NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18897, 20 December 1924, Page 21 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

A jelly-fish weighing lib. contains over 15oz. of water.

It is estimated that there are 36,000 million million tons of salt in the sea.

A pear tree at Liddington, Bedfordshire, yielded three crops during the past season.

Ten thousand tons of fuel oil are consumed on one .round trip by the Atlantic liner Leviathan.

St. Paul's Cathedral, London, can accommodate. 32,000 worshippers, and St. Peter's, Home, 54,000.

It is estimated that the solar energy received on the earth's surface amounts to 1.500,000 h.p. per square mile. After three years a Surbiton black Persian cat returned to its old home at Kinstou while its new owners were on holiday. A patent has been granted for a match provided with two heads; a safety head at one end and an ordinary one at, the other. With a modern X-ray tube a raidograph of a human heart has been taken with an exposure of one-thousandth of a • second. It is estimated that 3500 years ago Egyptian carpenters possessed practically every tool used by modern members of the craft. For the first month in its history the town of Quarry Bank, Staffordshire," with a population of 9000, had not a death in September. A portable camera, weighing only 301b., will detect hidden treasure or smuggled goods in brick walls or inside trunks. Lovebirds, once so popular for "fortunetelling," are becoming rare in London. Fifty years ago they were a common sight in the streets. Taxicabs in London are said to be three years behind those of New York in comfort. The American cabs are even heated - in cold weather. Many churches in Germany are equipped with bells of cast steel. These are as fine in tone as bronze bells and are considerably lighter. London's buses carried thirty-eight million more passengers during August and September this year than during the same months of 1923. Under a floor board in the organ loft at Westbury Leigh Church, Wilts, a swarm of bees was found with a store of honey weighing 1351b. An egg, which is not due to be laid till next April, was sold by auction recently for £2 lis. The bird whose eggs are so popular is a homing pigeon. Winter cruises on board luxury liners may cost as much as' £2500; the liners travel 28,168 miles on these trips round the world, " in the wake of the sun." ' An automatic gramophone attachment, which repeats: " Engaged, engaged instead of the, usual buzzing sound, is being tested in the telephone exchanges of Paris. The largest tunnel in the world is m s Germany. It carries the Rhone Canal* through the Nerthe Hills for a distance, of 4£- miles, the width at water' level being 72ft. . During four years as a social worker at Ellis Island, Miss Gulbeckjian has acted as matchmaker in 5000 marriages. She is not twenty-four, and is about to be married herself. . - In one year the.Royal Mint produced 287,500,151 silver and bronze coins of a total value of nearly £10,000,000, the profit on which, after deducting all expenses, was nearly £2,400.000. A bore 18 miles long through the rock of the Catskill Mountains, New York State, has been made electrically. Electricity furnished the whole of the power for the mechanical work. Experiments in Sweden showed that one man could move on the level a railway carriage equipped with roller bearings, while it required six men to move a similar coach with plain bearings. A firm in Singapore has put on the market a rubber compound which, when softened by heat and spread on a board, will, like birdlime, snare any unwary bird, beast, or insect that crosses it. Nightmares and unpleasant dreams can be banished, if an American doctor's theory is true. He claims to have cured a woman patient of terrifying dreams, giving her instead bright and happy ones. Iron is under examination as a material for the construction of -houses. A Botherham firm has submitted proposals to the Ministry of Health for building semidetached houses of cast-iron plates at a. cost of £550 a pair. Domestic training for girls who do not wish to take the full nursing course is available at King's College Hospital, London. The course includes domestic economy, cooking, and elementary medical and surgical nursing. A pheasant was lately decapitated by the engine of a Scottish express near Selby, and shortly afterwards a tawny owl flew into the headlight of the motorcar of Police-Superintendent Hoit, of Selby, and was killed. During the last Scottish herring season the Buckie fleet of 300 steam-drifters and motor-boats earned £275,000. The steamdrifters' earnings averaged about £1000. and the motor-boats' £600, their expenses averaging £50 and £30 a week *•««?««- tively.

Recent experiments by a zoologist have led to the discovery that male butterflies like to get drunk, while the females shun liquor. The butterflies were placed in a screened garden with bowls of whisky and water. The males invariably took to the liquor.

Two farmers, building a cornstack at Cumbernauld, Dumbartonshire, noticed a seagull mounting in the air with a large rat struggling in its beak. The' gull, after flying some distance, let its prey fall to the roadway, and made unsuccessful efforts to recover it. Two hundred and twenty-nine thousand yards of cloth are used annually to provide uniforms for the staff of London's Underground- Railways.' The companies have over 23,000 men on the uniformed staff, * and every year about £107,000 is spent on uniforms. A giant flying-boat fitted with the most complete set of wireless appartus put in an aeroplane is to be tested at Lytham. It is in itself a complete flying radio station, and, unlike other aircraft, can accomplish direction _ finding without giving away its own position. In China the floors of ball-rooms are divided into squares, each of which bears as a sign a bird, fish, or some other form of Nature. Dancers must keep to thenown squares; if they fail to do this they are stamped with a coloured disc. the penally for three failures is a request to leave the place. Born in the Tower of London, Mr. John Charles Tope, of Harefield, whose, death was latelv announced, was the son of a beefeater/and the youngest of 17 children. He used to recall the difficulty his mother had in getting so many children to bed. I At night she paraded them in single file J and counted them off as ihey passed her. More than £3000 has been subscribed | toward the memorial to Mr. Willie LccI mond M P., who fell in action while lead- | ing his men of the Royal Irish Regiment. at Messines Ridge. The memorial is to be erected in the capital of his native coun'v of Wexford, with which his family have been associated for many generations. The belief that a pig cannot swim without cutting its throat with its forefeet has proved to be a fallacy. A pig, weighing 1501b. was being driven at. Port Elizabeth, South Africa, when it broke awav and dashed into the surf, it; remained i'u the water nearly five hours;: I before a boat picked it up. It was none . the worse for its adventure. - {