NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10019, 4 January 1896, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

JotmifJliilSM has now become- a University subject) in Germany. ' Mail bags can now bo taken on and delivered from trains running ab sixty miles an hour. In 1869 thoro wore in London only 800 miles of underground wires ; there are now 13,000 miles. There are at the present timo 7,000,000 total abstainers from all alcoholic drinks iu Great Britain. Butter made from tho oil extracted from cocoanuts is about to be- placed on the English market. A newspaper in Spain is printed on linen, and can bo made to servo as a pockethandkerchief or duster.

There are now twenty-five women lawyers in Chicago, and fifteen more will soon be admitted to the Bar. —

Many of the new bouses in process of con* struction in Paris include special offices for the housing of .bicycles. A chemist now declares that the milk ol cows fed on grains is, to sorao extent, of an intoxicating character. The Royal College of Physicians has made another effort to keep women cut ot the medical profession. A novelty in cigaretto cases is in the form of a bunch of keys suitable for hanging from a lady's waist, Each key contains a cigarette. A Russian professor has fallen a victim to the bacteria he succeeded in producing, his system having become thoroughly poisoned. An Armenian princess, now in Vienna, lls a duly-qualified lady doctor. On returning home she will build a private hospital [ on her father's estate.

A Toronto man has invented an oven through which, in the process of baking, fresh air is constantly circulating. Meats baked in it have a delicious flavour. Asbestos towels are among the curiosities of the day. VV ben dirty it is only necessary to throw thorn into a red hot-fire, and after a few minutes draw them out fresh and clean.

The Loddon Hall estate in Norfolk, which some years since sold for over £30,000, has just been withdrawn at an auction, the highest bid being £4400, or about £5 an

Dunlop pnoumatic carriage tires ara being fitted to carriago wheels in tha Midlands and London most) extensively, and give every proof of shortly becoming the universal tire, for carriages. A firm of New York merchants has givon an order for 100,000 bicycles to a Chicago manufacturer, who agrees to deliver them within the nexb ten months; that is 10,000 per month, or 333 a day. • Sea birds outnumber the land birds, because their food never fails, nob because they are more prolific. The fulmar-petrol lays but one egg, yet ib is believed to be the most numerous bird in the world.

The young ladies at a drapery estabLlls ment in London are reported to have formed themselves into an "Anti-Man Society." They profess to have nothing to do with tli9 male aox. They give a ball without inviting men,

A tablet made of Nile mud, recontly found in she British Museum, contains in cuneiform characters the marriago proposal of Pharaoh for the hand of the daughter of the King of Babylon. It was written about 3500 years «g°- . A toad was discovered ab Gateshead embedded in a bank of reck and clay at a depth of 9ft. After a few days the toad came to life and motion, and now hops about. Itj mouth seems to bo quite closed from wanb of use.

Beneath an old house in Briton's Court, off Fleet street, a portion of tho crypt of the ancient Whitefriara Monastery has been discovered. The monastery, rive cenburios ago, occupied the site of the proseub White-friars-etreeb.

The strike of the Paris omnibus drivers has elicited the curious fact that French judges and judicial officers are forbidden by the etiquette of tho profession to ride in an omnibus. They must take a cab or walk, if they do not own a carriage. f A cheque for £8,225,000 Is lOd, tho first instalment of the Chinese war indemnity to Japan, was duly signed at the Bank of lingland the other day. The money will remain in the bank until the Japanese Government) give instructions as to its disposal. Every Jp panose barracks has a gymnasium, and the Japanese soldiors rank high among the best gymnasts in the world. In half a minute they can scale a fourteenfoot wall by simply bounding on each other's shoulders, ono man supporting two or three others.

A well-dressed woman, who was scratching her husband's face in a London street, was arrested recently by a policeman against tho wish of the husband. Tho wife, who declared that ho was her husband and she had a right to do as she liked with him, was fined half-a-crown. ,

No fewer than 7,000,000 of bacterial organisms are declared to have been discovered recently in a halfpenny worth of ice-cream sold from a barrow in "the streets of London. The Legislature is being urged to place these disease breeding-grounds under the control of tho law.

The bi-tri-cycle, tho latosb novelty, resembles a safety, only the frond wbeol 13 duplicated. These two front wheels ara placed about Cin. apart on independent axles. The morits claimed for tho bi-fcri-cycle are immunity from slipping, increased safety, and moro speed with less fatigue. Among the many uses to which celluloid is now put is the making of jowollers' ringtrays. A ring-tray of white velvet huts ordinarily but a single season; carefully as ib may be handled, it is suro to get soilod. A celluloid tray can be easily cleaned, and it lasts for years; there are thousands of them in use.

In the United States and Canada last year there wore sold the enormous number of 1,207,895,000 copies of weekly newspapers, besides about 10,000,000 copies of triweeklies, semi-weeklies, and semi-monthlies'. These papers circulate almost wholly anions the rural population, for in the cities daily papers are chiefly read. One of the most famous log chutes in tho Wesb, ab La Grande, Oregon, is to be cub up for cordwood, all the timber immediately tributary to ib having been cnl away. The chute 13 one mile and a-half long from top to bottom, and during its period of use more than 8,400,000 feet of. logs havo coasted through ib down the muunbain side. A girl of 15, whose parents had refused to sanction her marriage to a youth bab little older than horsolf, the abhor day, in Paris, throw hjrseif from a fourth storey window to the ground. She fell in tho street almost ab tho feeb of her mother, who was leaving the house at the moment. The girl was taken to the hospital, where she died shortly afterwards. Tho Germans are advancing in Persia. Her Felix Moral has jusbTioen granted a 75 years' concession for the, construction oi a carriage road from Teheran to Baghdad and for the establishment of a transport! He has also obtained a 00 yeara' concession for a steam or electric tramway, about ton miles in length, from Teheran to the villages north of the city. The centre of the city of Birmingham is being' undermined by myriads of rats infestiug the sewers. The damage done ho property is incalculable, and tradesman complain of the havoc played with thalt stock. Two restaurateurs, who have filed their petitions, attribute their failure to tho invasion of rats. In one place no fewer than 350 rats were caught in one day: • A Londoner, on going into a hospital, on. .trusted his valuable artificial leg to his wife, . She, confided ib to a friend, Ho, in turn, disposed of it to a gentleman, who w?s arrested on suspicion while carrying too article home under his arm. At the police court the magistrate ordered the. wife to " take ber leg home." ; For. some time she refused, declaring that ib was nob her leg, bub her husband's. 'Ab ; length she indignantly dragged the limb out of courb. .. ;,,.:. .' : ' A terrible story comes from Wesb Africa. A' native chief in the ' Hinterland of Lagos was driven; with his wives, children, slaves, and; troops ' into his' royal! enclosure, \ and' there closely besieged. Rather than surrender he gathered his treasures ; ; together, gob all the gunpowder he could, and ha himself putting A torch to the powder, blow tha,' whole place to pioces, the chief and (hose, with him thus perishing in the sight of their;! enemies. Ib is said that nob even a. trace , human remains ' W»W afterwards bo. found- ' ■' :"!'. •