LATEST JOTTINGS FROM THE WORLD'S PRESS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18889, 12 October 1929, Page 26 (Supplement)

LATEST JOTTINGS FROM THE WORLD'S PRESS.

Residents in the United States are now insured for one hundred billion dollars (£20,000,000,000), policies being distributed among 65,000,000 holders. The United States has double the amount of life insurance of all the other countries combined.

At the recent sitting of the Czechoslovak Medical Association/ a prominent Prague specialist raised the question of the voluntary euthanasia (putting to death) of persons suffering from incurable disease. A long debate ensued in the course of which nearly all the speakers urged an alteration in the law to allow doctors to administer painless poisons in all incurable cases if the patient desired. Sir Alexander M’Kenzie, the celebrated musician, celebrated his eighty-sec-ond birthday in London on August 22. Sir Alexander must be one of the few musicians still living who knew Liszt —he met him first in 1861. Charles Dickens, he. in his own words, once “ stalked from Oxford Street to the end of Wardour Street.” and he remembers sitting next to Thackeray in the stalls of the Royalty Theatre. Orders were give.n recently in Britain regarding the ingredients of a re-

larkable broth or soup which is to be tade in a giant cauldron in the York-

shire village of Baildon. This soup is to be prepared in connection with the forthcoming revival, after a lapse of thirty-four years, of an old-world gipsy party, which was held at Baildon for generations. The soup will include 500: ' '

b of m'at, 9001 b of vegetables, 6001 b of peas, 3001 b of potatoes, and 561 b of onions, in addition to herbs, spices and condiments.

Torquay gains top place in a list of Britain’s sunniest spots, according to the returns of the National Institute of Medical Research, which have just been completed by Professor Leonard Hill for the first six months of this year.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, writing to the Press expressing his gratitude to strangers who helped to move furniture from his house in the New Forest during the recent fire, adds: “ One or two, I regret to say. showed a disDosition to remove goods even farther, but the greater number gave me invaluable assistance. 1 '

Speaking at Eastbourne recently, Sir Alan Cobham said that he was convinced that England could produce the best aircraft and engines in the world, and that something in the character of the British people made them the best pilots in the world. The belief in witches still exists in Portugal. A poor woman has just been brutally murdered in Portimao because her neighbours attributed to her the responsibility for various misfortunes which had happened to them, such as illness, bad crops, and even the fact that bread did not bake properly. Three men have been arrested in connection with the crime. Professional musicians in Aberdeen have decided to create a fund to aid musicians thrown out of work by sound and talking films. For this purpose they are to create what will be called the Aberdeen Professional Orchestra. This body will give concerts in aid of the fund. . A stockbroker’s office, seating thirty people, has been equipped in the Cunarder Berengaria. On one side of the room is a large stock quotation board. The liner will receive prices continuously by wireless all the time the New York Stock Exchange is open. Transactions will be carried out for passengers by wireless. The Berengaria is the first British liner to provide this facility. A comprehensive research into the industrial applications of tin, including , its properties as a preventive of cor-

osion and its economic use in the production of efficient high-speed machine bearings, is to be undertaken by the Tin Industrial Applications Committee, which was formed recently in direct co-operation with the British Non-Fer-rous Metals Research Association.

“ The greatest workshop of research in the world ” is the description applied to the British Museum Reading Room by Mr A. I. Ellis, who, after twenty years at the Museum, has been promoted Deputy Keeper of Printed Books and Superintendent of the Reading Room. “ Certainly there is no great library where books are so accessible to everyone, and, I should say, none visited by so many research scholars,” he stated. “ Men and women come from all parts of the world, and every nationality is, or has been, represented in the Reading Room.” London’s telephone system has now a total of 642,400 subscribers and 132 exchanges, with thirty-one more projected or under construction, and is growing at the rate of 4000 new subscribers a month.

The latest development in insurance in England is holiday insurance. It is possible to obtain a comprehensive policy covering accident while on holidav and consequent medical expenses, loss of luggage and railway or steamer tickets, loss of hotel expenses due to accident, and loss of deposit money or advanced fares due to concellation of a holiday as a result of infectious or contagious disease. A week-end policy of this character can be obtained for 2s 6d.

“ Denmark,” said Sir Oliver Lodge a few weeks ago, “ sets the world a good example. They have reduced the army and navy next to nothing, and have money to spend on agriculture and arts.”

Ex-President Coolidge has. since he left the White House, written his autobiography. He begins it with the small boy who attended a very small school in Vermont, and closes it at Washington. Mr Coolidge was regarded as a silent President, but his autobiography, which will shortly appear in New York, and London, has a strong personal note.

When a young man was accused in the Liverpool Court of being drunk, a telegram arrived for the clerk of the court, which read: “ Please discharge with a caution this time.—His Fiancee.” Alderman W. Muirhead, the chairman, obliged.

The proposed increase in American tariffs on linen will have a serious ef-

fect on the already depressed textile industries of Ulster. Mr A. L. Ireland, chairman of the Linen Merchants’ Association, stated on August 22, that he regarded the increased duty as a very serious blow to the XJlster linen trade. The duty was chiefly on the type of linen which was an important part of the trade of the country. The coal output at the mines im Great Britain for the week ended August 10 totalled 3,253,200 tons compared with 4,888,000 tons in the preceding week. The wage earners numbered 925,200 compared with 928,700 in the preceding week.