MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 3865, 10 April 1928, Page 61

MULTUM IN PARVO.

—Of our men over 80 per cent, are unfitted to be soldiers, according to a recent statement by Dr John Fawcett. —Sufficient electricity to light the Sussex village of Heathfield is obtained in the process of burning chalk to make lime. —Words to the number of 500 per minute can be sent over a new cable nowworking between London and New York. —Charges in nursing homes in the West End of London may be as much as 30 guineas a week, with all sorts of extras. —The complete edition of the Bible, printed in Braille type, fills 38 volumes and weighs Ifcwt. —Butter imported from Denmark nowbears, in the majority of cases, a stamped device showing the date of its manufacture. —ln some people the arteries have begun to harden at the age of 40, while with others this process does not begun until 55. —A lock of hair, brought forward and twisted into the initial of the owner and fixed on the forehead with pomade, is a new form of coiffure. - —Painted on a piece of apron calico, a painting by a London plumber was recently exhibited in a London show and bought by a well-known expert. —ln the new Devonshire House. London’s newest block of palatian flats, there are 14 lifts, a bank within the building, and separate bathrooms to all bedrooms. —An American has been ordered to pay £25,000 for killing an Alsatian dog called Peter the Great, which acted for kinematograph Jilms. —Fire alarms newly installed in Edinburgh's streets work on loud-speaker principles. Once the glass is broken it is only necessary to call into the instrument. *-—Madagascar’s surplus crocodiles are to be skinned for bookbinding and shoe leather. Their fat is to be used in the treatment of rheumatism and other diseases. —Official figures show that, in round numbers, 31,550,000 persons in Great Britain and Northern Ireland come under the Contributory Pensions Act, passed in 1925. —Motor cars are being used in Los Angeles to take bees out to districts full of flowers. If the experiment succeeds it is hoped to increase greatly the production of honey. —Although Britain compares favourably in military flying with any other country, it is far behind Germany in civil aviation. One German company alone has at least 140 air liners.

- —Aeroplanes are beginning to replace the dog teams of romance in carrying mails in Canada during winter. Each ’plane will have a capacity of 15001 b of mail. —Monastries or convents do not exist in Norway or Sweden, where they are forbidden by law. —All the speed records for aeroplane, steamship, submarine, railway, motor car, and motor cycle are held by Great Britain.’ —The oldest railway in the world, the Mumbles Railway at Swansea, is to be I. electrified. It was opened in 1807, and for 70 years horse-drawn trains plied its five-mile track. —A new type of camera, with plates sensitive to light* rays invisible to the human eye, can take pictures through tlie thickest cloud or fog. —A hunted fox taking refuge in a cottage near Market Drayton was protected bv an old man in the house, but was afterwards killed by the North Staffordshire hounds. —Vegetarian weddings are being encouraged by the French Society of Vegetarians. The society has organised a series of functions where young lovers of vegetables can start their courtships. —Everything, from handling luggage to cleaning and cooking, will be done by electricity on a new ship being built in Belfast. There are 140 miles of cables and wires used aboard her. —The value of Kenya’s coffee crop shows a 20 per cent, increase over that of 1926, and the industry is steadily advancing. according to the acting director of agriculture of the colony. —There are more living organisms in a saltspoonful of soil than the total number of men. women, and children in the whole of Europe. —Small square islands with electrically heated metal foot-plates for traffic policemen to stand on in cold weather have been installed in Riga (Lithuania). —A heavy lorry with thin solid rubber tyres, travelling fast on a country road, might deliver blows on its surface with its wheels with as great a force as 35 tons. —ln the last 21 years long-distance flying has advanced from the non-stop record made by Wright in 1903 of Ss2ft to that of Chamberlain in 1927 of 3905 miles. —Central heating is fitted to a new aeroplane built for use in Newfoundland for “ spotting ” seals. It is possible for the pilot to dispense with gloves when flying. —Although there is no such thing technically in Britain as- imprisonment for debt. 2386 debtors were imprisoned during 1926. This is a decrease on the figure (2632) of 1925. —Figures show that the world is much healthier than it was 16 years ago, in spite of the war years. The death rate of America, for instance, has fallen from 15 per 1000 in 1910 to 12.1 in 1926. —The artificial silk industry employs 17,700 more people to-day than .in 1923. On the other hand, the general engineering and iron and steel industry employs 66,550 fewer hands than four years ago. —The burning of coal in the City of London and neighbourhood was a punishable offence in the fourteenth century, one man actually being executed for disobeying the order forbidding the use of sea-coal. —Chiefs of the British Army and Navy are apt to marry later in' life than politicians and lawyers. Mr Baldwin and Mr Lloyd George both took wives at the age of 25, while Earl Haig was 44 and Earl Jellicoe 43 before they entered the married state. —ln the hope of permanently extinguishing the Santiago volcano, engineers have dumped thousands of tons of earth into the crater, and appear to have thus extinguished the burning sulphur bed. The volcano has ruined a quarter of Nicaragua’s coffee crop for years by its poisonous fumes.