PERSONAL NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3384, 22 January 1919, Page 61

PERSONAL NOTES.

Undoubtedly the most picturesque parliamentary oandidate was Dr Macgrcgor Reid, the chosen Brujd Chief of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Brittany, who was to contest Clapham in the Radical interest. Dr Reid recently appeared in ancient Druid garments amid, the setting of Stonehengc. Ho is a famous scholar, poet, and philosopher, and belongs to An Druid U'iloach Braitherachas, the most ancient of all Druid associations. —'" There must be no idle rich, no idle poor. Unless wo change our habits we shall not be able to meet our war debt,"

says Mr Walter Runciman, M.P., talking of after tho war. A thoughtful student of national life, Mr Runciman is known as the" " Ministerial Peter Pan" on account of his youthful appearance, and looks at least 10 years younger than his actual age. A hard-headed business man, keen on a-clever and witty debater sums him up. —Mr Tim Healy, whose retirement takes from the wit of Parliament, will still continue practice at the Bar, where, also, ho has a reputation for saying biting things. To take one example. He was engaged in an Irish suit in opposition to one of his most pronounced political antagonists, now occupying a high place on the Irish bench. In his address to tho jury this gentleman went to the length of shedding tears, or, at any rate, Mr Healy professed to think so. ' : Gentlemen of the jury," he said in ■-.his own address, " there has been no such 'miracle since Moses struck tho rock." The Bishop ,of London, who is at present visiting the Near East, can always count on an attentive audience. He is a -particularly rousing speaker, and has the -faculty of conveying his enthusiasm to his hearers. Once, however, he was shouted down by his audience, or by the major .portion of the body. It was at a Fulham baby show. " The audience of 200 babies -was the roost trying I have ever faced," said Dr Ingram. ' " They were all right till I began to speak, but no sooner had I begun than they all, with one accord, lifted up their' voices against me." Even when he implored them to give their bishop a chance they were untouched. Signor Bomenico Tordi, Postmastergeneral of Florence, who is a well-known collector of ancient documents, admiring the heroic deeds of the British army in the ,reconquest of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, has sent to 'General Allenby a beautiful collection of reproductions of antique silver, representing the figure of Christ dying for the peace of the world, with the Almighty looking, down from above "upon the Divine sacrifice, while all around is the legend, " Jeroslina pacis fundamentum." Sir Erio Geddes, the First Lord of the Admiralty, i.s quite frank in his dislike of both politics ancl the House of Commons, and wants to get back to his old billet in the North-Eastern railway. He started as a "shunter," and is never happy Unless on the rails. "By the way, Sir Eric must -be our most highly-paid Minister. He draws ' -no salary as First Lord, but gets £SOOO a year from the North-Eastern railway. •As - this and all other railways are now Government controlled, he is really drawing his income" from the State. In addition to the £BCOO, he'has a beautiful residence free at the Admiralty. , —One of the many people who have done remarkable and too-little-known service during the war is Mr Solomon J. Solomon He has just been elected president \>f the' Royal Society of British Artists, but his war-work has been as a camouffago export. His studio contains a very large number of photographs, i drawings, and models which have been of/the greatest use to the military authorities. Mr Solomon it was who discovered the German habit of covering whole .fields with -netting strewn with hay, beneath which diyisons could shelter unobserved. He also improved our own methods of providing imitation buildings with imitation shadows —thus defying detection altogether. —Mr John MacCbrmack, the. famous tenor, who ranks with Caruso as one of tho highest-paid singers of the world, was recently serving as an -army cook on Salisbury Plain, and probably. no one enjoyed the humour of the contrast more than MaoOormack himself. For he "loves one up against himself." as he remarked once at the Covent Garden Opera House. And then he told this one: "As a oollege boy my voice was in demand for the, college ooncerts, and, being by birth an Irishman, I, with true patriotic spirit, sang an Irish song at one of these. Later I interviewed Biddy, our Irish cook, to whom I had given a ticket for the entertainment. ' Oh, sure, sir, you did sing beautifully,' she said; .'but why ever did you sing in'a foreign language? I did not know a word of it.' Crushing criticism, indeed, but it was a forcible lesson in elocution, and one that I have laid to heart." Willard E. Case, whose researches in the field of electricity won him recognition in scientific circles both in the United States and abroad, died recently _ at his home in Auburn, New _York,_ a victim of influenza. Case was a millionaire, a fact to which may be attributed the lay public's unfamilianty with his scientific achievements, for he never attempted to capitalise or commercialise his remarkable discoveries. Several years ago it was announced that his efforts to solve the problem of "looking up life " had resulted in a number of important discoveries which would have a far-reaching effect on civilisation. These discoveries, it was said, concerned the effect of low temperature on the beginning of life, both plant and animal. They were accepted by the Royal Society of London, but were sealed up at behest of the experimenter, who explained that their disclosure at that time might bo too great a tax on the credulity _of tho lay mind. Mr Case also made somo important discoveries along the line of conserving the power of tho sun's rays and tho transmission of black and white photography by wire, In which he was assisted by his son, Theodoro W. Case. He had a wellequipped laboratory, in which ho worked out many of his theories.