NEWS AND NOTES.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1717, 25 January 1905, Page 17

NEWS AND NOTES.

Wireless telegraphy has recently been adapted to burglar alarms, and an apparatus has been fitted to a safe in Chubb’s Look Works, Wolverhampton. Any tampering with the doer of the safe immediately sets at work a small but powerful transmitter, causing the safe to radiate waves in all directions suiiicient to ring alarms in any part of the building. It would also administer to the burglar an uncomfortable shock.

Kettles made of paper- -a Japanese invention —are about to lie supplied to the German army. By pouring water over i-nem they can hang over the fire without bum ng, for a length of tune sufficient to boil the water.

A Naval cadet who, on his training ship, took eleven first prizes, and in the first examination obtained ninety-seven and six-tenths per cent., was rejected at the medical examination on account of a small defect in one little toe.

Thanks to the researches of the Government Botanical Department of the United States the landowners have been supplied with prepared powders, and by a process of vaccination they are obtaining heavy crops from what was barren soil.

Count Lubienski, a. Russian engineer, has brought forward a p reposal for the electrification of the Trans-Siberian Railway. The numerous waterfalls in the vicinity of the line might:-, he thinks, be utilised to give a current of 100,OdO volts.

King JEwdard has received the Grand Prize for the Victoria jubilee souvenirs in the historical department of the World’s Fair at St. Louis.

Farthing packets of tea are being sold throughout India by growers, who have at last recognised that they have an immense market lying at their door.

A cheque for £1,415,000 was drawn recently by the London County Council for payment to iVaaryiebi-ue Boiouga Council as a loan for electric lighting.

The Chief-Const able of Abeideen holds the view that posting football results in publichouses is against the spirit of the Lioensmg Acts, and if it is persisted in he intends to bring it under the attention of the Licensing Courts.

According to ‘‘Truth,” the “restaurant stare” is one of the afflictions of modern English womanhood. The modem Einlishwoman does not go to a restaurant to enjoy he self, hut to assume a stony glare in the interests of propriety.

A faulty hot-water bottle placed in th© bed caused the death by scalding of Rosina Ward, aged ten months, a patient at the Havil Street Infirmary, London.

Mr Carnegie is reported to be about to purchase Lea. Park, Surrey, the estate of the late "Whitaker Wright, and to hand it over as a national sanatorium.

A German traveller cl a ims to have discovered m the forests of Borneo people who still have tails.

The other day Lady Frances de Burgh-Lawson, widow of Sir Henry de Burgh-Lawson, fell out of bed at Kensington and was killed. She a-as 79 years of age.

In a five-hours deep-sea competition -at Dover, in which HD anglers took part, the prize for the heaviest fish was taken with a whiting turning the scale at six ounces!

President Roosevelt lias been presented by an admirer with a bed quilt composed of 22,642 different pieces of material. The pattern represents the national colours.

Twenty millionaires impersonating farmers had a curious dinner in an hotel at Philadelphia. A miniature cornfield had been installed in the dining hall, and roosters ate wheat from the floor.

The State of Kansas is much concerned about the havoc caused by a new species of grasshopper, which is three times the normal size, and is endowed with a double set of teeth and two stomachs.

Tramps who tried to rob the dwelling of an eccentric hermit near Tyson, Vermont, were bitten and driven off, says the “New York World,” by snakes, of which he kept a large collection.

A religious revival not less frenzied than that in South Wales has broken out in North Wales, in the populous industrial district of Rhas, near Ruabon. One prayer meeting lasted for 13i hours without a break. The earnest supplication of one woman—a collier’s wife —was that the Lo d, would send thorns into the cush.ons and easybottomed chairs of the ministers and

pas tore of the churches, to wake them from apathy to action.

Alfred Ceilings, aged nine years, son of A. Codings, druggist, Toronto, died on the 4th November from vaccination. The family removed from Cootsville recently, and in compliance with the school regulations, the lad was vaccinated three weeks previous to his death. Tetanus developed about a week before his death, and the patch grew rapidly worse, until death ensued. Antitoxin was injected ten times in two days. Another of Mr Codings’ children is suffering severely as the result of the vaccination operation.

