From Many Lands

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 986, 31 May 1930, Page 21

From Many Lands

TABLOID READING FOR THE WEEK-END.

A FUTURE KAYE-DON BOY OF 12 AT WHEEL A 12-year-old Westcliff boy was summoned at Southend-on-Sea, England, for driving a car without a licence. The Chief Constable said that to find a boy of such tender years at the wheel of a big touring car was a shocking thing. The boy was ordered to pay the costs, but his father was fined £2 for aiding and abetting. MUSICAL RECORD SET BY BLIND PIANIST Josef Goedel, 26, blind pianist, recently broke the world's record for continuous piano playing by thumping out Vienna waltzes for S 9 hours. He finally stopped on his doctor’s orders when his playing became unduly tonal and the player began talking about people who don’t exist. The previous record of 86 hours was held by Geza Ledowsky, also a Viennese player. FELINE PICAROON DIRECTS OTTER BANDITS A story of a swaggering tomcat c° Portland, U.S.A., named Thernistocles and his cut-throat crew of seven otters, who live beneath a houseboat on Souvies Island in the Columbia River, was brought to the State Game Commission recently by Frank Ruthman, sportsman, who asked that the otters be captured and removed. Ruthman said the tomcat and his pals made life miserable for Ruthman’s call duck flock. THE LENIN LIBRARY THIRD LARGEST IN WORLD. Revised plans for a new Lenin library, the third largest public building in the world, have been submitted to the Council of People’s Commissars for approval. The architect is the famous Professor Shuko. The library will contain several million volumes Excavation work will start this summer. The present Lenin Library has long been inadequate. Last year more than 1,000,000 requests for books were received. RACE AGAINST TIME WOMAN BOARDS WRONG TRAIN. After an exciting 30-mile dash from Bolton to Liverpool, completed in an hour and a-quarter, a woman boarded the s.s. Caronia bound for New York, recently, just as the last gangway was being withdrawn. She was Miss Mary Murphy (20), of Poultou-le-Fylde, near Blackpool, who in her excitement boarded the wrong train from home. At Bolton she alighted, and offered £2 to a taxi-driver, if he could reach Liverpool, in time to catch the boat. There was a stir among the crowd on the landing-stage when her cry was heard, and way was made for her to get aboard. From the promenadedeck she waved and smiled her joy at winning her race against time. AERONAUTIC BRAKES GREATER CONTROL OF PLANE A new Moth 111. two-seater monoplane, fitted with air brakes, has been successfully tested at Stag Lane Airdrome, Edgware, Middlesex, by Capl. Geoffrey de Havilland, the airplane designer, and Capt. Broad, the airman. The brakes enable tlie machine to descend at a steeper angle and land in the restricted space of IGO yards square. The braking effect is produced when the pilot manipulates a lever which turns the streamline legs of the undercarriage broadside on to the direction of flight. This increases the resistance to the air and the machine is slowed down. AMATEUR DRUMMER WOMAN AGED 83 YEARS Lady Emily Hart Dyke, aged S 3, Lullingstone Castle, Eynsford, Kent, played the side-drums at a special matinee performance of “Marigold” at the St. James’s Theatre in aid of Mrs. Baldwin’s effort to raise £40,000 for providing maternity hospitals with anesthetics for mothers. Lady Emily Dyke has been playing the drums for 30 years, and is one of the best amateur drummers in the country. DANGEROUS FELLOWS SPIT AT KEEPERS Keepers in the London Zoo reptile house made certain that there were no cuts ou their hands, and put on goggles, when they transferred three i pitting cobras from travelling cases. The cobras, though only half-grown and two feet long, are able to spit venom from four to five feet. “They are nice and lively,” the head keeper said. “It is nasty if the venom enters cuts or the eyes, but otherwise they are harmless. INFANT PRODIGY TALKS AT FOUR MONTHS West Australia’s latest prodigy is a four months’ old baby, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Stone, Hay Street, Perth. Seen by a Press representative the baby, who is a husky youngster with a great sense of humour, distinctly said “Mumma.” "Daddy” and “Harry,” the Christian name of his father, and he is now struggling to say “Hullo” and “Tata." Perth doctors consider that the child is absolutely normal in every way, is physically perfect, and has a very high mental development. In local medical knowledge there is no record of any child ever having articulated words at such an early age.

