NEWS & NOTES.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLI, Issue 51, 13 March 1906, Page 1

NEWS & NOTES.

I To many of the women of this uervous generation (says an English ■ paper) tea ts a curse, and to doub'e the number of men it is a beverage only seldom to be enjoyed. The latest substitute that smirt London has found for the beverage that 'is poison to the dyspeptic is apple .tea. It is made with shredded applr, which must be steeped for several hours before it is wanted as a beve'r- 1 age. The water in which the shreds haye been soaked and the shreds themselves are then boiled for five minutes, after which the tea requires straining. In flavour apple tea is very much like ordinary tea, especially Ceylon, and like tea it may have added to it sugar and milk accor- ' ding to taste. Although the Russian modern j woman has attained a specific destination of her own, notably in literature, medicine, and various branches of pedagogy, she sti 1 remains, in Che truest sense of the word, an exemp--1 ry mother and the genius of ti e homo. Unlike her American sister, f "-.e has, with happily few exceptions, j known how to preserve her domesticity. In the upper and in the commercial classes she not infrequently ' helps to administer the esta es, or as widow manages the business of htr deceased husband, and her voice is decisive as to the children's education, in which she constantly takes a pat t herself. Am'oug the peasan • try, women, as head of a household, j lanes her place as an elective _>t_>! I ber of the villngo mir or home rule ' commune, and she remains up to {ii) day an adept in baking, preseiv rig, Bpin_ing, weaving, ani sewing. After the motor car comcß tho motor boor. M. Constantini has i_iented a pair, and has careered ' on or in them through the streets cf Paris at the rate of 25 miles an hour. j The invention consists of tiny motor- ! cars fitted to Wellington boots, 15in | long. Each boot has four wheels. , ' Power i 3 derived from l|-h.p, motors, and accumulators are carried in a . belt connected by wires with the : motors. Tha cist of a pair of motor '■ bo .ts is about £20. It is said that ' they are capable of a speed of 85 ; miles an hoar. 1 Pr Scafer, the Geman aimy sur- ; geon, sent to the Far East to ttud> ' the war from a professional point if ' j view, reports tbat the bullet wound* > were of a flight character. The most astonishing fmtuie was the slight effect produ^td by bullets which ' traversed the bodies of the soldieis ' in ail directions. In very large norn ' bers of cases bullets, which fiom the : anatomical position oi the canals, they hart produced, must havt ! touched the vital organs not only ' were not fatal, but seemed to have ' caused no more disturbance than if ' the tissues hid been pierced by a ! i needle. '

The Japanese hospital repo ts (writes a Yokohama correspondent) recall to mind the fact, already ;cc_"mented on by Sir Fredrick Treves and Dr Saleeby, that the percentage !of deaths from wounds in cases treated by Japanese sugeons "during the recent war was only, a srr.a 1 j fraction of any previous record— lyoj per cent, having been the/per centage of the recoveries.' DrvSal- ' eeby observes that this' '.remarkable result was not obtained" solely in che operating theatre. ,'. '-'Does- -il c public know," he asks $how these amazing people prepared themselves for their naval engagements, how] the j sailors took an antiseptic; bath; and I donned freshly boiled and washed un-der-clothing, so that when, they were wounded their wounds were, as a rule, antiseptic from the first, just for all the world as if they had been made by a clean, if clumsy, modem surgeon. When these cases came up for observation they thus offered a problem entirely different, fronkthet. which the Russian surgeons had' to face. Does the public know thtt b__cic acid was served' round to every gunner, and that all. ■.gunners'" eyes were periodically examinee'^ and that no one was allowed to serve a gun whose eyes were not beyond critici m ? Dr Saleeby also , notes that, whereas in the South African war typhoid cost the British _>ore than Mauser bullets did, the Japanese operations, "conducted' dyer enormous areas and under great commissariat difficuitieF f . and with huge masses of men, were •frcefrom I anything like serious epidemics. T.iis was due, of course, to the extraordinary sanitary precautions adopted, and to tbe discipline which ensured strict obedience to* hygieriio rules." ' For some weeks (says a Melbourne despatch ) the depredations . of an unknown woman have caused inconvenience and anger among suburban residents. She worked what is called the "kinchin lay." Dozens ofchi'dren, while on errands for their parents, were accosted by the ymng woman, who professed to be a friend of their families, and eventually enticed them into handing her the money or parcels they carried. So many complaints were received that the police were in a ferment, and tbemendous efforts were put forth ta effect a capture of this sneakthief. For the sake of brevity, She was referred to by the officials' .as 'Ada." that being the name she invariably gave the childccn 'when talking to them. She was .arrested a-t South Melbourne and gave her name as Kate Bloomfield. About a dozen charges were entered against her at South Melbourne, and she was brought to Russell street for indentification. In a' number of cases the children, accompanied -by their parents, came from nearly every suburb. Ihe police station would not hold them all, and the^ crowd flowed out into the street. For | some time tram traffic had to be suspended. Witnout exception, the juvenile sufferers declared, ' on -seeing the prisoner, "That's her," and with indignation swelling up ih' their breasts they demanded' "Where's my muv ver's twopence ?'•' "You took my sausages," and so forth. One boy overcome by indignation and a sense of injury, shook his first in "Ada's" face, and howled,, "Nice hiding me father gave me',, 'cause you tuok his shirt.' Accused admitted a number of charges, which now total over forty.