According to intelligence fro-m New York there never has been seen in this world such a bLaze of diamonds as that Witnessed at the Metropolitan Opera House on a. recent date. It is reported that half-a-dozen boxes _ held people whose aggregate we lili is over £200,000.000 the Rockefellers, Asters, Goulds, Vanderbilts, Goeiets, and Belmont's. Mies Alice Rooseveldt, the President’s daughter, was there, as we e also the Dukes or Manchester and Newcastle and members of the diplomatic service. There wore 21 diamond tiaras, besides Mrs Alfred Vanderbilt’s allround solitaire crown, and there were countless diamond hairbands.

Queen Wiihelmina lias notified to the United States Legation at The Hague the heartfelt sal islact ion with which, she anticipates the assembling of another Pc os Conference In her capital. Her Majesty also says that the co-operation of the Dutch Government is assured as soon as the Czar, the great founder of the first oonlepence, and the other Powers have given their adhesion.

According to the statement issued in P-e'Ln, based on the returns of the Royal Fore-try Office, Emperor William the Second, since his acce-ion to the th one on June 18, 1888, has shot the following game:—Two aurochs, 1 whale, 3 .walruses, 17 bears, 1825 deer, 1053 wild hears, 822 stags and elks, 287 foxe's 156 wolves, 19 gazelles, 5 lynxes, 65 mountain sheep, 54 chamois, 6 ibexes, 12 seals, 17 lie- ons, 3 eagles, 5 vultures, 35 hawks, 5560 hares, 173 squirrels, 6 marmots, 76 ofipercailsfe, 18 polecats, 23 weasels, 3351 quail, 4223 partridges. This is a total of 4327 head of big game, and 13,590 head of small game.

To the ping-pong eye, the billiard arm, the tennis elbow, and the bicycle stoop, must be added the new complaint of “bridgitis.” It is the consequence of over-indulgence in bridge. The symptoms are violent pains in the head, particularly behind the ©az\s.

Peter ZebLcli, Servian athlete, can clasp his hands so tightly together that two horses pulling in opposite directions at the chains attached to his wrists cannot -separate them. Many animals have been hitched to his wrists, but Zebiteh’s clasp has never been loosened.

The Lancashire and Western Sea Ft heries Committee are about to release in the Irish Sea, 1000 plaice marked by silver wire threaded through the body. Rewards will be offered to fishermen who return them. The object is to determine the nature and extent of the migration of plaice.

At the Board of Trade inquiry at Brixham recently into the loss of the trawler Lyra by collision with the steamer Heathbank, the chief mate of the latter vessel stated that he had to leave the bridge to instruct mem bore of the crew, who were mainly foreigners, how to- carry out liis orders.

A novel departure from the customary sandwich, board has just been introduced into the Loudon streets. It takes the form of a gigantic hand, upon the back of which is printed the advertiser’s name and the nature of the articles that he desires to extol. The hand is mounted on a long pole, and is carried by the sandwich man in such a fashion that the index-finger is always pointing in the direction where the advertised shop, theatre, or restaurant is situated-

There is in the Rue Lafayette, in Paris, a considerable length of road laid with mahogany pavement. Its cost was £2 the square yard.

Achille Plehirs and O'otave 3>eroulle, two millionaire pastrycooks, of New York, have decided to work their way round the world in two years, earning their livelihood by cooking alone. They will ship os cooks from San Francisco to Japan, and thence cook their w r ay to Europe and back to America. # *

At first sight it appears a somewhat surprising fact that not a (few delicate, and even invalid, women have found health by indulging in the athletic pastime of ’mountain climbing. One wellknown lady mountain climber, who has scaled more than thirty of the highest peaks in Switzerland, was cuied of acute rheumatism by taking such exercise.