GENERAL HEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVII, Issue 8360, 13 September 1890, Page 2 (Supplement)

GENERAL HEWS.

A GIRL KILLED BY A LEOPARD.

At the Palace of Bangkok the other day a performing leopard was brought in o |> the amusement of one of the young Sia,« mese Princes. In one Prince's retinue was. a young girl of about fourteen years of agei The leopard jumped on her breast. It was merely in play, said the animal's caretaker} who begged her not to be frightened ; but in another moment the leopard had seized the. girl by the throat, and she died in sight of the horrified spectators, who fled in panic.*' HEREDITARY TUFTS OF WHITE HAIR. i Everyone who knows Mr. Whistler knows Mr. Whistler's white tuft, which inasmuch part of the man as his butterfly is part of his writings. " Attention may be drawn," says the British Medical Journal, "to a remarkable example of similar peculiarity which was published last year by Mr. E. Pascal in the Uoivers Illustre. In an old Limousin family with which that gentleman is acquainted nearly all the members, both male and female, have from their earliest youth a tuft of perfectly white hair, such us adorns the hea. 1 of a well known Loudon artist. This tult is generally situated ovey the brow, but sometimes it is on the temple, and more rarely at the back of the head. The family has been famous for this distinctive mark in its own part of the coun. try for 300 years, and they are said to be a* proud of it as Redgauntlcb was of the hereditary horseshoe vein on his forehead. The white lock, which can be seen in the family portraits for many generations back, is said to be rather becoming, even to the young women of the line."

THE PROFESSOR AND THE QUEEN". Shortly after the death of the Prince Cansort, Professor Sedgwick went to Windsor Castle and had a long and most touching interview with the Queen. " I came away,' lie says, " deeply impressed by the solemnity, I ought to say sanctity, of her sorrow ; by her beautiful self-possession ; by her large views of her duties ; by the great expansion of her love and goodwill to her fellow-creatures and subjects ; and by the firmness of her faith. She said that she wished to see me again, before I left the castle, but she was that morning ill and out of spirits—so General Grey told me. She told the Princess Alice to meet me, and she wished me to see her two youngest boys. You will believe me when I say that I was very deeply touched and moved by the interview." On Sedgwick's first appearance in Cambridge after this interview a lady said to him, " You have been to Court, Professor, since I saw you last?" "No, madame," he replied, "I have not been to Court; 1 have been to see a Christian woman in her affliction."

THE LATEST PRICE FOR WILKIIi'S PICTURES.

Wilkie'a pictures, like the Kilmarnock edition of Burns, go steadily up in price. The latest proof of this was furnished the other day at a sale at which his " Distraining for Rent" brought £2310. For this picture the artist got GOO guineas in 1815 from the directors of the British Institute, who in 1822 re-sold it for the same sum to Abraham Raimbach, who engraved it. As the sale of Mr. Wails in 1848 it fetched £10.30. "The Jew's Harp," another of Sir David's pictures, was sold the other day for £440 ; the painter got 25 guineas for it from Mr. F. Annesley. At the same sale the sketch - for " The Village Festival," which at one time belonged to Lord Mulgrave, brought £1890 ; at Lord Mulgrave'.-; sale iu 1832 it went for £121 Kis.

MAN'S I'KOJ'KK A child in tbe fourth jar should be three feet high, and weigh more than 28 pouuds ; in the sixth year, three and a half feet high, and weigh 42 pounds ; in the eighth year, four feet nigh and 51} pounds in weight'; at 12 years old, live feet in height and 70 pounds in weight is a fair average. At the term af adolescence 28 pounds should be added for three or four inches of height; 112 pounds for five feet six inches; 120 pounds for five feet eight; 140 pounds for rive feet ten ; 154 pounds for live feet eleven, and IGS pounds for six feet of height is good weight. Growth is very irregular in children and young people generally ; perhaps two inches may be gained in two months, and for the next ten months not another inch, even up to the age of ten or twelve years. While growth is thus rapid fatigue is readily reduced ; during the pause weight is gained, and work or training can go on again.

SKA CAPTAINS' WAGES. Tho sea-going captains of the Tj'ne, Wear, and Tees, having passed a resolution for an advance of wages so far as the Tyne is concerned, the increase is being generally conceded, several large linns on the Tyneside having agreed thereto without a demur. The same may be said in regard to some Wear steamers. Some screw steamers which have been laid up in th< Tyne through low freights have been go under way.

.MATRIMONIAL EXCHANGES IN" THE I'OTTERIES.

At Stoke-on-Trent, the stipendiary court was occupied with a charge against Martha Goldstraw, a married woman, of assaulting a child named Keeling, and the facts disclosed were of a startling character. It was alleged that last September two colliers named Goldstraw and Keeling exchanged wives. Mrs. Goldstraw had sinct been living under Keeling's protection, whilst Mrs. Keeling stayed with Goldstraw. Keeling's live children remained with him for a time, but the four elder ones eventually left. The present case was brought against Mrs. Goldstraw by Miss Keeling for giving the youngest, aged 18 months, a black eye. The defendant was sentenced to a month's hard labour. HELPING HIS EXECUTIONER. An event that aroused some interest in Orangeburg, Columbia, was the execution of Armisted Jones, a negro boy fiend who brutally murdered his stepmother. The execution took place within the prison walls, and, in accordance with the law in that State, was private. Jones rose at six and ate a hearty breakfast. At eleven o'clock he was led to the scaffold by tho sheriffs deputies, accompanied by his spiritual adviser. After his arms and legs hail been pinioned he made a brief address, in which he expressed sorrow for his crime, and reiterated his previous declaration that ho was bewitched when he killed his stepmother. Throughout the entire proceedings the prisoner manifested a coolness that was surprising. Clasping the straps that) bound his limbs he deliberately assisted the sheriff in adjusting his own noose. "I trust in God" were the last words uttered by Jones, and as he repeated them the trap was sprung. GAMBLING. The conscience of the Christian Churches of England is getting awakened, though very slowly, to the true nature of gambling. It is very strange to some of us that there should be such a difficulty in recognising the immorality of the practice. It is a nerious reflection on the moral insight of English Christianity that it is not yet able definite" -nake up its mind that gambling is a sin. iLjwever, the tree is becc.min; r known by its fruits. In the dear school of experience our churches are being taught the deadly nature of this too long tolerated vice. They are beginning to-day to say that something must be done. Two important meetings have recently been held that will help to give cohesion and definiteness to the general consciousness that the present state of affairs is gravely wroii"-, and that the Christian Churches must set to work promptly and earnestly to mend matters. In one case tho Vicar of Leeds called together the Christian ministers of that town to confer on the question, "and to consider what action should be taken to diminish, and, if possible, put an end to betting and gambling. And the other meeting to which I refer was, of course, tho Demonstration of the National Anti-Gam-bling League in St. James' Hall.—Medio dist Times.

BRIDGES. The first bridges ever constructed were of wood, and the earliest of which we have any account were built in Rome about 500 B.C. Tht bridge of Xerxes across the Hellespont was built of boats. Trajan's great bridge across the Danube, */00 feet long, was made of timber, with stone piers. The Romans also built the first stone bridge which crossed the Tiber. Suspension bridges arc of remote origin. A Chinese specimen, mentioned in ancient chronicles, was made of chains, supporting a roadway 830 feet in length. It was built A. D. 65, and is still to be seen.. China has the longest stone bridges in the world, but India has the longest wooden one—over five miles. Tho first large iron bridge was erected over the Severn in 1877. There is a trestle bridge across Lake Ponchartrain in Louisiana which is by fair the longest in the world.