MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 3854, 24 January 1928, Page 62

MULTUM IN PARVO.

—A monument is now on its way to the Antarctic for erection over Shackleton’s grave. — The old roof of a Gloucestershire barn near Tetbury has gone to America packed in crates. —A dog lived for a week under a station platform at London Bridge. — The heart of the average adult is about sin long, 3Jin broad, and 2Jin thick.

— Derby (England) Corporation has refused to allow greyhound racing on any corporation ground. — There are more than. 7000 islands in the Philippine Archipelago, of which only 2440 are named. —Among the Santhals, marriages take place at night, and the bride is conveyed to her husband in a basket.

—A newly-born boy baby has now an expectation of life of about 55J years, compared with 48 J 21 years ago. — Sir Jesse Boot has given a, playing field of about 13 acres to the people of Jersey, and will lay out the ground at his own cost.

— Circulating among the inmates, Wakefield Prison, England, has its own weekly newspaper. Contributions from the prisoners are encouraged. — Tonnage of vessels entering and leaving the Port of London last year increased by 2,213,198 to 49,278,172. This is the highest figure ever recorded. — The Saracen’s Head Inn at King’s Norton, England, in which the wife of Charles Stuart stayed, has been given a license) to the parish church. —A Zulu woman may not call her husband by his name, either when addressing or when speaking of him to others. She must use the phrase “ father of So-and-so.”

— Since 1870 the average death-rate in England and Wales has fallen from 22 per 1000 to 12 per 1000. The decrease in the infantile death-rate in the same period has been from 156 to 75 per 1000 births. •

— Two girls roller-skated from London to Brighton, a distance of 52 miles. —A seabird was killed in England by dashing into the lamp of a policeman’s bicycle.

-—A band of 24 boy pipers from a school at Dumblane has sailed for Canada on a five years’ contract to play in lumber camps. —A five-valve portable set with loud-, speaker is at the disposal of travellers in a motor coach now running in Monmouthshire, England. — Tire If.M.S. Railway’s train Royal Scot now makes the world’s record nonstop run of 299 miles between London and Carlisle in less than six hours. — While digging in Cheapside, London, a workman sent the point of his pick through one of the pneumatic tubes which carry telegrams, and for a while stopped the service.

—Mr L. Davy, an Islington (England) licensed victualler, recently received a picture postcard, sent to him by his brother on September 12, 1908. The writer has been dead for 15 years. — Houses built in England averaged 60,000 a year before the war. but by the end of December, 1927, nearly 230,000 houses had been constructed for that year alone.

— Using only a penknife and a pair of Scissors, 3lr T. Keane, of New Cross, England, has made a model, sft long, of Southwark Cathedral, with surrounding buildings, as it appeared in 1540. — Rats are estimated to consume food worth £/0.000,000 in Great Britain every year.

— Burnley. England, may have as its first Labour Mayor Councillor Harry Lees, who is a window-cleaner.

— The helmet of a Roman legionary of 2000 years ago was found recently by a peasant of Chamosen, in the Swiss Valais. More than 8,500,000 Bibles were circulated last year by the British and Foreign Bible Society, which now uses 311 languages in its work. — England’s third largest bell, known as Big Peter, has just been returned to York Minster after being recast. It stands Bft high and weighs nearly 11 tons. We have to make people ashamed of having flies in their homes, said an authority on these pests at a recent conference in England. . England’s national stock of cows is increasing; it is 82,000 higher than it was two years ago. Cats are subject to comparatively few diseases, and fewer still of these are of a contagious nature. — The largest halibut ever landed at any west coast fishing port was brought to Fleetwood, England, recently. It weighed 3291 b.

A spider an inch long, carrying its young in a circular nest between its legs, was found in a banana branch sent to England from abroad.

— There are in England 46,822 blind persons, of whom 31,667 are unemployable, one-third of the unemployable being Over 70 years of age. , — A British workman recently dived into a canal and saved a drowning boy. After the rescue he still held in his mouth the pipe he had been smoking. ; — Catching fish by electricity is being tried in Rhineland. The process consists of electrifying the water in a given stretch so that the stunned fish rise to the surface.

—A fruitgrower in South Germany had tried everything he could think of to frighten off birds, but without success. He has now put a loud-speaker in his orchard—and every bird shuns it. , . —The first dwelling house built entirely of steel has been erected at Duisburg, Germany. It four rooms and a narrow passage. It has no staircase, and to reach the attic a ladder has to be used;

— The annual requirements of the railways of Great Britain include 16,000,000 tons of coal, 210,000 tons of steel rails, 17,000,000 cubic feet of timber, 4,000,000 sleepers, 21,000.000 bricks, 9000 tons of paint and varnish, 62.000 tons of oil, and 4,000,000 yards of cloth for staff uniforms. — The males keep house among the rare Arctic surf birds. Though this bird has been known to science for 150 years, the first nest and eggs were found only recently on Mount M'Khdey, Alaska. From the bird’s breeding habits, it is now known that not only does the father bird hatch the eggs, but he defends them far more valiantly than does the female.