GENERAL WAR NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 16561, 9 June 1917, Page 2 (Supplement)

GENERAL WAR NEWS.

WHAT PROHIBITION WOULD SAVE. Pbohidition would. eave the country a, further 385,000 tons of shipping a year, states Sir L. Cbiozza Money, in a Parliamentary answer. He means by this the employment of 16 ships, each* of 6000 tons, making four voyages a year. MADE IN GERMANY I Two men were " gassed" during rescue practice at a colliery at Pontycymmer, Glamorgan.. Dr. Haldane, Home Office expert, giving evidence at the inquest, said the apparatus used was made in Germany. It was unscientific, highlydangerous, and a death-trap. It killed more men than it saved. There were safer British designs available. MINIATURE V.O. The King has approved of a miniature replica of the Victoria Cross being worn on the riband in undress and service dress uniform by recipients of this decoration. The award of a bar to the original decoration will bo marked by the addition of a second miniature cross on tho riband, an additional cross being added for each bar awarded.

SUEZ OANAL DUES RAISED. A further increase of 75 centimes (6Jd) per ton in the Suez Canal dues is now announced, to take effect as from July 1 next. The rate for loaded ships will then

be Bf. 50c. (6s 5d at the normal rate of exchange), and for ships in ballast 6f. (4s 6d). The rates were last advanced as from January 1 last, and as compared with the scale before the war show a rise of 2f. 25c. (Is 9d) a ton . both loaded vessels and ships in ballast.

NO PLEASURE . SHOOTING. Owing to-the need for conserving lead, the British Ministry of Munitions have stopped the manufacture of lead shot except where required for destroying vermin or preserving crops. Fanners requiring cartridges for these purposes will be supplied !-only; on production of a license, ' which - will'; be granted - only when absolutely. necessary. .\sji!'v : .", . - WAR-TIME INCOMES. The astounding increase in the "incomes of the people is indicated; by the following table of the gross incomes brought under the review of the' Commissioners of Inland • Revenue for the years mentioned :— • £ 1913-14 1,167,184,229 3914-15 «... 1,238,313,397 1915-16 (estimated) ... 1,300,000,000 1916-17 (estimated) ... 1,600,000,000 BUSINESS OF ESCAPING. Speaking generally of escapes, it does not seem to bo realised how numerous are those into Holland, writes J. P. Whitaker, a Yorkshireman who spent 2£ years behind the German lines in France and Belgium. At one time Russian prisiners got away in large . numbers. The business of escaping is nighly organised,

and I consider it impossible for the German authorities to stop it. There is a regular service of smuggled letters and newspapers into Belgium, and a service of letters outwards. The Germans have tried* every means of preventing this, but without avail. I have pointed out that properly to guard the Dutch frontier would require thousands of young, alert men, and, I might add, men incapable of being bribed. My experience is that the average Landsturm veteran can always be bought with a few cigars or a fow pfennigs.

A CERTAIN TYPE OF FLAPPER.

The criticism which I have just heard a certain young Canadian friend of mine' pass on a certain type of war flapper is picturesque enough to deserve publicity, says "Londoner" in the Evening Stan-* dard. " They come out of the gutter,'" he said, "and as soon as they get hold' of a bit of money they spend it on dia--monds so as to bo fit to be taken out to dinner in a restaurant. They don't know how to handlo themselves at table when they get there, but they expect you to start them with soup and take them safely through chickens and ices, right on to nuts. What, are they going to do after the war? They won't be content to go back to be slaveys, or do anything td r earn a living honestly ; and yet they won't! be able to earn a living in the other way, because there'll be such a devil of_a lot oil 'them.'* ' " *"'. " V.

OFFICERS AND ECONOMY.

"The Rambler," in the Daily Mirror, writes:—l heard recently of an officer who had to travel several miles every week on duty. He rode a push-bike, and sent in a claim for lid a mile expenses. As this was promptly and decisively " sat upon" by the pay department, the officer now takes a taxi-cab. This costs 10 times more, but is cheerfully paid, because 'it is "in accordance with regulations." NICHOLAS 11. AS PRIVATE. ' It i.« not generally known that, in his younger days, the ex-Tsar served his period of service in the Russian Army as a common soldier. He submitted to all tho restrictions placed on an ordinary private, saluting his officers and carrying his" full equipment with the rest. On the regimental roll he figured as " Private Nicholas Romanoff, of the Orthodox faith, coming from Tsarskoe Selo." PRIMA-DONNA'S POOD "PAY.. An Italian semi-official bulletin says that in order to appreciate the food situation in Austria the following is more eloquent than price-lists The Pesti Dappo says that tho prima-donna of the Brunt Theatre, in Moravia,' has agreed to sing on tho following terms : Half a kilo of butter, 60 eggs, four kilos of flour, six sausages, six saveloys, one kilo of smoked meat, two kilos of green peas, 20 kilos of potatoes, one kilo of lentils, and a white loaf. FRIGHTENED .BY SUBMARINES. The submarine menace has frightened ore man in England— Portuguese who is now in prison awaiting deportation. He has asked to be allowed to stay in prison until the end of the war, saying he would' rather he there than run tho risk of being a victim of the submarine pirate. The novelty of the petition has, it is taken the authorities so much by surprise that for the moment they are acceding to the man's request, and he is by his own desire still an inmate of an English prison cell.

