NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11854, 4 January 1902, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

d #&;>;:iN;'^ , ■ . ; f- There are 206 bones us the Iranian body*! ' v.; worked by 522 voluntary muscles. " ! d Russia is 77 times as big as the United 8. Kingdom, the United States 29 times. ■> Kangaroos" can jump lift in height, J'' against a' deer's best record of 9ft- «:'m, I he population of the earth's Polar r* [. gions is supposed to be just over 80,000. '•■■•■' The various countries of the world usa Y 13,400 different kinds of • postage stamps.■„■.■., ■- >■ "., The. famous - fishing-ground, the Dogger L . Banks, is 170 miles long by.6o miles broad. U > Durham's ; coal mines are. the most impord taut in Britain; those of Notts the smallest. e The world's average rainfall is 36 inches. London has 25 inchey a year, Plymouth 38 '■•:■' inches. e The debt of the United States is only > £1 4s to every .£10:3 of its wealth, Italy's - is £16 Is per cent. - '■; X V; In 1827 seven million acres of Great Bri-,,-tain were under wheat, against under two •'.?■ . 1 : million acres to-day. if Westmoreland, with only 84 persons to' the square mile, is tile most sparsely inhabi,l ted English county. • r The Belgian pigeon which won the great race from Burgos, in Spain, to Brussels did ■> the 700 miles in 14 hours. ' . e A scientific person asserts ihat. 1 bagpipe-. ,f playing in 'the vicinity of a cowshed causes' . the cows to yield more milk. . ' s • The common flat-wick paraffin lamps now i t used everywhere were first introduced into' % England in 1854 from Berlin. a Japanese florists have succeeded in culti- i* ■ voting a rose which looks ■ red in the sun* ._ light and white in the shade. ■; Persimmon was the first horse to win the " y Derby in 2m. 425.; but four horses have • ; s covered the distance In 2m. 43;-. 0 In Wales last year 14,0000z, of bar gold ; 0 was obtained, mainly from old workings, 1 the value being upwards of £52,000. I ,: s In 1801 only 22 per cent, of grown people' 1 in the British Isles could read and write. ; To-day. the proportion is 66 per cent - ;. Earl Nelson lias a pension of £5000. and s Lord-Rodney £2000. These pensions de- ' f" scend to the heirs of these noblemen. The new premises of Leahy, Kelly, and Leahy, in the centre of Belfast City, were . destroyed by fire, much damage being done, i 1 The largest bird of prey in the old world • , is the lammsergeier, or bearded vulture,,, .; which has a wing expanse of nine to ten 1 feet. " ' 3 Battersea's municipal dairy for the supply 3 of sterilised milk as a precaution against tuberculosis has been opened at 28, York Road. - , i In trial by jury in Germany a vote of j. eight to four is necessary for, the conviction: of the prisoner. A six' to six vote means acquittal. Potatoes form the world's .'greatest.single- ' crop, 4000 million bushels being produced ; annually, - equal in bulk to the entire wheat and corn crop. To give some idea of the growth of. the English language words and phrases under 1 the letter A have increased in 50 years from 7000 to nearly 60,000. . • The Wesleyan Methodist -Mill Guinea * Fund will lead to the building of 240 new; j chapels, •25 new : Sunday and day schools,; f. and 300 enlargements. There are three varieties of the dog that _"';:.;' „' never barkthe 'Australian dingo, ■ the ?■- Egyptian • shepherd ' dog, and ' the' " lion--1 headed" dog of Tibet. r ■ Niagara, though hot the highest waterfall,i:--..;"'■ l.olds the record for size. Thirty-two milj lion tons of water roll over the cliff in the -! course of a single hour.', r- England's tallest tree stands in Lord; - Brownlow's park at Ashbridge, in Buck-; > "inghamslure., It-is known as the Queen's; ,; beech, and is 150 ft high. • • , ; '•..'' ' ; Europe and Australia together are almost ' " exactly equal in area :to South America., 1 : North America and Australia combined' ' would almost cover Africa. I'. ":-': ".