NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10479, 26 June 1897, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BR IEF.

Masy persons are leaving Johannesburg for Buluwayo. . The weight of the Eiffel ToweHa estimated at 7000 tons. , " A codfish reeentlywughboff Flauiborough Head had inside of it 59 fishhooks. The Archbishop of Canterbury is patron of 191 livings, the Prince of Wales of 21. Perfectly white cats are invariably deaf} they are auro to be if they have blue eyes. . Tho number of public lamps lighted in' England aud Wales is somewhere about) 300,000. Tiireo copies of the Bible written on leaves of the fan-palm are in the British Museum.

From 1537 to 1897 the population of London has increased from 1,700,000 to 5,000,000. A new yacht is to be built, probably all Carrtckfergus, to race for the Queen's Cup, and also for the American Cup. The London and North-Western Railway passes through more than half of tho 53 counties of England and Wales. The brewers of Great Britain use annually about) 70,000 tons of sugar in tho manufacture of beer and malt liquors. Messenger-boys in London add to their incomes by odd jobs, such as taking out blind men or animals for an airing. \ The depth of water has a considerable influence on the speed of steamers, which are found to move more slowly in shallow water. The raresb metal is didymium, and it< present markeb price is £900 per pound.' The nexb costliest metal is barium; iti value per pound is £52. A bicycle-maker saya there are 12,000,000 wheels in actual use in the world, and wen they to be placed in single filo they would reach right round the earth. It is seven and a-balf years since the German Emperor came to the throne, and in that time he has killed, according to tho official statistics, 25,372 head of game. A workman named Alfred Chinnery, employed ad the Leeds Steel Works, was crushed to death whilo in charge of a travelling crane which was caught by a similar machine. The railway metals between London and Edinburgh, a distance ot 400 miles, aro 200 yards longer in summer than they are in winter, owing to the expansion caused, by the extra heat.

There is a wild flower in Turkey whicbae the exact floral image of a humming-bfrd. The breast is green, the wings are a deep rose colour, the throat yellow, the head and beak almost black.

Greece's standing army consists of 16,280 infantry, 3120 cavalry, , 3542 artillery, 1080 ongineers and transportation men, 3400 officers and men, making a total of 28,470 troops in the. land forces. The smallest military expedition ever sent' out on a pacific errand is at present engaged in completing the survey of the River Gambia. It consists of a single soldieiya , corporal of the Koyal Engineers. If all the tobacco smoked in the British' Empire last year were rolled into rope an inch in diameter, it would form a anakelike roll which, following the line of the equator, would go 30 times round tho eartzb. Off Grand Riviere, in BresS harbour, a frigate 150 feet long, pierced by many cannon-balls, was recently found by dredgers. The vessel is believed to hare been sank by the British 300 years ago. ,' ] In Great Britain 2186 magazines are nab*' liehed, of which 537 are of a relifjrow character. There are 2396 newspapers printed, 318 of them being dailies. IFifty years were only 14 dailies pub-< liehed. ' . Damage to the extent of two and a-imlf millions of dollars was caused by a fire at Newport News, Virginia. Two piers and * large quantity of grain and stores were destroyed. Several ships were badly damaged* Persopal estate of the value of £380,015 haa been left by Mr. Daniel Nicolas da Nicols, of,.Bagent House, Surbiton, and the Cafe"' Royal, 68, Regerif&tfeet, restaurant proprietor end'lfe6hokJef''of the Empire Theatre. The first prosecution under the new byelaw designed to prohibit street-betting took placo at Yarmouth on May S, wien Robert Tubby, bookmaker's clerk,'w»g fined the maximum penalty of £5, with' the alternative of one month's imprisonment The Queen has signified her intention t<r confer the Victoria Cross upon Captain R. C. Nesbitt, of the llashonaland Mounted , Police, and Trooper H. S. Henderson, o( the Buluwayo Field Force, for gallant conduct during the operations in South Africa' last year. The parish church of Grove, on thai' borders of Bedfordshire and Buckingham.-; shire, is eaid to bo the smallesb and mosf curious church in England. The parish contains under twenty inhabitants, and th<t church will comfortably eeac a few more than that number.

Ad Irieh school-teacher, named Gilmour j met) with a terrible accidenb while cycling! near Ballymena, Hβ was found lying um conscious beside a broken bicycle on the public road with blood issuing from hiJ month and eara. The doctors state thai the injured man cannot recover, A London inventor has devised an inn mense lamp, which is composed of 300(1 pieces. It 18 aix feet high and measures three feet ten inches in diameter, It is f<4 with lard oil, and the conanmption is ver¥ email, its light being so powerful that may read by it at a distance of 600 feet. A recently-patented device for telephone* consists of attaching the receiving-cord t< the switch-lever in such a manner as t« throw the telephone oat of circuit when the receiver hangs suspended, and throw ib in circuit! and give a signal at the central office as soon as the receiver is raised foi , use.

Mr. Abraham Dee Bartletb, A.L.S., died on May 14, at his residence in the Zoologi. cal Gardens, Regent's Park, after a somih what protracted illness. The decease! who was born in 1812, bad held the responsible office of Superintendent of the Gardens of the Zoological Society of London since 1859.

Atthebeginning of this century 21,Q0OjOf)Q persona spoke English, 31,000,000 French 30,000,000 German, 31,000.000 Rnssian 26,000,000 Spanish, and 16,000,000 Italian' Now 125,000,000 persons talk EDglisD, 50,000,000 Freuch, 70,000,000 German 40,000,000 Spanish, 70,000,000 Russian, and 30,000,000 Italian. Recently Sir Henry IrvinsreadTennyaon'j "Becket". at the magnificently restored Chapter House of Canterbury Cathedral, for the benefit of the Thirteenth Centenary Fund. There was an exceptional interest in hearing Sir Henry Irving read Lorf Tennyson's work in the midst of the scene! in which the memorable death of the great Archbishop took place. - -

There are now in process of building onr Nary, 89 vessels; for the French, 33; for the Russian, 39; for tho German, 19, and for the Italian, 13; Of these vessels which are being built for Great) Britain, 48 are torpedo-boats, while of the ' other Powers, Italy is the only one that is building, any, and she only one. ~ The Queen's special trains from Cherbourg to Nice and back cost about£4ooo, and Her Majesty has also to pay for the specials from Boulogne to Nice and back, which convey the servants, horses, carriages, and heavy luggage. The average .total cosi to the privy purse of the Queen's annual Continental trip is about £10,000. '.• ", The four great) tunnels of the world are cited as an illustration of 'the'"marked diminution of the cost of engineering "works during the pasb quarter of a century. The Hoosac Tunnel, the oldest of the four, cost £100 a foob; the Mont Ce"nis, the next in date, £95 the St. Gothard, £73 and the Arlberg, the most recent, only £40. '•'■ '. . One of the curiosities at Chateworth ii a weeping willow made of copper, and so dexterously fashioned that) at a distance ib'resemblee a : real tree. Ibja' a shower-bath, by pressing a iecrefi:trapi> tiny spray ol water an be made to burst forth, from every branch and twig of the tree, to th« dif comf orb of any who may be under it.. The Government is eerkweiy considering the cooitrociion - of "&i submarine v tunnel between. England and' Ireland. - 16 is estimated that the : cost of - : .th|e tunnel will amountto£7,opo,ooo. Experts,however, are unaoimou in declaring that the project) of building » causeway i between .the two', countries impracticable, owing, to the , jertMafyrtwiey character of St. George , *'