NEWS BY CABLE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3882, 7 August 1928, Page 49

NEWS BY CABLE.

BRITAIN S UNEMPLOYED. RUGBY, July 31. On July 23 the total number of unemployed was 1,282,900. This was 35,468 more than the week before, and 253,998 more than the year before. THE COTTON INDUSTRY, LONDON, August 2. The threatened Lancashire cotton lockout was averted by the spinner, Ackley, rejoining the union on certain undisclosed terms. AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE. RUGBY, August 3. Sir William Tyrrell, the new British Ambassador to France, was received at Rambouillet to-day by President Doumergue, to whom he presented his letters of credit. CHANGING CHINA. PEKING, August 2. The Mayor of Hoehichung has issued orders that within three weeks the pigtails of male Chinese must be severed and women under 30 must bob their hair and cease binding their feet. Offenders will be fined. MR STANLEY BALDWIN. RUGBY, August 3. The Prime Minister (Mr Stanley Baldwin ) who celebrates his sixty-first birthday to-day, is spending the first portion of his summer holiday in his Worcestershire home. He will leave for Aix-les-Bains at the end of next week. HEAVY MOTOR CARS. RUGBY, August 1. The Minister of Transport (Lieuten-ant-colonel Ashley announced in Parliament that the legal maximum speed for heavy motor cars fitted with pneumatic tyres would be raised from 12 to 20 miles an hour from October 1. COSTLY DIAMONDS. PARIS, August 1. Diamonds worth £400.000, the property of the Belgian Government; were recovered from the wreck of the Belgian steamer Elizabethville, which was torpedoed off Belle Isle in 1917, while en route to Congo. The Havre salvagers will receive 60 per cent, of the value of the pearls.

ORDER OF ST. JOHN. LONDON, July 30. A delegation of the Order of St. John, headed by Sir John Hewett, ’s going to Australia on the Oronsay on October 27. The delegation will spend nine days in each capital, co-ordinate the work of the St. John Ambulance Association, and will consider a great charter for full selfgovernment to the Australian and New Zealand Orders. BOVRIL AUSTRALIAN ESTATES. LONDON, August 3. Bovril Australian Estates announces that the severe drop in the value of cattle in North Australia occasioned a net loss for the year of £203,328. A scheme of reconstruction proposes to cancel the whole of the deferred shares and 15s a share on the preferred ordinary, and to make a new issue" of 824,464 deferred 5s shares. A REMARKABLE TRAGEDY. VANCOUVER, August 3. An amazing tragedy occurred at the office of the News Tribune at Waco (Texas). Mrs Robert Ashworth, wife of the cashier of the newspaper, appeared, and, without uttering a word, fired two shots at her husband’s secretary (Charlotte Lowson), killing her instantly. Mrs Ashworth then drank poison and administered doses to her two young daughters, who were with her, the three dying before they reached the hospital.

H.M.S. DIOMEDE. LONDON, August 3. The New Zealand cruiser Diomede, which has been paid off, was partly recommissioned on June 19. She is at present refitting pending receipt of the remainder’ of her complement. She will leave Portsmouth fqr New Zealand via Panama on September 4, arriving in the middle of November. - The repairs to the submarines Otway and . Oxley at Malta dockyard should be completed on September 3. They are expected to Ire seaworthy early in No vember. BRITISH RAILWAYS. RUGBY, July 30. Referring in a speech yesterday to the railway settlement, which was reached on Friday, Mr J. H. Thomas said he believed that the agreement presented the right policy. He recognised that the proper care and development of the railway companies was as much the concern of the humblest platelayer as it was of the chairman of the board of directors. For the first time, not only in railway history, but in the history of industrial labour, an agreement setting out in black and white the terms, which included an all-round sacrifice, had been reachd.

MYSTERIOUS EPIDEMICS. LONDON, August 3. Following a recent mysterious epidemic in the ranks of the Metropolitan police, which is still unsolved, and resulted in one death, an extraordinary outbreak occurred among army officers stationed at Chatham. Fifteen, including Captain C. G. Martin, V.C.. and three holders of the D.S.O. were taken to hospital after attending a dance. They were suffering from acute throat trouble and tonsilitis. Six women guests were similarly affected.

