BRIEF MENTION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7569, 29 November 1902, Page 3

BRIEF MENTION.

Most people who grant a favour expect two in return. It is very annoying that Fortune will not calL by appointment. Fines are now being imposed at Dundee for striking matches on the walls of public buildings. Licenses have been taken out in Ireland for 422,693 dogs, tbe amount paid being £42,269 Os 6d. Mr W. K. Vanderbilt has bought Sir Philip Burn- Jones's picture, "The Vampire," for £3680. Several hundred railway carriages, made in Hungary, were shipped to South Africa from Fiumein August. , People who fish for compliments do not need long lines. They will get their best bites in shallow water. - An inquisitive person wants to know whether news transmitted through saltwater by telegraph would be fresh. Any child over seven can be prosecuted! as a criminal dn England, but in Germany twelve is the limit of responsibility. Australia's first railway was from Melbourne to Hobson's Bay. It was opened in 1854. Australia has now 11,000 miles of rail. * By order of the American Navy Department the dynamite cruiser Vesuvius will be sold out of the service, having been condemned as useless. Swiss postal officials are to be employed to assist in the reorganisation of the Japanese Post Office. The Swiss postal system is to be taken as a model. It is proposed to establish a Japanese Monte Carlo on an island in Tokio Bay. At present, however, the laws of Japan discourage gambling in any form. As many of the Paris hospitals are not' up to modern requirements, it is proposed to pull them down and build new ones. The cost will amount to £3,000,000. " Burn* ale, ' the liquid refuse from the manufacture of Scotch whiskey, has been used with great success in the Glesnlivet district this year as a soil fertiliser. In ac6ordance with a decree of the Pope, the Cardinals resident in Rome must return to the former custom of using gorgeous carriages when driving out and employing liveried footmen. If the reader is really curious it may. interest him to know that the total length of hair in the average woman's head is just fifty-five miles, until she has sifted out the combingsJn the morning. Leeds Corporation is endeavouring to introduce- by-laws sanctioning overcrowding of its tram-cars dluring wet weather and on other, special occasions, as to which the conductors axe to be the sole judges. King Lewanika, of Barotseland, occupied a seat beside Sir Francis Jeune in the Divorce Court one day lately, and exhibited a lively interest in the proceedings, which were interpreted to him from time to time. An inventor of Chicago recently got a patent on an apparatus to convert, transmit and use the power of the wind. It is claimed a plant will soon be built to furnish this compressed air to the industries of the city. Of all the silks used in the United States 26,000,000d0l worth is imported and 107,000,000d0l worth home made. The domestic silk industry employs 24,000 men,; 36,000 women and 6000 children in 483 milk, with 81,000,000d0l oapital. To cover their risks in connection with the construction, fitting and trial of the machinery of the battleship King Edward VH., for which they are the contractors, Messrs Harland and Wolff* of Belfast, have effected an insurance of £197,000. In Manila, most of the houses and offices bave tiny window-panes, made of translucent oyster shell instead of glass. An average window, six feet high by four feet wide, contains 260 shell panes, which temper the heat and light of the sun, and prevent blindness. Skulls of many countries and periods came under the hammer at Stevens's, London, lately. The highest price was realised for that of a Maori chieftain, which found a purchaser at twelve guineas.) Other lots included skulls from Egypt, Peru, India, Africa and Ireland. Birdwood Bey has left Cairo for Assuan, to report on the claims for damage to, land by inundation resulting from the new Nile dam. The Government has assigned £102,500 for the settlement of these claims before the dam is opened during the present month, November. Not even the White House can display such a splendour of tableware as the British Embassy in Washington. The silver servico provided for the Ambassador's use is in itself worth £10,000. It contains 1000 pounds weight of silver, and the regal) arms of England are worked upon it with) exquisite skill, with flowers, birds and vines surrounding them. The total income from the Russian Government sale of alcohol, together .with the tax on private factories, is estiihated for 1902 at 590,000,000 roubles, or about £40,000,000 sterling! No other single item of the Russian Imperial Revenue yields such a sum, which is just sufficient to cover the whole military and naval expenditure of the country. Anew "electrio bath," which' is not a bath in the ordinary sense, has been introduced by Dr A. Phillips, of California. A thick robe, with electrio wires running through the stuff, is donned, and an electric current sent through them. The warmth very soon produces the effect of a vapour or Turkish bath, and energetic rubbing with flannel aids it. At Villasor, in Sardinia, the Rev Benvemuto Casti beard cries of distress fromi a neighbouring field, and running to ( the spot saw a mad bull trampling upon the prostrate form of "a farm labourer. The ! priest, who is a splendid athlete, jumped j over the fence, and, seizing the bull by the horns, held the frantio animal pinned tol the ground until assistance arrived. The people of St Albans (England) are very proud of their old fire engine, which took part in the Coronation celebrations. It was purchased in 1745, and was in use for a oentury. Exeter, however, possesses a fire engine which also figured in the local Coronation pageant, and which is nearly 120 years older than that at St Albans. S The Exeter engine bears date 1626. J The safest place during a thunderstorm is in bed, a position between two feather beds giving complete immunity. Owing to the metallic substances in certain soils, some trees are more frequently struck than others, and should, therefore, be avoided. Thus, the oak and the elm are often struck and destroyed by lightning; but the ash is rarely struck, aiid the beech, it is said, never. The French Consul at Batavia states that lighthouses are buii't of bamboo cane im Japan, and suggests the importance of they wood in erecting builders* scaffolding. The power of resistance of a bamboo cane eight to ten inches in diameter, even with aj length of sixty-five feet, is enormous. Moreover, bamboo is said not to rot either when in the ground or in water, while the dryer and older it grows the firmer it becomes. " Molten wood " is a new invention, due to M. de Gall, inspector of forests at Lai mur, Franco. By means of dry distillation i and high pressure the escape of developing I gases is prevented, thereby reducing the wood to a " molten " condition. After cooling oft", the mass assumes the character of coal, yet without showing a trace of the organic structure of that mineral. , This \ new body is hard, but can be shaped and polished at will, and is impervious to water and acids. [ The United States Government has deI cided to finish the Panama Canal. It is i calculated that it cost the French Government five lives for every sleeper laid on the forty-eight miles of railway across the Isthmus, and double the number of lives; | for every foot of canal it- cut. But tbe Americans are going to adopt the most improved sanitary measures, and they will plant groves of eucalyptus trees, which have done so much to rid the lower lands of Algeria and Morocco of malaria.