BELGIANS OPEN GERMAN EYES.

Belgian workmen who have escaped from Germany state that the free conversations they have carried on with German fellow-workmen in the various centres to which they were sent have hart tho effect of opening the eyes of the ignorant German workmen for the first time to the real condition of affairs and to tho brutality exercised by their own people.' Tins had a considerable effect, and is one of the reasons why the. Germans are sending back even these Belgians who under pressure agreed to work. WHERE SHALL WE PUT IT? Some of the " comforts" sent to France for the Indians when they were there puzzled the men, notably the body-belts, which were received in large numbers. " They were far too big to fit the slim and graceful waist of the native of India," Major H. M. Alexander relates in "On Two Fronts." " The drivers eyed, them curiously, wondering what they were for. Some wrapped them round their heads, converting them into a- sort of puggaree; others, despairing of. discovering their proper use, hung them round the neck of their mules."

THE NEW WOUND-HEALER. Speaking at the Middlesex Hospital annual meeting. Captain Sampson Handley, one of the honorary surgeons, appealed for support for the Bland-Button Institute, where the new antiseptic flavin was discovered by Dr. Browning. Flavin, of' which there is now an ample supply, has proved of great value in the treatment of septic wounds. Unlikn most other antiseptics, flavin, in destroying the microbes, does not injure tho flesh or the white blood corpuscles which attack the microbes. ; .

THE CROOKED MADE STRAIGHT.

Much public interest ,has been directed to the treatment given at Croydon Military Hospital, which specialises in cases of injured limbs. The head of the hospital, Colonel Deane, is a skilful gymnast, and in the system he has adopted he makes use of all the apparatus usual for the development of muscle. The.wounded soldiers are put through a rigorous course of training, and in a surprisingly short space of time crooked limbs have been made straight, and wrists and fingers that seemed past curing have been put in good working order again. The men always seem to get a great deal of pleasure and exhilaration out of the exercises. A WOULD-BE SOLDIER. The police of the Glasgow Central Division report that a boy of ten was found in the waiting-room at the, Central Station. Ho was dressed in sailor garb, and wore yellow leggings. He carried a toy gun under his arm, and had a box of ammunition to fit it in his possession..Two dogs on a chan were his escort. Being unable or unwilling to give an account 01 himself, the boy was handed over to the police. Ho informed them that he had run away from his home in Carlisle. It was found, however, that a lad of Newcastle, answering to his description, had been missing, and the father, arriving in Glasgow, identified the lad as his son, Gerald Vickers. __—_ THE EX-TSARINA'S FATE. General Korniloff, the commander of the Petrograd district, has informed the exTsarina that she is under arrest. _ He was taken to the private apartments of the exEmpress, who appeared in a few minutes dressed in black. She asked all the visitors to be seated. Her first words were : "To. what am I indebted for your visit!" General Korniloff, arising, replied: "I have come by the instructions of the Council of Ministers and have to inform you of the decision of the Provisional Government." The ex-Tsarina rose and said : " I am listening." After reading the decree General Korniloff informed the ex-Empress that from that moment she was deprived of her liberty, a strict guard would be established at the palace, and the former watch would be removed. DELIGHT IN HOSPITAL. All who have seen anything of patients in our military hospitals must have been struck by the- state of delight, almost ecstasy, into which the men have been thrown by the German retreat. It was interesting to note the way in which racial characteristics came out. • The Celt, with his wonderful instinct for words, liberated his soul in a sentence: "I'm glad to be a soldier." The more practical Englishman laconically implored his nurso to hurry up with his treatment: "I want to get back." Even the men who had talked little before about the front suddenly woke up, and, the Spectator says, showed their intimate geographical knowledge of it. Thev bubbled over with information as to this or that village upon which their thoughts had been so long engaged. A WONDERFUL FRENCH CANAL. The Canal du Nord, the greater part of which is now behind our lines, has a double interest for British readers. With our neglected waterways, says a writer in the Manchester Guardian, we can 'hardly i imagine a canal so overburdened with traffic that it can carry no more, and yet this was the case before the war with the ' water route from Paris to the Lille district. It represents the " very latest" in French canal engineering, and is 70ft wide and Bft deep, and has 19 locks, with an average, lift of 20ft—more than sft [ greater than ' any ordinary canal lock in England, and 3it 6in more than Latchford, the deepest on the Manchester Ship Canal. The. canal, when completed, would have cost nearly £3,000,000, and Jo. have.bjegojidppted,.