From Many Lands

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 714, 13 July 1929, Page 3

From Many Lands

TABLOID READING FOR THE WEEK-END

THE FLYING GARAGE an unwelcome visit United States forest rangers from j Camille station in the Coronado national forest are opposed to flying buildings, especially sheet iron garages. The report made to the Phoenix j office of the forest service by the j Camille station told of a garage, j carried by a ‘‘very strong whirlwind” j -wooping down upon them as they j were driving a truck near Patagonia, \ and landing close to their vehicle, ac- j companied by a shower of limbs from i trees. “FREEDOM” IN PRISON ESCAPE IN CHIMNEY The prisoner, James Daniel Tidjnarsh, 25, who was supposed to have escaped from Strangeways Gaol was found hiding in the chimney-flue of the blacksmith's shop in the prison. There had been a hue and cry i throughout the country for him. The blacksmith’s shop had bepn \ searched several times, and it is be- | lieved that for nearly 40 hours Tidmarsh had been hiding in a cramped position in the chimney. He was j exhausted when discovered. CHANGING COLOUR LIZARDS. WITH BLUE TAILS Some skinks which have arrived at the London zoo from America have proved a puzzle in nomenclature. Their specific name is the Latin equivalent of "five-lined” but the visitor who tried to identify them by this appellation would fail, for the five lines which characterise the young disappear entirely with maturity. Conspicuous in the young, too, is a bright blue tail, a really beautiful appendage, but the scientist who named them was not tricked by this peculiarity. As the skinks grow up the blue of the tail fades away completely, and the lizard is then a dun-coloured i creature, save for the head, which, with i maturity, becomes vividly scarlet. "DIPLOMATIC LIQUOR” THE EMBASSIES' QUOTA The port of Baltimore is one place 5u the United States where liquor can be unloaded unmolested. To this port is consigned the supply which the foreign legations and embassies are permitted to import for their private use. Stevedores unload the cases, then representatives of the embassies aD(I legations present papers issued by the United States Government and ride away with the trucks to Washington, D. C., in the manner prescribed by the State department. In a recent shipment landed at Baltimore were consignments for envoys of eight foreign nations. Though the prohibition law does not allow the importation of liquor by foreign envoys, the immunity granted them under international law is sufficient to permit importations. The State department requires an attache of the legation to which the liquor is bound to accompany the truck which carries his shipment from Baltimore to the national capital. Under these circumstances there can be no interference by dry agents or policemen.

AN ITALIAN UKASE LONG SKIRTS—OR NO FRIENDS Spare a moment’s pity, you emancipated, short-skirted women of the South, for your sisters in Italy, w'here woe betide the maiden who would expose too much silk-clad leg or a dimpled kuee. Sight of a dainty garter or the tiniest glimpse of the most respectable lingerie is to bring the heavy wrath of Italy’s indignant manhood on the fair offender. A group of young men in Venice has decided to ostracise all women who show their knees. Youths of Genoa have declared bitter war on short skirts. Young men of the Chioggia have taken a solemn oath to cut all their ■women friends whose clothes offend their susceptibilities. The Chioggian youths will not only snub their immodest friends. They are pledged not to enter cafes or bars or restaurants where the waitresses are indecently dressed. Girls whose knees can be seen are seized and a point on the stockings to which their skirts ought to extend is marked in heavy crayon.

KEEPING UP TRADITION LONDON EASTER CUSTOMS From time almost immemorial — certainly going far back into preReformation days—the quaint ceremoney of 21 dames picking up 21 new sixpences from a certain tombstone in St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, London, has been observed on Good Friday. The origin of the custom is obscure, but for at least 500 years it has been punctiliously honoured. Each of the recipients must be a poor widow over 60 years of age. Last 3'oar the oldest participant was 95, and the average age of the 21 was 70 years. Easter eggs are given away to the Worshippers in St. Mary Woolnoth, in the heart of the City of London. This ceremony has been observed at the old church in Lombard Street for nearly 700 years. The custom has been carried out without a break ever since 1235. No two eggs are identical in colouring, but all are alike in one particular, for every egg bears the words of the text from which the rector preaches on Easter Sunday. Many members of the congregation have preserved their eggs for many years, and possess a long record of the church’s Easter texts. The wonderful colouring of these Easter eggs is a carefully guarded secret of tho church.

