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Timaru Herald, Volume CVII, Issue 16717, 20 December 1918, Page 6

A cable message sent recently by its j Pa lis eori't■>] 2ll to the (my York "Times' 1 bears oil the present condi- ! iioii of Rheims Cathedral, which was I threatened with complete destruction ' when the German guns were last | assaulting it. A French Marquis from , Rheims told Mr Grasty that- the build- ■ ing was so badly damaged that- immediate work was required to prevent I the walls from falling, lnit- an Ameri- > can architect living in Paris expressed i his coiifideneo that the walls, which ' are much heavier than those of Tvotra J Panic. in Paris, will ptand. The , '•carcass" of the Cathedral, ho added, ' was practically intact-, but it was no J more than a carcass. From other ! opinions Mr Grasty inferred that the { ■ great pile can be sufficiently restored • i to maintain its place among the \ , world's art treasures. The old. city of ' Rheims is practically levelled to tlio ground.

An Auckland paper describes the lem oval ot interned German prisoners irom Motuihi Island to Narrow Neck camp. The ex-Governor ot Samoa, Dr Schukz, conveyed in a motor-car from the Detente -steamer to the new

camp, took no notice ot his surrouiuTings, but sat back in his seat reading .. a newspaper. "His deuieauour suggested vice-regal state, and it he felt any chagrin over his positiou his nonchalant air very completely concealed the fact." The main body of the prisoners were marched from the port to the camp under a smart guard commanded by a non-commissioned officer. There was no congregation of the public at any point on the route. "But for the presence oF tlie guards, who marched with bayonets fixed, the Germans—about- eighty in all—might liave been a party of picnickers who

were very satisfied with their outing." Octint von Luckner took no nart in the general laughing and Joking, and raised a coat which he had on his arm in front of liis face when a photographer "snapped" the party. Tt was reported that suggestions br.d K->«n made beforehand to certain noncommissioned officers that they might cefc a party of Gilbert T.-land soldi >rs to prepare a former Y.M.C.A. lint for th*» ex-Governor, hut a report in ihe morning's paner telling of the mutilation of a "British prisoner in Germany was regarded as a sufficient -e.ijon for not doing so.