NEWS BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11843, 21 December 1901, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS BRIEF.

The life of a steel rail oa a main line'W not over 12 years. •,* 0 A 90 candle-Bower oil lamp bums 3050 grains of oil an hour. The blood of the eel injected into a veil* is a deadly poison to man. " , ;Bo coal and tobacco smoke are very in** jiirious to lacquered surfaces. ' , .V. -Vv The average income of British money* earners who pay income-tax is £274. . As much 8,8 3s duty apiece is paid yearly i upon 5700 bottles of patent medicine. The Sooth Shields lifeboat holds the re-, cord of having saved the lives of 1023 people. • • ■ ; , ,■ : . / ' ' ■ :■■■ The public-houses of London, if placed; ' * side by side, would reach a distance of 76miles. ■■■ . 1 '-' - - A Divisional Court of King's Bench hasi struck off the roll five solicitors for various' offences. ' Rice is the easiest of all common foods! to digest, and roast veal and pork the most] difficult. • , : ' Eight million Germans are insured against, illness fewer than three million British; subjects. The oldest royal dynasty in the world' is that of Japan, which goes back unbroken SIISSII 2600 years. j ' Britain uses 104,000 tons of flax yearly-) i France comes next with a consumption o£< 66,000 tons. • An ocean steamer ot 10,000 ton's burden carries in a year's steady work an averageof 210,000 tons. ' b Next to Great Britain, Nippon, part of Japan, has the largest population of any. • island in the world. - ' The 46 principal British fire insurant companies have a premium income of over. £20,000,000 a year. The 3d card duty was paid last year oa just under two million packs of home-made British playing-cards. . The largest egg laid by any European bird is that of the swan ; the smallest that of the golden-crested wren. ' The Ophir, after the necessary alterations have been completed, will start her ordinary service in January next. The record price ever. paid for a walnut-' tree was £300, but the veneers cut from this" " , tree sold retail for £12,000. ■ Double the time of the sun's rising gives ' the length of the night; double that of his setting gives the length of the day. . Lord Dunleath is erecting a large hotel on his estate at Ballywalter, County Down, to be worked on the Gothenburg system. In Atalanta, chief town of the State of' Georgia, ... all '..prisoners charged with minor; offences are released on "Christmas Day. 1 The red breeches which George 11. wore at the battle of Dettingen .were sold at Mr. Stevens' auction rooms lately for 15 guineas'., Mr. R. P. Paranjpy, 8.A., an Indian who was bracketed Senior Wrangler, 1900, has. ben elected Fellow of St. John's College.. i Cambridge. • Beef and herring have exactly, the same'' ; value as food. Taking beef as 100 in units of food value, duck is worth 104, salmon 108, butter 124. _ All Christmas decorations should be left' 1 . in position till Twelfth Day, and a sprig of ' holly should remain somewhere in each room i till Ash Wednesday. 1 The excuse made by one man charged at Bow-street with being drunk and disorderly was that he had'been "celebrating the relief; of the Duke of York." Bishop Barry dedicated a memorial font and . tablet >. at All * Hallows, Barking, in memory of the Rev. J. S. Stone, the author, ; of "The Church's One Foundation." The Queen has presented signed portraits of the King and herself to the Red House, a. temperance public-house which is to bo opened at St. Augustine's, Stepney. Out navy costs "each 'individual of'the , J, British nation six shillings a year. Dutch, people pay five shillings a head, and French ' three shillings and tenpence yearly. Sergeant Price, who shot his wife at the Woolwich canteen, and was sentenced to death with a recommendation to mercy on account of provocation, has been respited.

Askal Chin, in Tibet, is the lake which' lies at a greater height than any other in"' the world. Its level is 16,600 feet. The lowest is the Dead Sea—l29o feet- below the V sea-level. , Home grown wheat makes jlO weeks' bread out of the year for the United King-' r . - doiu. From our colonies we get a further six weeks'-supply,;• while the .vest comes from abroad. It has been officially announced that amongst'the troops attending the coronation • will be a large contingent of the native army and of the Imperial service troops under Sir Pertab Singh. At an inquest at St. Pancras on a cook named Gratton. the doctor said that she had died from heart disease, accelerated by the*'";"/ pain', of having an inflamed thumb lanced. Verdict accordingly. • The Amazon and its tributaries hold the record among rivers of possessing 25,000 miles of water suitable for steam navigation. The area the river ; drains is two- r: thirds that of Europe. Norway's population is the smallest in Europe compared her area. Each of her inhabitants could have 40 acres of land, . while the Briton would have to be content '~ with less than an acre. At North London Henrick Proclil was "■ charged with being drunk and disorderly, and though he said lis had been for a day's - fishing and caught no fish it was not accepted as an excuse, and he was fined 5s or five days. ' - * The Lord Mayor of Pennyless Cove" is the chief Christmas character in Tenby. He is one of the fishermen, who is carried in a chair through the town, rle stops before each house, and wishes occupants a "Merry Christmas." A proposed strike for the right to keep dogs is to be considered at the next meeting of the Northumberland Miners' Association. At several collieries in the county workmen are being forced by the owners to do away with their dogs or themselves remove from the colliery.

The Rev. Arthur Furiier, of the Loudon Road Congregational Chapel at. Leicester, lias accepted a call to the pulpit of Redlandstreet Church at Bristol, vacated by the death of the Rev. Urijah Thomas, long one of the most eminent leaders of the Congregational denomination.

I It having: been brought to tile notice of the War Office that some of the Imperial Yeomanry regiments (at Home) are adopting a fancy style of service dress, and some of them a full dress also, the Commander-in-Chief lias directed all proposals of the kind to be submitted for approval.

The classical island of lona will soon be the ; scene of a new industry. Excellent marble has just been discovered, and a " blast" which has been tried 5 has revealed

a mass of white and also green marble. The samples have been favourably reported upon, and there is every prospect of a company being formed to work the marble on an extensive scale. The stone is adapted for church ornamentation.

On October 24, in connection with the Colchester Oyster 'Feast, the Mayor laid the foundation stone of a new Masonic hall.' In a cavity underneath was placed a bottle con- _ tabling the current coins of the realm and > sevral Masonic documents. It was discovered a ' few ' days ago that thieves had r ~, tunnelled beneath the stone and had stolen the bottle and- its contents. Dr. King, the Bishop of London, in the : course of his , visitation - address at Spald-, ing lately, said' I ''that>' the ;^ indifference . ./* assumed by many persons calling them-" , ■selves: Christians-;was a matter which called f-iLX for the most serious consideration of the . Church. Perhaps the two most; obvious • -J W causes of this indifference were love of nlea*. _ • sure and of ropney. ; - ■ jfm