NEWS AND NOTES.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 May 1931, Page 8

NEWS AND NOTES.

MR SNOWDEN. The recent illness of the Chancellor of the Exchequer gave his opponents as well as his friends an opportunity to pay warm tributes to his character, and the opportunity was very generally taken. The “Manchester Guardian” says that all parties have a remarkable confidence in him, not because of his policy, of course, but because of his mind and character. “Few men,” says the “Observer,” “have made a deeper impression in Parliament. His views are liked or hated. He cannot he ignored. There is no person we have had to fight harder, and >e\v we like better.” These notes are typical. Mr Snowden bits hard in debate, and sometimes bis speeches could be described as menacing, but lie is said to be personally of “the most engaging and even lovable, nature.”

SLUMP IN EMIGRATION. One of the efforts of the world-wide depression lias been a serious slump in emigration from European countries, In 1928 British subjects emigrating froip Great Britain numbered 136,834, in they numbered 143,686, and last year only 92,152. The biggest decrease occurred in the numbers going to Canada, but Australia, which took 40,000 in 1927, only received 8500 last year. Curiously enough the migration to the United States was not greatly affected, but it is explained that the tull extent of the depression there was not realised until late in the year a»u. m any case the desire to go to the

States is so pronounced that toe demand for passages always exceeds tile quota admitted. The check to emigration is regarded as a serious matter m the Old Country, which has already far too large a surplus o. labour.

PIPE-MAKERS ANXIOUS. A statement, which has caused sonic doubt, was made a .civ weeks ago by uie pipe-makers ol tile dura, on toe SWISS IlOlltiei, LiIUL pipe-SllluKillg IS on the decline. iSot many years ago toe spectacle, of a man sinewing a pipe in the streets ol Pans immediately branded him as an Englishman, but since tlie war, F reiiebmeu are now seen smoking pipes 111 places where an English visitor hesitates m. producing one. One reason tor tiie pipe-makers’ alarm

may be attributed to the stupenJous ; increase- in cigarette indulgence, an 111j crease to which the new army ot wo- | men smokers lias greatly contributed, ilt is probably this comparative aspect lof the matter that the pipe-makers have in view. As a means of giving an impetus to their industry, they haw asked the French Minister of War and > Marine to authorise soldiers and sailors to smoke pipes in public. WEIGHING THE EARTH.

It has just been announced that scientists i» America have been weighing the earth and found it to be, in figures, (3 with twenty-one noughts after it, tons, or as. the boy at school would read it, six thousand trillion tons. While such a calculation attracts attention, the most interesting leature is that the weight now given is the same as that which was given by a great English scientist, Henry Cavendish, who died in 1810. It was in 1798 that he carried out his great experiment. With a torsion balance he calculated the attraction two balls of lead each weighing 350 pounds had on small lead halls of one and a half pounds, and then lie measured how much they would have been attracted had the balls been made of water instead of lead. A comparison of the attraction in the two experiments showed that the earth’s power of attraction was about five and a half times as great as that of water, in other words, that the earth was five and a half times as heavy as a similar hall of .water would be. The size of the earth being- known, the rest was merely calculation. After one hundred and thirty years his results still stand.