NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 11062, 13 May 1899, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Only one man in 203 is over 6ft in height, The average amount of sickness in human life is nine days out of the year. The weight of the human brain is usually about one thirty-fifth of that of the whole body. It is estimated that about 2,000.000 bicycles have been made in Europe and America. A healthy baby increases to treble its weight at birth in the course of the first, three months. Mr. Arthur Pease, M.P., of Darlington, who died on August 27 last, left estate tho gross value of which was £139,135. The flatmen's strike at Liverpool, which caused great inconvenience in the coaling of steamers, has been amicably settled. A man over 70 years of age. residing near Haverfordwest, has just been married for a fifth time during a period of SO years. A young lady in America had a violent quarrel with her lover 13 months ago, when she fainted, and has lain in a comatose state ever since. Sir Samuel Wilks, Bart.. M.8., having filled the office of President of the Royal College of Physicians for three years, has decided to retire.

Lord Dalmeny and the Hon. Neil Primrose, sons of the Earl of Roseberv, were among the students confirmed at Eton by the Bishop of Oxford. The resignation is announced of the Most Rev. Hugh Jermyn, Bishop of Brechin and the Primus of the Episcopal Church in Scotland, owing to ill-health. The world's agriculture occupies the attention of 280,000,000 men, represents a capital of £4,800,000.000. and has an annual product of over £4,000,000,000. The Warspite .has been commissioned at Chatham Dockvard by Captain Thomas P. Walker and 541 officers and men to relieve the Imperieuse on me Pacific station. The boring for coal which has been carried on at Barham, midwav between Canterbury and Dover, for several months past has resulted in coal measures being struck. A pocket-boot having been accidentally left in the witness-box of the Tottenham Police Court several witnesses were sworn on it in mistake for the Testament usually in use. A new society, to be called the British Poultry Association, is to be started at once. Lady Cranborne, the daughter-in-law of the Prime Minister, is taking much interest in the venture. A sum of £100 has been left by a Miss Gordon to the Bethnal Green Free Library to defray tho expense of a lecture on kindness to dumb animals, to be given annually at the library. At a meeting of the Fellows of the Royal College of Physicians, of London, Dr. William Selby Church, senior physician to St. ! Bartholomew's Hospital, was elected president of the college. Two angry sparrows were chasing each other through a suburb of Berlin, when one of them, in its haste, flew into a woman's face. Its sharp beak penetrated her eye and destroyed the sight. An inmate of Cane Hill Asylum, namul Sinclair, took up a plane iron, placed it against his throat, and struck the iron with a mallet. His windpipe was severed, and death resulted a few minutes later. Shipping returns show that in 12 months the total addition of steam tonnage has been 1,111,768 tons gross, and of sailing tonnage 29,053 tons. So large an addition of steam | tonnage has never before been recorded.

An old couple named Palaise have died at Montpelier from poisoning after partaking of some larks, which had been caught with poisoned grain. Three younger members of the family are seriously ill from the same cause, but no further deaths are expected. The tomb of St. Cuthbert, in Durham Cathedral, has been opened to enable the coffin to be reconstructed. The bones were found to be in an excellent state of preservation. The original coffin was dated 698. The Kettering Board of Guardians decided, as an experiment, to substitute wood-chop-ping for oakum-picking in task work to casuals. Several of the Guardians Have triad to pick 41b of oakum in nine hours and failed. A verdict of" Manslaughter" was returned at High Wycombe against Mrs. Ann Greenaway, who is in custody on a charge ol having starved a child by giving him condensed milk instead of cow's as ordered by the doctor. The Martello Towers on the Kentish coast, erected as part of the Duke of Wellington's scheme for the protection of Southern England against Napoleon's 1 threatened invasion, are gradually disappearing. Two will be blown up by the Royal Engineers. A Porthcawl correspondent reports that one evening lately some trains were delayed at Tondu Yard from some unaccountable cause. A messenger was despatched to the signal box. There he discovered the signalman, David Roderich, aged about 50, dead at his post.

The announcement comes from Berlin that Professor Wassermann, one of Professor Koch's ablest pupils, believes he has discovered a serum for the cure of pneumonia. Experiments with animals have been successful, and he is now operating upon human beings. The Duchess of Portland has sent £5 to the Church Society for the Promotion of Kindness to Animals towards a fund for securing the services of a special preacher, who shall devoto ins whole time to inculcating the Christian obligation of showing kind ness to animals. The Lord Lmincenor having placed on the Commission of the i'eace for Newark seven new magistrates without consulting the Town Council as to their fitness, the Council have unanimously refused to pay the guinea fee to the Crown Office for entering them on the Commission. A miner at Klondike «is reported to have discovered the body of a mammoth 40ft from the surface. The flesh had been frozen, and was said to be in a perfect state of preservation. The body was over 41ft in length. The left tusk was perfect, and measured 14ft in length and 48in in circumference. An elderly man, named John Meeting, was remanded at Birkenhead on the charge of wilfully murdering Colin M'Creath, aged 60 years. The prisoner is a dairyman, and both men slept in a barn behind the dairy premises. There they quarrelled and fought, and shortly afterwards M'Creath died. An old man, named Charles Henry Phillips, was at Shrewsbury committed for trial on a charge of breaking into three Shropshire churches and stealing tha contents of the offertory boxes. He obtained access to the churches by representing himself as agent for a firm of stained-glass window makers. The rarest bird in existence is a certain kind of pheasant in Annam. For many years its existence was known only by the fact that its longest and most splendid plume was in much request by mandarins for their headgear. A single skin is worth £80, and the living bird would be priceless, but it soon dies in captivity.

Lady Lo, wife of the Chinese Ambassadoi in London, having died, her remains were despatched by special steamer for interment in China. For a month the body remained at the Chinese Embassy, At the head of the coffin, according to Chinese custom, wes placed a cock made of white cloth— clarion of eternal mourning. France has now a law by which marriage may be dissolved without cost to the applicants. The Paris Divorce Court devotes Thursdays to gratuitous decrees. On one % day recently 294 couples were divorced during a session of four hours, an average of Ay more than one divorce a minute. The appli-;Jvss cants belonged to the working class in gl® which divorces were infrequent before the passage of the law.'.l