised by Guards’ officers who will take part in the Trooping the Colour ceremony. The new movement, which nail, I gather, apply equally to salutes at the halt and on the march, will almost exactly resemble that used in the French army. Over any length of time it will be considerably more tiring than the old motion. BOMB IN BASKET OF EGGS An attempt was made recently to murder Don Eduardo Ortega Gasset, a prominent lawyer who had acted for the prosecution in connection with the shooting in Asturias of. Luis do Servai, a journalist, by an officer of the Spanish Legion. A basket of eggs with a chicken tied on top, purporting to be a present from a friend, was handed m at his flat. In the basket was a bomb which exploded, doing much damage to the flat, but failing to harm Benor Ortega Gasset and his family. An Englishman, Mr Rosset, who was working in an office below, was covered with plaster and bricks, but also escaped serious injury.—‘ The Times.’