GENERAL NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13355, 8 December 1906, Page 4 (Supplement)

GENERAL NEWS.

GOLD IN THE DUSTBIN, SCKS Finchley District Council has mad© £40 in six months by the sale of condensed I milk tins found in the dustbins. They are - bought for making solder.

OLD-TIME FOOTBALL. Football has many detractors to-day, but perhaps it has improved a little since 1583, -when, ,according to a writer of the period, " : fit was ■"A pastime to be utterly abjected by all noble men, the game giving no pleasure but beastlie furie and violence. ,

AFTER TWELVE MONTHS. * The body of Captain Hartley, of the ketch Evening Star, was recovered from i the River Ouse, near Lynn, recently, cm :v-the= morning :of October 22 last year the '' Evening '■= Star' was~run down, by the steam- '■• ship'Tangermaendc, and the captain and ,two hands were drowned. ;

34AHOMET AND THE MOUNTAIN. The head of one.of the departments of the Krupp Works at (Essen, Germany, states that having charge of so many English employees he has been obliged to acquire a thorough mastery, of the English .language. "Many of the Englishmen with 'tis will'not take -the' trouble to learn German," he says.

SUGGESTION . An old man named Echivard, who was known as. thel" cutter'.' down," has hanged g liimself in Paris. For many years whenever anyone hanged himself he was sent for to cut down the body. A letter addressed to the - police commissioner,;> ,m •which the old * cutter down" recommended ; a, friend for his post, was found on his " tablo.

POLICEMAN AS A CRITIC. Mr. Plowden, the magistrate at the Mary- 1 tabone Police Court, appointed a policeman as an official music-hall critic. An appli'cation was mad© to him for a license ' for a - girl thirteen wars old to appear in an acrobatic performance at the Bedford Theatre of Varieties, and Mr. Plowden declared that be would send a policeman to the theatre . to.'see exactly what the performance was.

;: -? v ".: ';*«:' ', ,'■ ■ ■ ■ - ■''.'-■ -.. . ■ HORNED MEN. , ~ ■' People visiting Durban for the first time are surprised on landing to see a -number of human beings with horns on their heads. This strange headgear is adopted by the ' kaffirs, -who run about with ;the South African rickshaw carts. The spectacle is a very curious one, and is somewhat diffi- ' cult to' understand, unless if has some relationship in the kaffir mind to the bullocks, which -«• the principal beasts of burden in ibis part of South Africa.

- BULLOCKS IN A CHAPEL. " While the' sermon was being preached at . i mid-week service at the Wesleyan Church, Etruriia, Stoke-on-Trent, •■» two bullocks ran into' the building, scaring the congregation greatly. The bullocks made their way upstairs', to the gallery.- The service was stopped, and : the chapel-keeper and some members of the congregation went to turn the amimals out. They had great difficulty in getting them downstairs, but at - last" the bullocks were induced to leave. They were followed ■by the congregation, ■jwho dispersed as soon as possible.. • .

A NOBLEMAN'S PLIGHT. ■-■,;■:■', The following - announcement appears in the Vienna Tageblatt:— "The ; undersigned, ■ . Count Robert Keglevitch, aged 41, has lost -allhis property through failure in business. ■ Having honestly endeavoured for three tnonthfl, without success, to obtain a situation, be has decided >as a*last? resort to undertake a -i- long-distance walking tour through Bavaria,' Prussia, France, "Italy, - Turkey, Roumania, Bulgaria, and back to • Vienna. He -hopes to make a; living by - : thei "sale of > picture postcards on which his photograph will * appear.— Count Robert Keglevitch, " .. «

U- A FISHING ENTHUSIAST. .' At Limestone, Tennessee, there has died, Rt the age of 85, a worthy disciple of Izaak Walton, named Ira : Brown. , According to - -the Nashville Banner, Mr. Brown spent his uneventful, contemplative life on the banks of the Nolachucky River, where he made a modest living by*the: sale of fish. ,y It is, stated ; that he had never been farther than five miles from home, and he certainly never left" the riverside willingly, except in older to record his vote. Mr. Brown was one of -. . Nature's own fishermen, and every day for 70 years he fished in the Nolachucky River. In the winter time it was often necessary to cut holes in the ice. , Mr. Brown never : complained of •? illness, ■; and attributed his • good health to his continuous life in the _ open air. . ' * - :

A NOVEL RAILWAY RIDE. " In his desire to leave the navy, which he had only joined a week previously, -a stoker, named Alfred Easby, 18, elected -to undergo an unnerving experience. : Crawling.beneath, the brake van of an Eastleigh train leaving Portsmouth at an early iour in the morning he forced himself between the floor of the' vehicle and the vacuum pipe, and so travelled for three or Jour hours, with the metalling just beneath him and the whirling wheels on each "]iahd. At Portsmouth, when the train returned from Eastleigh, he was noticed by » ticket : examiner, ; and when extricated was found to be smothered with iron rust from the brake*. The L Portsmouth Bench fined Easby ten shillings, or in default seven days, in recognition of his exploit in travelling, without a ticket v', .

EQUINE SAGACITY. Michael Edward 11. is the name of a t horse that earns; his oats hauling a parcel cart from the Pennsylvania Railroad depot in Jersey City to the Adams Express Company's pier. His lifelong friends, the ferry | hands, say that he (Michael Edward II.) has established a horse trades union all by fthiniself, and objects to working overtime. When the whistle .blows for the noon hour and his driver happens to be away at the moment ; Michael Edward 11. starts for the ~'.; Adams Express stable six blocks away. He is generally stopped before he gets very i'ar, but on more than one occasion, he has made the trip alone. This wise horse * knows when .to stop work, for punctually at six p.m. he sticks up his ears, whinnies, and makes for the street. Michael Edward : 11. has held his job for many years.

COMEDY OF THE SEA. An extraordinary incident occurred in the . bay north of Blyth, Northumberland, a derelict vessel coming ashore just before dusk. The coastguard at Camboia reported to ' Blyth' that : a schooner, under full sail, was heading for the beach, and on the vessel's striking four miners put out in a small coble and boarded her. - They found that the small boats were missing and that no one was on board. A further search revealed the fact that the schooner's crew had "taken away the whole of their clothes, suggesting that for some reason the vessel, which proved to be the Archimedes, of "-: Lowestoft, had been abandoned. . The Cam- •"- bois lifeboat ? and a Blyth ; tug went out to ■i the vessel/ which was towed off in a couple of hours, and with her new crew of miners .:- and lifeboatmen she was brought into Blyth Harbour. " The. ship's papers v were found on the Archimedes, showing that she - was on a voyage to Lowestoft. She was in J ballast/ there being a small quantity of cement in the bold. Next day' came the sequel, when the crew of the Archimedes linded'abOresswell in a email boat. They had left their vessel, thinking she was sinking. The crew were nonplussed on hearing ibafc the Archimedes was not only berthed, .but had only a couple of feet of water in *-r, f J ■*" - • ' ~ ~. ....