Simultaneously a mild epidemic, variously described as enteric fever and paratyphoid, was reported from several districts in the London area. Three outbreaks have certain features in common, and the food supplies are being analysed.

ELSIE MACKAY FUND

LONDON, July 31.

Lord Inchcape is desirous that the Elsie Mackay Fund of £500,000, which he and his family gave to the nation, should. not be the object of complaint by any other sufferer from the transatlantic disaster in which the Hon. Elsie Mackav lost her life, and has given the Chancellor of the Exchequer a further £lO,OOO to meet such complaint as the Chancellor deems Ct. The Chancellor has handed over the amount to the Public Trustee for administration accordingly. LONDON, August 3. Her solicitors state that Mrs Hinchcliffe will receive the bulk of Lord Inchcape’s gift of £lO,OOO next week. The deductions will total about £lOO on account of the claims of minor creditors. INFLAMED MEXICO. MEXICO CITY, August 2. Americans here fear a reign of blood with terrible reprisals before General Obregon’s assassination is expiated. The attorney-general (Senor Nieto), in a formal statement, asserts that Jose Toral belonged to an organisation led by the Abbess Maria Conception. “ I am convinced,” declares Senor Nieto, that this group of individuals who directly or indirectly participated in General Obregon’s murder belonged to a terrorist organisation headed by none other than the Abbess Maria, an intelligent woman who has been trying to mislead justice. This organisation resembles the Russian nihilist, and some Italian associations formed to attempt the life of Mussolini.” DEFRAUDING A CASINO. LONDON, August 1. A colossal attempt to defraud the municipal casino at San Jen, where the stakes are the highest in the world, and break the roulette bank was discovered when Jean Ferri, an engineer, of Milan, was dramatically arrested in the roulette room after it had closed for the night. The night watchman caught Ferri inserting a piece of a magnet in one of the roulette wheels. Investigation revealed that Ferri had arranged with the croupier, who was also arrested, to use ivory balls with metal centres, which would be attracted by the magnet, thus allowing him to forecast with certainty the number where the ball would come to rest. It is estimated that the casino would have lost £lOO,OOO in a night.

THE FOREIGN SECRETARY. LONDON, August 3. Sir Austen Chamberlain’s ill-health is causing anxiety. He was obviously ill during his House of Commons speech on Monday, and he has been in bed since. He is not making satisfactory progress. The doctor’s bulletin states thai Sir Austen Chamberlain is suffering from a mild attack of broncho pneumonia. There is no cause for anxiety. RUGBY, August 3. An official announcement is made that Sil Austen Chamberlain is suffering from a mild attack of pneumonia but is progressing satisfactorily, and his condition gives no cause for anxiety. Sir Austen Chamberlain hopes to have sufficiently recovered to be able to leave at the end of the month for Paris and Geneva.

DECIDING CHINA’S FATE. SHANGHAI, July 31. The fifth plenary session of the Kuomintang Central Executive will be opened to-morrow, and the deliberations should decide China’s fate. Excepting the congress of the whole party it is the most powerful body in the country, and is able to make or unmake Ministers, while even generals hesitate to challenge its will.

A sinister figure at the conference is Changeching Liang, an arch intriguer. Though crippled by disease to such an extent that he must be carried everywhere, he is a man of indomitable energy and a master of chicanery. Should he succeed in dictating the formation of a Cabinet of his own appointees he will be virtually the uncrowned Emperor of China.

TREATMENT OF CANCER. LONDON, July 24. Are we any nearer a cure for cancer T Has the International Conference, which has just been concluded, given a new message of hope to humanity? Sir Thomas Horder, physician to the Prince of Wales, specially summed up the position for the Daily Mad. “ I

think,” he said, “ that so far as con ferences ever accomplish anything, this has been as successful as any I have known. 1 believe a definite advance has been made toward finding a cure for cancer.

