BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2924, 30 March 1910, Page 24

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

j LONDON, March 21. j Mi' Licht, the sugar expert, estimates I that the production of beet sugar shows a decrease of 191.000 tons, and that for the whole season the decrease will be ; 332,000 toms. March 22. H.M.S. ' Irresistible has been isolated in . Portland Harbour for a week, owing to ail her gun-sights having been thrown overboard. The cause of the dispute has not been made public. ; The Scotland Yard authorities have discovered renewed -activity on the part of a famous gang of blackmailers, numbering 200, who some years ago victimised many people in high social standing to the extent of £200,000. The Borough of Lambeth has undertaken a scenic pageant, of Empire, which j will depict Captain Cook’e departure for ♦Australia. Four hundred actors will take part in it. ! March 23. { In the House of Commons, replying i to Mr A: Fell, Colonel Seely stated that j the question of the “ All Bed ” route was under consideration, but he was unable to say when a decision would be reachedi March 24. A Bluebook shows that the withdrawal of the British troops from Somaliland to the coast is due to the advice of Generals Wingate and Manning, because the friendly natives are now sufficiently well armed to be able to defend themselves. The withdrawal does not imply the abandonment ot the country. A hunter in the Eastern Alps discovered an eagle’s nest containing the skeleton of a child aged three years. The personality of the late Mr John Cory, the well known Welsh philanthropist, has been proved at £726,356. He bequeathed over £IOO,OOO to charities, including £20,000 to the Salvation Army and £40,000 to various missionary societies, also £IO,OOO to his employees. Sir G. H. Reid had an informal meeting with the Agents-general, and it was agreed in order to advance the interests of Australia to hold a series of meetings apd to fully-. co-operate on all matters of general interest to Australia, March 25. Mr Roosevelt had a, long interview with i Mr Keir Hardie to-day. A cadet at Dartmouth College died 1 from the effects of cyanide of potassium. | His diary showed that he had been exj perimenting with its effects on his system. ■ The jury urged that the naval authorities I should prevent boys haying access to i poisons. , March 28. I • An unknown assassin, pretending to be a telegraph messenger, visited and shot dead M. Chaxlois, astronomer at the. observatory at Mont Gros, Nice. • - PARIS, March 23. j The Chamber of Deputies has resolved j to replace the liquidator of properties belonging to religious orders by a directorgeneral, who will be responsible to the Ministers of Worship and Finance rei spectively. March 25. Eight Paris thieves were sentenced from two to five years for opening letter-boxes J with skeleton keys. They were arrested | by detectives disguised as “ Aoaches.” March 27. Tire Senate has passed a bill excluding criminal convicts from the home army, i An ancient cemetery has been discovered near Rheims, containing some magnificent vases, bowls, and bracelets from 2000 to 3000 years old. BRUSSELS, March 23. | The burglars who entered the jewellery ■ shop of Ro'ssel and Co., in this city, and stole therefrom £6OOO. worth of jewellery, pumped the fumes of a soporific composition through the keyhole, and thereby succeeded in drugging the night watchman. They left no clue BERLIN, March 22. j Herr Dewalthausen, lately German ; Minister at Buenos Aires, has given the i Kaiser £IO,OOO to promote German schools in the Argentine, Uruguay, and '-Paraguay. n March 23. Prizes amounting to £1250 each will be awarded to architects, builders, and townplanners for the best scheme to prevent the overcrowding of this city till the year 2000, when the population of the capital is expected to reach 10,000,G0d. A carpenter belonging to a td'rpedo boat stole 23,000 marks from the ship’s treasury while she lay in Wilhelmshaven Harbour. On being arrested he confessed to the crime. March 25. Mr Theodore Roosevelt will be the , Kaiser’s guest at Berlin Castle for four days in May. General Ying Chang, the new War Minister for China, in the course of an interview here, stated that he contemplates introducing universal militai'y service in China. March 27. The Howa.ldt Works at Kiel have contracted for the first of the three battleships in the 1910 programme. VIENNA, March 22. The police are prosecuting the Hungarian deputies who assaulted Ministers during the recent scene in the Diet. ROME, March 22. Herr Bethmaun Hollweg, the German Chancellor, received a great popular welcome on arrival here, and had an audience with King Emmanuel to-dav.

ST. PETERSBURG, March 26. M. Kukuhoff, in his presidential ad- ' dress in the Duma, declared that constitutional monarchy did not and could not imply parliamentary government in the English sense in Russia at the present day. He foreshadowed bills systematising national defence and co-ordinating .national education. One hundred and fifty peasants died at A.rdatoff from eating bad fish bought of an itinerant salesman. CAIRO, March 27. Mr Roosevelt received 400 Americans here, and lunched with the Khedive. WASHINGTON, March 22. The Committee of the Senate on sions declined to proceed with the bill j for : retiring ex-President j Roosevelt as Chief of .the Army and Navy, with a pension of £2OOO. '•'«*-'; ■• A confession by Klein, who was sentenced to three years' imprisonment for bribery at Pittsburg, has led. to an • indictment being . filed -C against 40. present and former councillors of. the city, who ; are charged with bribery. In the maI jority of the cases the alleged bribery 1 did not exceed £2O in amount March 23. ! By a motor accident at Fort Myer the wife of Major Herbert Slocum was killed, ■ and General Franklin Bell, Chief of the | United States Army Staff, very badly ! injured. | : March 27. Gipps, an agent of the Holland-Ameri-i can line at New York, who was arrested I in November for 'violation of inter-State law, admitted -receiving rebates, and was j fined 2000 do! on each of three counts. I A special Democratic Conference; at ; Cannington resolved by a large majority : that' members of the party should join the trade unions, in order to conduct, a vigorous Socialistic campaign. The amal- • gamation of nil unions on the basis of 1 class, not craft, is advocated.. I - NEW YORK, March 26. An explosion of benzine set fire to | Fish's 10-rstorey furniture shop in Chi- | cago. . • Fifteen dead /Bodies have been recovered, including those of five people who leapt from the windows. ■ OTTAWA, March 26. j The Federal authorities in Canada aTe j prosecuting the owners and operators of j numerous-Western elevators on charges ]of making fraudulent /eturns and imj properly blending superior and inferior : grades of grain for foreign markets. CALCUTTA, March 24. 1 The Secretary of Commerce and Inj dustry has introduced a bill in the Legislative Council of Calcutta giving the Government power to. prohibit immigration to any country where the treatment accorded to British Indians does not meet with the ; approval of the GoverhorI general. March 27. j An amended treaty has been signed, | whereby the Maharajah "of Bheehan will j receive 100,000 rupees annually, arid fol- • low the advice of the Government of I Great Britain" in regard to his relations with external States. ' > " • TpKIO, March 25. The murderer of Prince Ito was executed at Port Arthur to-day.