OSSIFIED MAN MUSCLES TURN TO BONE A disease in which the patient’s muscles gradually transform into bones, until he dies in pain, is baffling science. A Prague charity hospital patient was brought in 12 years ago suffering from influenza. Inflammation of the hips followed, and cartilaginous growths were found between the hip sinews. These could be removed by surgery; but later more and more muscles were transformed into bones, without the physicians finding any remedy. Now the patient has not left his bed for four years; and can only move his fingers and his toes. PISCATORIAL UNDERGRADS PROMISING READERS Fish can read, or at any rate they have mastered their A.B.C. Professors at a Berlin University who have had fish in their reading classes have found them promising pupils. First they were taught to distinguish colours. Food was placed in variously coloured bags and dangled in the aquarium. The fish learned to swim to the bag containing their favourite food, and to open it by pulling a string. The savants then attached letters of the alphabet to bags, which were all of the same colour. In time the fish learned to pick out the bag containing their particular fancy by the letter, and even to distinguish the letter R from B. CHAMELEON-LIKE OWL WHICH IS “ADJUSTABLE” An “adjustable” owl is on view at the London Zoo for the first time. It is known as a European Scops Owl, and, though insignificant in size, being normally less than six inches high, it is regarded as a great rarity. The colour and markings of its plumage are like those of a tree trunk. When at rest the owl elongates its body and sits motionless In such a position that it resembles the stump of a branch. But a remarkable change comes over it when alarmed. It blows out its body, which visibly grows in size like a toy balloon being inflated. The bird is then almost globular in shape and quite unlike its elongated self. AN ANCIENT PEST LOCUSTS ON THE MOVE Wav against 500 square miles of locusts was recently declared by Palestine local authorities. The insects in incredible numbers “marched out of the desert of Sinai and the advance hosts soon reached the district south of Beersheba. It was the most tremendous invasion of locusts ever recorded in Palestine. Nearly 3,000 men, witli headquarters at Beersheba, were recruited for the war. LOST COLLAR BUTTON DRIVES CHAUFFEUR TO DISTRACTION Male resentment of the collar button’s proclivity for losing itself reached a climax in Vienna recently, when a chauffeur 'gave it as his reason for attempting suicide. Fritz Mimmler tried to jump from the window of his third-floor fiat. A policeman who had noticed his preparations caught him by the waist and hauled him back into the room. Mimler told the officer that he had tried five times to fasten his collar. Finally the stud fell out and rolled out of sight, and lie decided to depart for a better world where there were presumably neither collars nor collar buttons. THE YELLOW STREAK WHICH FLIES DON’T LIKE What makes flies avoid yellow glass? That is the riddle that is perplexing a jam factory in Northern England. Yellow glass was put in a warehouse to stop the jam from fading, and It was found that flies completely avoided the yellow room. A partial explanation was supplied by Dr. S. A. Neave, honorary secretary of the Entomological Society of London. “Probably,” he said “the flies avoid the yellow glass room because yellow absorbs from the light certain rays that they need for health. “X remember from experiments conducted some time ago that flies also dislike blue. A room that was white attracted them, but when it was paiuted blue they avoided It. "The suggestion that larders should be glazed in colours avoided by flies might be useful, but I have not heard of it being put into practice.” “BOTH FOR ONE ANOTHER" PUZZLE OF TWIN BOYS Masters at Tolington Secondary School for Boys, Muswell Hill, N., England, have been faced with the difficulty of distinguishing between a number of pairs of twin brothers who are exactly alike. “There have been five pairs in about three years,” said Mr. F. W. M. Draper, the headmaster. “There were four at our prize-giving recently.” Mr. Draper continued: “The confusion in class is easy to imagine. You address one of the twins by his initials, only to find that you are looking at the wrong one. To the amusement of the whole class you have to say, ‘I want Major to go on. Which is Major?’ “As a general guide the ‘elder’ twin is slightly bigger and often slightly cleverer. “A curious coincidence has been that in three out of the five pairs of twins one of the brothers has been a lefthander. One of those now at the school has the initials R. 8., and he is easily distinguished at football because he plays right back..”