‘ Perhaps th e most importane lesson 18 .., . le m °st successful treatment s j. I’ es * n the sphere of surgery and radiology, and we cannot throw over known methods of dealing with the disease for those whose value has still to be demonstrated. We are still much m the dark.”

THE CANADIAN HARVEST. RUGBY, August 1. The Dominions Secretary stated in the House of Commons to-day that arrangements had been made in consultation with the Canadian Government, under which 10,000 men were to be assisted to go to Canada from this country for work in connection with the Canadian harvest, which was now proceeding. By agi cement with the shipping and railway companies special reduced rates at half the ordinary fares were offered. 1 he. Canadian Government had expressed a wish that the men should be recruited from the mining areas, and the British Government was offering special nelp to suitable men in eases where they could not find the cost of the outward journey. The Canadian Govemument would try to find work for the men at the close of the harvest, and those who wished to return would have special rates given them.

VALUABLE GEMS. t, .. PARIS, August 1. Italian divers hxve recovered a steel chest containing 13,000 carats of diamonds and quantities of other precious stones, valued at £1,250,000, from the wreck of the Belgian steamer Elizabethville, which was sunk by a German submarine in 1917, and which has been lying m 40 fathoms off Belle Isle. It was known that the precious stones were m the captain’s cabin, and French trawlers undertook to search for the wreck last May, but were unsuccessful whereupon the Italian salvage ship Artigho, specially fitted for deep-sea work, was ordered from her base at Genoa. An Italian diver located the wreck on June 26, and traced the captains cabin a week later It was necessary to pierce the deck and force a way rough the iron debris by submarine charges, one of which dislodged the chest which it was feared was lost irretrievably.. The divers, however, continued directing the Artiglio’s electromagnet lifts of thirty tons, and discovered the chest yesterday. SLEEPING SICKNESS. ■ LONDON, August 1. Vaccination is one of the causes of sleeping sickness, according to an important report by the Ministry of Health, which states: “In our opinion the available evidence acquits the vaccina virus of being the sole cause of encephalitis, but we are unable to exonerate the vaccine from playing some part .m its causation. Diseases under the heading of encephalitis include that known as sleeping sickness ” The report adds: “Recently there has evidence here and abroad, especially in Holland, that acute disease of the central nervous system, characterised in the main by symptoms indicative of encephalitis, has occasionally followed vaccination. The occurrence of this nervous disease, however seldom it may ?fp Ur .’ 18 w f f erious im Port, and cannot fai. to affect vaccination, both in the administrative and purely medical aspects Early infancy remains the best time tor primary vaccination ”

MR RAMSAY MACDONALD. m, , QUEBEC, August 3. T fo ’' raer Prime Minister (Mr Ramsay MacDonald) and his three daughters have arnvedd here on a tour of Canada from coast to coast. T . QUEBEC, August 4. In an interview Mr Ramiay Maconald said that the railway agreement was not a reduction because the employees accepted the former wages, getting permanent instead of irregular work. Commenting on the elections, he said tnat the Conservatives were decidedly due for a hard blow. They hrwl done nothing towards utilising the country’s natural resources and attempting a real solution of the unemployment problem. Immigration was the best way at present. The trouble was that Canada wanted the cream, leaving Britain the derelicts, old and diseased. The situation called for the Governments putting their cards on the table and finding a solution. The Liberals would make no headway at the elections, and Labour was under a handi cap; as the Conservatives had organised for a strong campaign, and the newspapers were behind them.

BACHELOR BISHOPS. LONDON, August 4. The Bishop of Norwich, who is 65 years of age, announces his engagement to Miss Joan Ryder, aged 25. She has been acting as his secretary for the last few months. Interest is added to the announcement by the wide publicity lately given to the fact that there are nine bachelor bishops in England—namely, the Bishop of London, who recently visited Australia, and the Bishops of Norwich. Southwark, Truro, Ripon, Worcester, Oxford, and Salisbury, and finally, most significant of all, Dr Lang, the Arch-bishop-cleet of Canterbury. Miss Winifred Graham, the novelist, entering into public discussion on the subject, said that bachelorhood is a disease

