GENERAL NEWS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIII, Issue 1706, 22 December 1919, Page 10

GENERAL NEWS.

HUN WHO SHOT 17 CHILDREN.. Among those Huns who, in addition to tho ex-Kaiser, should be brought to.trial for their crimes during tho war there must not be forgotten those responsible for .the execution of 603 civilians in Dinant, fiaya tho Daily Mail, i They are General von Lisa, Colonel Meister, Majors Scldiok and Kielmans, and Captains Wilke and von Loben. I( . M i a i° r Scldiok ordered 17 children under to to be shot. '

WAGES THAT MADE FOOD DEAR. Charles John Young, 27, a mechanic, ofcarged with bigamy at the Old Bailoy. waa stated to have earned from £2O to £24 a week on munitions. The Recorder (Sir Forrest Fulton), in sentonoing■him, said: "You were demorah isect by the preposterous wages you wera paid as a munition worker. It did not do you any good. All the money waa squandered without being of any use to you'or your class, and with infinite damage to many of the community, for it was the payment of these preposterous wagos which led to the present exorbitant price of provisions. Had a reasonable wage been paid instead of thoso fancy wages there would not have been this enormous increase in the price of food.' 1

STRIKERS' COURT-MARTIAL. Stories of a strikers' court-martial which lias passed a resolution to tar and feather a supposed blackleg- wore told at Forth (South Wales), when four operative bakers, concerned in tho nxttrit cessation of work at Rhondda, were charged with violent intimidation. It was stated that at six o'clock in tho morning the prosecutor was marched to the top of Rhondda Mountain, where ho was strpped naked, and told that a resolution had been passed at a court-martial of tho strikers to tar and feather him. Prosecutor was compelled to walk two miles to his home clad only in his overcoat. For the defence it was urged that the alfair was only a huge joke as regards the tarring and feathering, and that prosecutor voluntarily stripped himself, no violence whatever having been used. Fines ranging from £6 to £lO wore imposed. ARCTIC MOSQUITOES. It must ■' seem odd to people who were not long since reading of tho Arctic- hardships of our men at Archangel and tho. Murman coast, that now their discontent arises from frightful heat, without a breath of air, and a plague of mosquitoes, says a London paper of micl-ifuly. That, however, is characteristic of tho fringe of tho Arctic regions. Tho short burst of summer produces a plenitude of animal and vegctablo life. Tho "breed of mosquitOß is_ said to be far moro virulent than the tropical sort. They have a brief life and a merry one. The only thing that can bo said in thoir _ favour is that they are not malaria carriers. TANKS 440 YEARS AGO. "Tanks were really invented 440 years bofore tho Battle of the Sommo by Leonardo da Vinci," said Mr C. J. Holmes, director of tho National Gallery, addressing the British Academy recently. "Leonardo claimed to make 'nnattackable covered chariots, which could break through any multitude of men,' so that infantry •fould follow," added tho speaker. _3 TRAGEDY OF DEAF MUTES, Recently a young woman named Daisy Kenwood (25) was seen rushing out of 29, Rosslyn Road, Tottenham, London, into the Back garden, with blood streaming from her head, on which were several severe gashes. When Police-constablo Donovan arrived lie found Mrs Kenwood (51) at tho back of tho house, also bleeding from several severe head wounds, anrl_ in the back garden was her daughter Daisy, lying unconscious, whilst in an upper room ho found a. man lying across a bed with it bloodstained hatchet and razor beside him. There was a doep gash in his throat. All were in a critical condition.

From, correspondence found on him tho man is believed to bo a relative of tlio Keuwoods. All throe aro doaf and dumb. Mr Kenwood, who is also deaf and dumb, was at business in the city at tho time. 'A MAGNANIMOUS HUSBAND. Four days' imprisonment was tho sentence passed at Guildford Assizes on Rosina Reed, 23, an ex-munition worker, who was charged, with bigamously marrying at Kingston James R. H. Murray, of Richmond. Murray, a married man, was charged with aiding and abetting and with making a false declaration. The two worked together at tho Delta Metal Works and used to go out together. Murray's defence was that she did not tell him she was married, but tho woman's mother said that she informed him that her daughter hud a husband in France. Murray, who has a wifo in Capetown, was sentenced to a month's imprisonment for making a falso declaration to the registrar ; he was found not guilty of aiding and abetting. On the woman's husband offering to take her back she was sentenced to four days' imprisonment. A GOVERNMENT NEWSPAPER. It is not generally known (says a London newspaper) that in case tho recent railwaymen's dispute had developed into a general strike, arid the public had been unable to obtain its customary newspapers, arrangements had been made for tho production of a Government daily. It was to contain no editorial views whatever, but simply ft record of what was happening at home and abroad. The editor hud been appointed. His name, is a household word on belli sides of the Chorine) and tho Atlantic, and ho was prepared, if the emergency had arisen (which happily it did not), with his characteristic enthusiasm to take up his duties. Five million copies would lmvo been circulated by a squad;on of 150 aeroplanes. The Government's idea was that the dangers of a general strike would be enormously enhanced if the gen. ral public did not know what was going on.

SIX-FOOT TRUANT GIRL. 'A schoolgirl. 6ft. in height, appeared at Tottenham Court when her mother was summoned because of the girl's absence from school. "Why don't you go to school?" she was asked. the other girls call me 'Long 'un,' and I don't like it," she replied. Tho .Magistrate: You have boon summoned four times already. Tho girl tried, and said, "I can't boar them to call mo 'long 'un.' '' Fined 15s. EVER EATEN DAHLIAS. The Dahlia. Show of tho Royal Horticultural Society, held tho other day, owes its origin indirectly to a Swede'.named Dahl, who, while travelling in Mexico about 130 years ago, partook of a dish of tubers, which ho pronounced to bo superior .to potatoes (says Lloyd's News). Dahl brought a number over to Europe and planted them, but the tubers failed to catch on as an articlo.of diet—at least, generally— though thero are still eaten'by the peasantry in some parts of France. Many of our soldiers sampled them over thero during the war, but the general verdict was that they tasted too bitter; although, roasted in wood ashes, and plentifully salted and_ peppered, they served as a passable substitute in an emergency for tho genuine " baked tator."-