OMINOUS! ROLLING-PIN CHAMPIONSHIP Mayor AVill A. Brooks, of Ponca City, Oklahoma, believes in giving tlie women a chance. For a Saturday afternoon attraction he has arranged a rolling pin throwing contest, lim- ! ited to married women. The target will be a wife-beater, if ! Mayor Brooks can find one, but if i not, a Ponca City negro who has j been a target in carnival basketball throwing booths has consented to j take a chance for £5 a session. The woman who scores the most i hits will get a box of groceries as a prize. STRANGE DEATH BAG TIED OVER HEAD Witb his head thrust into a mackintosh bag filled with water, EngineerLieutenant Reginald W. Laughten, R.N., was found dead in his cabin at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. Laugbten’s face was in the water, and the strings of the bag had been tied round his neck. Laughten, who was 26, was a wellknown Rugby footballer. He played for the Engineering College, Keyham, j and Dartmouth Athletic. MODERNISING WAGNER AND THREATENED WITH BOMBS All attempts to modernise traditional art products in Germany have invariably met with the same result. "Jazzing” Wagner or other classical composers, or giving “Hamlet” or the time-honoured plays of Schiller up-to-date settings first evoked a widespread interest, which soon turned into disdainful criticism and frequently terminated in vindictive resentment. A typification of the latter instance were violent attacks on Otto Klemperer, one of the conductors of the itate opera, who was threatened w'it.li gas bombs for bringing out Wagner’s “Flying Dutchman” in a glaringly realistic setting. PEANUT PUSHING! A QUAINT PASTIME Undeterred by the fact that he wore | out five goobers (peanuts) and one j knee-pad in pushing 1.1 miles to. ward the summit of Pike’s Peak, Bill ' Williams, the Rio Hondo, Texas, pea-nut-pusher, started out with a fresh j supply of peanuts and bigger, better and softer padding for his stone- | bruised knees. Williams pushed the peanut to the I crest of the peak. He had to reach his j goal in the specified time of 22 days. SMOKERS’ VICTORY GERMAN TRAIN SERVICES The increasing number of xvomen cigarette smokers in Europe has resulted in a ruling by the German State railroads requiring that half the space on every German train shall be designated as smoking compartments. By another ruling directed toward improving the comfort of Germany’s rapidly growing travelling public, a thousand small cushions have just been issued. These will be rented to travellers at a shilling a-piece, fresh linen covers included. FROM RUBBISH MANUFACTURE OF WOOD Adolph Hawerlander, German chemist, has a machine for making wood out of rubbish. At a demonstration in his laboratory he put such things as corn stalks in a revolving drum and sprayed it with a chemical under pressure. Then the waste was pressed under heat. The result was lumber, veneered as desired. The inventor says his product is cheap, strong and more fireproof and waterproof than natural lumber.

A ONE-MAN CRUSADE BUT WIFE NOT A SUPPORTER Charley Zack’s one-man crusade against the Volstead Act finally has exhausted the patience of Mrs. Zack, of Chicago, who has asked for a divorce She said Zack was abstemious when they were married in 1920, a few days before the Prohibition Act became effective. Witb the law in force, however. Zack informed his wife he “knew his rights, and that nobody could tell him what he could drink.” “I am going to drink steadily, the then abstemious Zack was reported as saying, “until this Prohibition law is abolished.”

i Mrs. Zack says she tired of this after j nine years. TRAIN RUNS AMOK BRAKES FAIL TO ACT With the guard helpless in his van, part of a heavily-laden goods train tore out of control down a step gradient near Bristol. A mineral train was approaching a bridge over the road at Westerleigh, when the couplings of a truck near the engine snapped. Thirty-nine trucks and the guard's van began to run backwards. Guard Haves, who was alone in the van, applied the brakes, but they were powerless to hold the heavy trucks, which rushed down the line at increasing speed. \ Flung from side to side in the swaying van, the guard was helpless in the I face of almost certain disaster. Fortunately, automatic catch-points, near Y'ate South Junction, diverted the runaway trucks into a siding, where they crashed through the stop blocks and mounted a bank. Guard Hayes jumped from the van a moment before the impact, and i escaped serious injury. ! A signalman heard the trucks thundering back, and putting his signals at ! danger, ran from his cabin, fearing ! that the train would jump the rails and crash into his box. | Traffic was delayed for some time.