that is spreading. 'The church is setting a bad example, and some protest must be made. Why are they bachelors? If they think marriage handicaps career or intellectual development why are bishops always the first to cry “ Hands off the home,” and to talk of the sanctity of home life, and advocate large families? What foolish creatures these bishops are! A bachelor has no one to point out his faults, and no one but a wife dare tell a bishop that his sermons are overlong, or that he is vain and pompous. SIR GEORGE WILLS. LONDON, August 3. The estate of Sir George Wills, formerly chairman of the Imperial Tobacco Company, who died last month, has been provisionally sworn at £10,000,000. LONDON, August 4. The Exchequer will benefit to the extent of £4,000,000 from Sir George Wills’s estate under the maximum death duty rate of 40 per cent. After legacies have been paid to relatives, employees, and charities, the residuary estate will be left between his children. Amongst large fortunes left in recent years were the following:—

SHIP’S LOADLINES. RUGBY, July 31. The president of the Board of Trade was asked in the House of Commons what action the Government was taking in pursuance of its policy of promoting international uniformity in the matter of ships’ loadlines.

Sir Philip Cunliffe-Listcr replied that the rules relating to ships’ loadlines were being revised by the committee, and the revised rules would be sent to the dominion and foreign Governments for consideration. Every effort was being made to secure an international agreement, but it was too early yet to say what the precise alterations would be.

The Minister added that this subject was not one which in the ordinary course would go before the committee of the League of Nations. The president of the Board of Trade was asked about the overloading of ships at certain ports, especially ships engaged in the American coastal trade. He replied that the Board of Trade had been collecting information on the manner in which ships were loaded in different trades, and he had received a statement to the effect that over-loauing of ships took place in certain trades. What action could be taken was being carefully considered in the interest of the merchant service. After the Board of Trade had been in consultation with the shipping authorities he hoped to be able to make a statement. POLAND AND LITHUANIA. LONDON, August 2. Reports from Poland and Lithuania indicate a highly inflammable situation, which is believed for the first time to be causing anxiety in official circles in London. WARSAW, August 2. Telegrams from points along the Polish. Lithuanian frontier record further incidents including shooting, destruction, and the removal of boundary posts within Polish territory, while considerable movements of Lithuanian troops have been observed. A Lithuanian powder magazine exploded at Alida with numerous casualties. Polish newspapers are apprehensive concerning Lithuania’s future actions.’ LONDON, August 3. Warsaw reports that the Polish press continues to refer to movements of Lithuanian troops on the frontier, and alleges that four infantry regiments are massed in one sector and large detachments of irregulars at others. The Lithuanian authorities are acting in a provocative manner by printing and distributing thousands of leaflets in which they assure the population that the army of irregulars is strong enough to defend them against attacks of the Polish armies. LONDON, August 4. In spite of Lithuanian secrecy it is believed that the explosion at the chief arsenal at Olida was very serious, and that nine were killed and 60 injured. Practically all the country’s munitions were destroyed. Treachery is suspected. WARLIKE PROPAGANDA. LONDON, July 31. The special correspondent of the Daily Express, who spent some weeks in Italy, says that warlike feeling is rife throughout the country. He does not believe that Signor Mussolini wants to risk war, which, if it went wrong, would end Fascism, but he wonders whether the Duce will be strong enough to check the people, who are being fed on warlike propaganda. Fascist and non-Fascist Italy alike are waiting for an opportunity to fight Serbia. Italian children are being taught

to regard France as effete and decayed, and that her possessions must come to Italy, and also that Britain is on her last legs, but for the time being they must be friendly towards Britain owing to the British Navy. The feeling against Jugo-Slavia is a real danger to the peace of Europe. The Serbs will not fight at present because they are without heavy artillery. The recent disturbances in Jugo-Slavia show the extent to which anti-Italian feeling has gone. The nationalistic feeling in Venice is comparable only to that in Berlin in 1913-14. There is a movement to separate Montenegro from Jugo-Slavia, and one of the Queen’s brothers is ready to declare himself King of that countrv when Mussolini says the word. This will supply a match to the smouldering fires in the Balkans.

