RANDOM READINGS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XX, Issue 2102, 14 April 1925, Page 6

RANDOM READINGS.

THE ORIGIN OF WOOLWICH ARSENAL.

We owe our present arsenal at Woolwich to the occurrence of an accident. The Government had a gun foundry ic Moorfields, where, upon one occasion at the end of September, 1716, a distinguished party were gathered together to witness the operation of casting a large cannon. A young foreigner, named Schlach, who seems to have been an almost entire stranger, but who was well acquainted with the details of casting, noticed that one of the moulds had bean insufficiently dried, and warned the moulders against using it. They disregarded his advice, and when ho saw he could not prevail upon them to desist, bo immediately put himself out of harm’s wav before th« metal was v>ou v ed.

A terrible explosion occurred when the molten metal rushed into the wet mould, owing to the sudden generation cf : team that could find no outlet, and several persons were killed and a large number injured. Search was made for the man whose predictions had been so painfully verified, and the Government employed him to advise about tbe best mode of preventing such accidents in the future. The result was that Moorfields was given up as a site of a gun foundry altogether, and upon Schlach’s advice the establishment was removed to the Warren at Woolwich.

A MAN WHO CANNOT FORGET. A man lias been unearthed in Toronto whose memory is of the most remarkable sort. This man, whose name is McNair, is able offhand to tell you *lig sort of weather there was on any particular day for the past twenty years or so. The process, so far as has been ascertained by the scientists who have examined the man, is that he makes a mental picture of the weather, fair or stormy, cold or warm, as it may happen, and tacking to it the day of the week and the month, stores it away in liis brain. On being applied to, we will say, as to the weather on August 30tli, 1899, McNair immediately unfolds his little package of information which lie has stored away somewhere in his head, and answers correctly, according to the data compiled at the Observatory, adding to it tbe information that the 30th fell on Friday, or whatever day it happened to be. That these tests are genuine and the answers correct almost without exception is vouched for by University professors and others who have examined the man. However, the strangest part of the whole thing is that while this man can without the least effort recall weather conditions for every day bad as far as 1890, lie is running an office lift for a living, whereas men who possibly could not fell you what the weather was like the day before yester day are running the affairs of tbe world

RUSSIA’S COSSACKS. More controversy has probably arisen in regard to the origin of the name Cossack than in connection with any other word in the world’s languages. The name of Russia’s famous soldiers has been variously derived from words meaning, in distinct languages, an armed man, a sabre, a lover, a goat, a promontory, a mat. a cassock, and a district in Circassia. By some people Cossacks are held up to be Tartars, and are regarded as such in more than one sense by their enemies. But they usually claim to be pure Russian stock, and point proudly to the fact that they fought for Russia as far back as the tenth century, and were known as a powerful military confederacy for hundreds of years later. v There are really two main types of Cossacks—one known as the Little Russians and the other as the Don Cossacks, the latter being the better and more enlightened type. Both the Little Russians and the Don Cossacks, however, who together number about 1,600,000 men, are born soldiers and splendid lighters. A certain number follow agricultural pursuits, while in some of the isolated Cossack villages oip the outposts of Russia, Central Asia, and Caucasus they gain a livelihood by fishing. Everything, however, is sacrificed by the Cossack in order to be skilled swordsmen and horsemen. They are capable of doing anything in the saddle. Cowboys, broncho, or circus riders are not in it with these amazing riders, and in peace times they amuse themselves by such feats as leaping ft,/in the saddles while the horses arc going at full gallop, and then remounting, springing from one horse to another, riding double, snatching a man from the ground supposed to be wounded, and picking up coins as they hang downwards from Hie saddle •while the horse is travelling at full speed.

The Cossacks, by reason of their military prowess, have for centuries past lived on land granted them by the Russian Government as part payment for the military service required of them. They are liable for military service for life from the age of nineteen. They provide their own horses and equipment, and for the'first two years are trained at their homes. Then they enter what is known as the “first category” regiment of their district, in which they remain for four years. These regiments are permanently embodied and may be employed in any part of the Empire. The men then dpass to the “second category” regiment lor another four years, and to the third for a similiar period. Finally there it a period of five years in the reserves, which fills casualties in time of warj hut every Cossack, up to any car he celled out at a time of 6mergencg M» assist in the national dsfenoa.