GENERAL NEWS.

Colonist, Volume XLIX, Issue 11999, 27 July 1907, Page 2 (Supplement)

GENERAL NEWS.

Moscow's orphan asylum, founded by Catherine 11., is supported by a tax on playing cards. Ingenious Appliance. —By means of an ingenious appliance wbicb has heen adopted by the British Admiralty a submerged diver may. by pressing a small button in his helmet, commun.caie by telephone with ?another diver, or even, with proper connections, with, the authorities at Whitehall. A Mouse Causes Trouble. — The clerks in the United States BubTreasury at New York were unable for hours the other day to make their figures tally with the amount of the bullion, which had been weighed several times. , Finally someone discovered that a mouse had been weighed with a sack of bullion. The Lake Wakatipu Mail states that an industry which may in the near future assume large dimensions is being caried on by an ArrowtowD firm. A soil formation containing a large percentage of lima exists at Lake Hayes, and an experimental shipment was forwarded some weeks ago with a view to ascertaining its puitability for manuring farm lands. As a result an order for 500 tons was received, and is being executed. A Mexican cowboy was placed on trial on a charge of borse stealing. A jury had been gathered in the street, put into a room, and sometime later a dozen men unceremoniously burst in, demanding the verdict. "Not guilty," answered the foreman. With ominous laying of bands on pistols, the intruders slammed the door with "You'll have to do bettor than that. "Try again!" In half an hour one of them opened the door once more. " Your" opinion, gantlemen ?" 'Guilty." "Correct! You can come out. We hanged him an hour ago." The sum of £5000 has been left by a German merchant who died at Cottbus, to found a church in Constantinople for all denominations. The sermons are to be preached in Esperanto. Mr Basil M'Crea, a North of Ireland contractor, who died at Belfast recently, has left about a quarter of a million of money to tbe Magee College, Londonderry. One of the largest sums paid in New Zealand for duty on cocoa and. chocolate for one shipment is report-^ ed to have been mada by Messrs Cadbury Bros. (3aya the Post of WedIt is stated that the British Governmens has decided to set apait £6000 for developing experiments in India in connection with the Brennan mono-rail system. Miss Julia Marlowe and Mr E. H. Sothern recently accepted two weeks' engagement at the New York Academy of Music for the guaranteed sum of £10,000.