The Italian press is demanding the return of Corsica, Nice, Savoy and Malta to Italv.

THE BRITISH LEGION. _ LONDON, August 4. The British Army of Peace has begun its pilgrimage to the battlefields for the anniversary of the outbreak of war. Thirty-six special trains are bringing 11,000 members of the legion from the provinces to Dover and Harwich, and 12 steamers have been chartered for the cross-channel trip. The majority are men who made the same journey in khaki years ago, and are now revisiting places which the valour of the Empire’s armies made memorable. Others will be parents paying their first' visit to their sons’ graves, as the newspapers say all are going to pray that war will never return to trouble the earth.

The pilgrims will be billeted in concentration towns in Northern France and Belgium. Sunday will be devoted to private exploration of the battlefields. On Monday there will be an impressive ceremony on Vimy Ridge, and on Tuesday they will go to Bethune, where the Prince of Wales will join the assembly for the anniversary of the great stand which checked the German advance. Prince Charles of Belgium will meet the legionaries at the Belgian frontier on Wednesday. Then the pilgrims will march in relays to Ypres for the great memorial service at Menin Gate, to be addressed by the Archbishop of York. A message from Paris states that the quiet dignity of the pilgrimage arrangements has made a most favourable impression.

PARIS, August 4. A luncheon by General Gouraud began the visit of the British Legion to the Paris proceedings. It was informal in conformity with the Flanders proceedings. Colonel Crosfield, the chairman, broadcast a speech of thanks and greetings.

OBITUARY. LONDON, July 16. The death is announced of Miss Lottie Venne, the well-known actress, at the age of 76. She made her first appearance in public in 1867, and in her long career played many notable roles. Miss Lottie Venne became seriously ill last October, after a seizure in her home in St. John’s Wood, London, and she was taken to the Hampstead General Hospital. Her first appearance was in 1867, as Miss Carbonnel in “ A Dream of Venice,” and her last appearance was in 1924, at the Queen’s Theatre, London, as the Duchess of Penny in “ The Claimant.” She was born in 1852, and in 1868 made a reputation in burlesque. Since then she has appeared in a very large number of parts, in drama, burlesque, farce, comedy. She played in a fi. st production of a burlesque by Gilbert A. Beckett and Sir W. S. Gilbert, with Mrs John Wood and Sir Charles Hawtrey, and Sir Lewis Waller. In 1917 she appeared in the all-star cast of “ The Man from Blankley’s,” in aid of KingGeorge’s Pension Fund for Actors. NEW YORK, July 30. The death is announced of Mr Thomas Barlow Walker, lumberman, philanthropist, and art collector. He was the richest man west of the Mississippi, his fortune exceeding £20,000,000. He was 89 years of age. BRISBANE, July 31. The death is announced of Mr E. B. C. Corser, a member of the House of Representatives; aged 75. CAPETOWN, August 2. The death is announced at Kenya of Rear-admiral Blunt from blackwater fever. Rear-admiral Blunt, who was born in 1870, was placed on the retired list in 1921. He was captain on the Gloucester at the Battle of Jutland on May 31, 1916, and was commended in despatches.

Sir David Yule, estimated.. £10,000,000 Sir George Wills Lady Strathcona and Mount 10,000,000 Royal 0,749,231 Sir R. Houston 6,000,000 Lord Glentanar 4,042,263 Viscount Bearsted 4,000,000 Viscount Cowdrav 4,000,000 Mr William A. Coats .. .. 3,922,664 Mr Peter Coats 2,526,270 Sir E. A. Hambro 2,323,710 Sir E. Hulton 2,222,471 Earl of Dunraven 1,962,971 Mrs E. A. Douglas-Hamilton 1,755,795 Sir Robert Jardine 1,5.47,203 Mr W. Fox Tibbitts .. .. 1,522,687 Mr J. S. Thomas 1,246,676 Sir Alfred Haslam 1,064,394 Marquis of Landsdowne.. .. 1,044'613