NEWS AT A GLANCE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 18 February 1907, Page 1

NEWS AT A GLANCE.

We havo 90 British-colonial bishcp: Applause is strictly forbidden in Ru; sian theatres. Billingsgate in Saxon times was th Port of London. Birmingham's Grammar School wa founded in 1552. Six per cent of all houses in Eng-lanc uninhabited. Old London Bridge, begun in 1176 took 33 years to build. The machinery of a 10,000 ton bat tleship weighs 1400 tons. Good beetroot yields on an averagi 12 per cent of sugar. The total value of British roads i: estimated at £1,235,000. Tripoli now produces £200,000 wortl of ostrich feathers yearly. At Hanau, in 1891, a record tuningfork was made, weighing 721 b. Each link of the cables of the new Cunarders weighs 1501 b. Only six pc rcent. of all paper produced is used for making books. London's gas consumption is over 6000 feet yearly per inhabitant. Out of 80 ordinary men 55 wear hats smaller than 7's and 25 larger. The average size of steam yachts is 120 tons, of sailing yachts 18 tons. The same force that moves a ton on the road will pull a 32-ton canal boat. The Falmar Petrel and the parrot can live longest of any birds without water. The average weight of a goods train is three times that of a passenger train. ........ w.w uonuiidl 1/BUI (iMIgIUUU) - was converted in 1889 £7,850,000 re- - mained unclaimed. i j Fossil coral found at Suva, Fiji, is ■ the stone which best resists the action i of fire. Quicksilver mining has a worse effect upon the teeth than any other occupation. r (Railways use one ton of coal in every nine raised, and gasworks very nearly as much. The late Sir Richard Burton could ' converse freely in 35 different lar- ' guages and dialects. So lately as 1902 Lieut. Boyd Alej ander discovered 32 new species o birds in Fernando Po. The greatest number of differen stamps belonging to any country ar issued by the United States. If a lion had powers of jumping pre portionate to a flea it could easil spring one-third of a mile. The average first-clas ticket price ii England is 14Jd for 10 miles; in Rus sia it is B£d for 10 miles. It is estimated that £8,500,000 year ly change hands in bets on horse-racei in tho United Kingdom. An African bird, the "pine pine,' builds a spur on the outside of its nest, where it sits and keeps guard. It is reckoned that the world loses yearly by wear and, tear two tons of coined gold and 100 tons of silvor. A Sunday School class nt Carnarvon contains a member of Parliament, a member of the county council, a town councillor, and a guardian. Carrying mails for Bombay, the ex-treasure-hunting ship Xema sailed from Capetown at the end of November, and will call at Mauritius for cargo. Turkish women do not come into control of their private fortune until after marriage. They can dispose of onethird of it without the husband's consent. It is said that tho biggest sum ever paid for the autograph of a living celebrity was seven guineas, which was the amount realised by a letter of Tennyson's in 1876. The Chinese voice lacks two notes its scale has six notes instead of eight. The fourth and seventh notes are the missing ones. The death is announced of Mr Alexander Vidal, senator for Ontario, and for years president of the Dominion Temperance Alliance. Of the British population, the working classes form 69 per cent., the middle classes 28 per cent, —and the upper classes 3 per cent. I In England and Wales about one In four of the population has an account in the Post Ollice Savings Bank, in Ireland ono in 10, and in Scotlcnd one in 11. A mountain of salt is one of the national curiosities of San Domingo. The nountain is about five miles square at ;he base, and is estimated to contain ibout 90,000,000 tons of salt. Salmon hide is found not only serviceable for boots, but among the Esquimaux it has been used for generaions in making waterproof clothes. : The people of the very far north also , lse codfish skins for jackets, j M. Poincare, late French Minister of , r inance, declared to an interviewer that he floating debt amounted to forty:ight million sterling at the end of the ast year, and. that the Government annot carry out its legislative pro;rame owing to want of money. I