BRIEF MENTION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7923, 30 January 1904, Page 3

BRIEF MENTION.

Narrowness of mind is often the cause of obstinacy. Wherever a true'woman comes, home! is always around her. . Candour is ever the brightest gem of true criticism. — B. Disraeli. Success only knocks once at the door, but adversity will pound all day. Modesty seldom resides in a breast that is nbt enriched with nobler virtues. Do good, and leave behind you. a monument of virtue the storm of time can never destroy. ' A good understanding between France and England is of greater value than cruisers.—"Le Matin," Paris. The most ancient printed calendar in the world has been found at Wiesbaden. It was printed by Gutenberg in 1448. Human nature- is not so much depraved as to hinder us from respecting goodness in others, though we ourselves want it. Of England's total foreign trade, of £800,000,000, just a quarter is with ber colonies, and the rest with foreign countries. Manila has a poulation of something like 300,000, about 10,000 being American and European born. The American population is estimated at about 6000. _ If grown men can find time to play at stamp collecting, there cari surely be nothing wrong with the position of the nation.—Mr H. B. Marriott Watson, in the " Daily Mail." If a man looks after the flowers in bis window, he looks after bis window; and if he looks after his window he also looks to see that his house is kept clean.— Sir Edward Sassoon. The Buenos Ayres international nfle tournament resulted in a victory for the Swiss team with 4588 points, Italy being second with 4411 points, and Argentine third with 4200 points. The clock which has been placed in tlfe hall of the Holborn Borough Council is at least 250 years old, and has been in. the possession of the -local authorities for that period. It still keeps good time. ■ Th c Church Aid Committee has called 'upon the Scottish Congregational Churches to raise £1500 a year, which will enable it to make the stipend of the minister of every aided church £100 a year and a manse, or its equivalent. Iceland has received a, new coat of arms representing a white hawk on a blue field. The former arms consisted of a crowned codfish, to which objection has long been raised, " codfish " being the Icelandic equivalent for "blockhead." »• The birds of Lapland are reported by H. Goebel to number 198 species. Of these, 133 certainly breed in that country, 34| probably do so, 17 are stragglers and 6 winter visitors, 1 is an ocean species and 7 aro seen only in the Solovetski Islands. In Manila most of tho houses and offices have window-panes made of translucent oyster-shells instead of glass. An average window, 6ft high by 4ft wide, contains 260 shell-panes, which temper the beat and light of the sun x and prevent blindness. The Sleaford Urban Council Electric Works are progressing most satisfactorily, the amount of units manufactured being quadrupled in two years, as had' also the number of customers, whilst the cost of production had been reduced from 3gd to 2|d per unit. .. } , If the money, thrown away in war during the last seven years had been applied to expropriating rotten monopolies in the United Kingdom, we should have had a smaller debt, many valuable assets, . and a better system of internal communication. —"Speaker." An Italian has recently made a boat of cement. The framework is of small steel bars, covered with wire netting, the latter being, in turn i covered with cement. The surface is then polished. It>is claimed that such a boat costs less than a N wooden one, and, despite its extra weight, glides more easily through the water. A novel watch in Zurich is in tbe form of a ball which moves imperceptibly down an inclined plane without rolling. .There is no spiring, the sliding giving motion to the hands, and the trip from top' to bottom of the inclined surface, a distance of sixteen inches, requires twenty-four hours. The ball is then lifted again to the top. Tbe dahlia! is a plant prized solely for its bloom, yet were all the Irish potatoes to be destroyed it is possible that tbis plant would to some extent replace them. Roasted, the dahlia bulb is wholesome and toothsome and makes a not bad substitute for the potato. When first introduced into j Europe it was not for its flower 2 but ac a vegetable that it was valued. Witb American Imperialism we are in firm political sympathy, but ifc is impossible tb conceal the fact that commercially we have been and are destined to be the losers by it, and that in the absence of any effective retaliatory stroke it now rests with the sugar and tobacco growers in, the United States to decide whether 'dur profitable trade witb Cuba is or is not to pass into American hands. — "Morning Post." The young heir to the octogenarian Marquis of Donegall will be deprived of one of his hereditary rights of the suggestion that Lough Neagh. should be drained' is carried into effect in' bis time. For be is heir to the hereditary Lord High Admirals-hip of the lake, which ds the largest in the United Kingdom, having an area of over 150 square miles. .If is the only lake in the United Kingdom that has a Lord High Admiral of its own. The two Archbishops, their Graces of Canterbury and York,' celebrated their silver weddings on November 12, 1903. Both were married 1 on November 12, 1878, it being the Archbishop of York's second marriage. The Northern Primate's first wife died in 1862, two years after their marriage. For sixteen years be lived' yn widower, and then, in 1878, the year in which he was appointed Bishop of Lichfield, be married Augusta, daughter of the sixth Viscount Barringt'on. Concrete steel sewer construction is fast growing in favour, the latest report advocating it being one by Samuel M. Gray to the authorities of Lancaster, Pa. The report advises the use of concrete reinforced with expended metal as being cheaper than brick, although .for the construction to be successful it must be executed by experienced men. Should brick sewers be adopted they must be made two inches larger, Mr Gray states, because the friction lo&es in a brick conduit are larger than those in one of concrete. The German Government is encouraging higher speed upon its railways, and to attain it has proposed a competition between electric ami steam locomotives. Builders of both types have 'been asked to submit plans for motors which will attain velocities of 100 miles per hour, but under what conditions of load and permanent way has not been stated. The capacity of- our largest and most powerful locomotives with 200 pounds of steam pressure per square inch and a very moderate load behind the tender, is limited to an average speed, of from sixty to sixty-five miles per hour under favourable conditions ; ib remains to be "shown what kind of a steam-driven engine can be produced which will raise the 'speed thirtyfive to forty miles more per hour. A recent traveller on the Niger, in Africa, writes : . " I was anxious to purchase some fruit from a native woman 'who came down to the ship, and to this end I produced a handful of coppers which 1 bad brought out from England. I firsb showed her five, then six, seven and eight,, bub she pushed them all aside in a most unceremonious manner. More by way of a joke than anything else I then produced a threepenny piece, which she at once accepted, giving me in return just twice as much as I had asked for my eight coppers. I also discovered that she had a partiality for white - glass bottles. I happened to have about a dozen empty soda water bottles t for which she gave me the same number of eggs. I afterwards found that any white glass bottle had this purchasing power all over Nigeria. The natives send them to Bida, .where they are melted and made into rings about three or four inches in diameter, to be worn either a_ armlets pr anklets.''