■ •: ,' [ The parish of All Hallows, London Wall, . has i a population. tof more than 30,000 by} -'■ ,! day, while the resident population of the! ,' parish by night is only 164. Of 315 provincial mayors recently elected--* ; 184 are returned as ; Conservatives, 27 as Li- . * beral ! Unionists, and 99 as Liberals; whilst;'' ]<. in five cases the politics are not stated. ■;■ The worst storm Britain felt in the last;; , century was in 1839. . Twenty people were: killed in Liverpool, and 100 in the neigh-1 bourhood; £500,000 worth of shipping was--destroyed. The Order of the Thistle consists of thei Sovereign, British Princes, and only 16) knights. It is the smallest of the three* great orders of knighthood in point of nnm--bers, but the oldest. "! - Out of the 22 millions sterling Britain spends annually on her navy shipbuilding ■ is the biggest item, costing 9£ millions.} : Pay comes next, 4$ millions. Naval arma-i ,' ihents cost 2% millions. A man has junt been hanged at Dantzig for the murder of a woman '15 years ago Thinking he was exempt from punishment . by lapse of time he confessed to his crime and was at once arrested. ' Suburban theatre managers met at the Tavistock Hotel,. Covent Garden, and presented to.Sir Spencer Ponsonby Fane a sil- ' :""■".:'. ver salver, on his retirement from his position in the Lord Chamberlain's office. . Russia has built a greater length. of rail- : , way in the last 25 years than any other European countryls,l42 miles is "her record since 1875. Germanv comes next with h .14,666 miles. France has built 12,998, • / -' ; and Britain 5089. The curious sight may be seen in Dover of a young tree growing out of a high mill .-; chimney in a public'.thoroughfare. Not-' , : withstanding its extraordinary position, the tree has grown 2ft or 3ft high. It is believed to. have its root in an old nest..' < : ; A suite of recreation rooms, costing £1100, provided from the profits of the - Gothenburg public-house, has been opened j at the village of Beath, Fifeshire. The village bowling-green and an electric light in*stallation . have also been provided in this way. v '.v ,C; : .: : ''>y')'i':y' : : : :..'^i :^l:M'':: W:Q:o :^ v. ; The Prince and Princess of Wales attended the Lyceum Theatre on December 2. .",'< 'At the end of the first act William Gillette ' , \ was summoned to the Royal box and complimented upon his artistic - realisation of Conan Doyle's famous character of Sherlock Holmes. - ' Dom Perosi's new oratorio, " Moses," has .been: produced at Rome with great success. .^ , One ,of the finest numbers is that illustrating the passage of the Israelites between " ; the divided waters of tire Red Sea. "Moses? is considered the best work Dom Perosi has yet produced. To prevent accidents at the dangerous ' ' meeting-place of three roads at the corner : . ot' Market .Hill, on the.- Woodbridge surveyor's recommendation, mirrors > have been . erected so that drivers in one road may see what is : approaching ~in .another.;* The plan ;'5?! is said to have been very successful. - ' - '■ - - . -■•■■ ....... .■ ' ■•■-■ . ■ '.. -'•-:■■■ .■• Recent investigations made by the Department of Agriculture show that mush- '."-* '■ rooms are about equal to potatoes in the element of nutrition that goes to make flesh and blood, but that, on the other hand, they do not hold much of the fuel stuff re-. . f, quired to keep the body machine running. C In Naples there exists a race of cats which live in the ; churches. They are kept and fed by the authorities on purpose to catch ' the mice which infest all old buildings there. ■..: The animals may' often be seen walking j about among the congregation, or sitting - 'J gravely before the,altar during the time oi • :';:-"' mass. The cinematograph for the blind is a machine which ; : passes under the fingers_ of ■■ .'.'• the blind, a, series of. reliefs representing. . "-.^ ; the same object in different positions— branch of a tree, a bird, or any other object. The blind person has the illusion of moving; i< : scenes, jupt as photographs passing oyer *,:'-: :,| luminous screen Jtend. .tin.iUm^-'^i*^-'-