NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20454, 4 January 1930, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

London's sewers hare a total length of more than 500 mileji.

Nearly 500 brands, of tobacco are now grown in the British Empire. Some of the games played by children in rural parts of England are 1000 years old.

A bell-ringing instruction class has been inaugurated ail the Enfield Parish Church.

Thero were about- 7000 millionaires in the United States in 1914. Now thero are nearly 40,000. Champagne may only be made from grapes grown in an area limited by tho French Government..

Dust falling in Britain has been traced as coming from thu Sahara, a distance of at least 2000 miles.

Tho Europeans in British Africa number 1,750.000 out of a total population of over 62.000.C00.

The Glasgow Savings Bank, which has 300.000 depositors, is one of the largest of these institutions in the world.

Bees, it is estimated, produce 171b. more honey in each hive when the hives are lit and ivarmecl by electricity.

Tho death's head moth, now rarely seen in Great Britain, emits.' squeaks almost as loud as those of a mouse.

The highest point to which a human being can ascend without involving injury to health is stated to be 16.500 ft.

As there is 110 nrther need for them, .four of the industrial schools under the .London County Council arc being closed.

A church service. l organised and conducted entirely by children is held every Sunday morning at Wealdstoue, near Harrow.

The head of a firm of mu.sic publishers recently gave statistics which showed that iu Great Britain there are 500,000 music pupils. During the first ids months that the new Madame Tussaud's Exhibition in London was op em. J; o the public 1,000,000 people paid for admission.

Public street clocks in Berlin contain in their pedestals an ambulance department where a stretcher and first-aid appliances are alwf.ys available.

Miss Elizabeth Gadsby, who is said to have entered ths employ of an elastic web factory in Leicester . at the age of nine, is still there at the age of 92.

Two Englishwomen, each of whom runs a large quarry, share the unique .honour of being the only two women members elected to the Institute of Quarrying. The Great Western Railway have prepared nearly 10.CO0 slides, over 100 sets of 19 sections cf the territory it serves, for loan, free of charge. Every year 65,00(3 girls disappear in the United" States, and no trace is found of them, according to Mrs. Man? E. Hamilton, the first policewoman of New York. Charlie Chaplin's original clothing that made him famous on the screen has been insured, for exhibition purposes, for £IO.OOO. Its actual value is probably about 2s.

Using all his Spare time during the past three years, a ticket collector on the Great Western Railway, England, at Caerlon, Monmouthshire, has built a sisroomed bungalow. There are 1500 artesian wells in London, each of which saves its owners at least £2OO a in watecr rates. That at the Bank of .'England saves no less than £6OOO yearly. There are 570 separate electricity undertakings in Britain. AH these will be scrapped and replaced by 30 great stations, producing electricity at a far more economical rate.

There are said to be two " danger periods " in the day when factory accidents are most liable to happen in Britain —between 9.50 a.m. and 10 a.m. and between 4.50 p.m. and 5 p.m.

The custom of a woman wearing a wedding ring originated in Egypt. In tha early days a woman wore a ring in her husband's absence, to show that he had delegated his authority to her.

Bookmakers are more numerous than auctioneers and house agents in England. according to the number of licences issued. There are 14.641 " bookies - to 14.284 of the other profession.

There are five different time zones in Canada, each differing by an hour. At 12 noon in Halifax it is 11 a.m. in Toronto, 10 a.m. in Winnipeg, 9 a.m. in Calgary, and 8 a.m. in. Vancouver. Dogs are allowed "to roam free, while cats are chained up. in French Indo-China. In this topsy-turvy land women wear trousers and" men skirts, while children are given numbers instead of names.

When a landlord asked for possession of a room at Bravton Park, England, he told the magistrate that the room measured -12 ft. s 18ft. It was occupied by a hunband and wife and eight children. Great Britain is the "world's greatest exporter of leather footwear. Last year British exports had a value of more than £s.ooo.ooo—double that of American boot and shoe exports during the same period. The price of a common cold has been, adjudged at £SO by the First Chamber of the Seine Tribunal, which awarded that sum to 31. Gaotron, who sued his employer for damages arising from a cold caught in 1915.

Workmen engaged in the restoration of Peterborough's seventeenth-century Guildhall found"in / -the roof- a nest containing a clutch of hen's eggs. It is estimated that the ecrcs must have been laid a centurv or so ago.

One bis firm in Birmingham now has half-an-hour's community singing before commencing work every Monday morning, in order to counteract the Monday morning feelin?." The results are said to be very satisfactory.

What is to be the largest suspension bridge in the world is being built over the Hudson River, New York. Tha towers on the banks will each be 635 ft. in height, 'while the span of the bridge will be 5500 ft. in. length.

Belgium is now busier than ever. There were 27,600,000 tons of coal mined in 1927, an increase of .4.800,000 tons over 1914; while the land under cultivation has risen from 4,465..742 acres in 1915 to 4,526,500 acres to-day. There were no signals, in the early days of railways. When' drivers of trains met on a single line they had to argue it out. Later, a post was erected midway between stations so that "he who had passed the pillar must go on, and tha coming man go back." There recently at Lancaster. England, at the age of 91 years, Thomas Rogers, who had been employed at tho Waring furniture factory there for <6 years. He worked at the bench a> a wood turner right up to his death. ILs soil has been 49 years in the same factory, and his grandson nearly 20 years. Electricity is . being used to catch fish in parts of Germany. One copper eab.i9 is laid at the bottom of the water to be fished, and the other held near the surface bv Coats. An electric current passe? through the cables, ana all the foh in their neighbourhood are painlessly electrocuted.

A farmer's son. living near Zweibrucken, Germany, .piqued by the refusal of several girls to dance with him at the local fair, sot the villcge on hie. A new house, three barns and farm premiss belonging to his own father were, burned down, and then the maa shot himself dead.