NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 934, 2 December 1933, Page 26 (Supplement)

NEWS FROM ALL QUARTERS.

£7OOO SUIT OVER MOUSE. What is probably the world's most valuable mouse was found by Airs. Iva Goueha at Chicago in a bottle of ginger ale—she values it, dead, at £7OOO. At least that is the sum she claimed in an action against the bottling company. The £7OOO was estimated by Tier as the cost of her reactions, consisting of—treatment for nervous shock, convalescence in a sanatorium, and recuperative trip to Europe, during which she had to place her daughter in a private school. The judges suggested compensation of £2OO, but it was mentioned that Mrs. Gousha had already refused an offer of £3OO. The case is pending. RICH MEN’S SONS AS CROOKS. Eighteen fraud offences at London, Brighton, Guildford, Portsmouth, Hythe, Southampton and Bournemouth, were taken into account when three young men were each sentenced at Bournemouth Quarter Sessions to 21 months’ hard labour for housebreaking. Having met in prison, the three were said to have toured the South Coast living on the proceeds of fraud and false pretences. The men were Frederick Close, 33, Tan Middleton, 23, and Charles Heyraan, 24. Close was stated to be the son of a retired lieutenantcolonel, and to have been a former cadet at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich; and Middleton was described as the son of a wealthy woollen manufacturer. SHAVING .BY COMPASS. • A way to make his razor blades last longer has been found by the Hon. Gilbert Coleridge, a son of the late Lord Chief Justice Coleridge. When he has finished shaving he carefully puts the blade down on a shelf so that it lies due north and south. “In May, 1931.” he told a reporter, “I thought it possible that if I orientated mv razor blades—kept them lying north apd south by compass —it might affect the life of the blade. Up till then a blade would last approximately about one month or six weeks. After I orientated the blades I noticed they tended to last considerably longer.’ Mr. Coleridge keeps with his shaving tackle a little pocket compass which he uses for putting the blade into position. Nearby is a notice: “Please do not shift.” He thinks that terrestrial magnetism may have the effect of lengthening the average life of a razor blade. “Twice I have tested the magnetisation of the blades after they had been orientated, by placing one of them on a cork in a basin of water,” he said. “Each time it swung to the north though repeatedly displaced.’*

WONDERFUL OPERATION. A wonderful operation was carried out on Stoker Taylor, one of whose feet was almost severed in the explosion in the submarine L 26 at Campbeltown, Scotland. As a result of the operation, which was 6erformed by two loTal practitioners, Dr. Town and Dr. Peters, it is hoped that Taylor will recover the use of his leg. The doctors grafted the cut sinews of the ankle and joined the severed bone. An X-ray examination indicates that the limb will knit successfully. PILOTLESS ’PLANES. The Italian Schneider Trophy pilot, Signor Mario de Bernardi, lias completed satisfactory experiments with an invention for wireless control of aeroplanes, special attention being paid to control from escorting piloted ’planes. The manoeuvring of the controlled ’planes is obtained through .a “phantom pilot” by means of short-wave wireless, and they are also fitted with an automatic stabiliser on which Siguor Mario de Bernardi has been , working for nearly two years. The system of control from an escorting machine opens up new possibilities in aerial fighting, including decoy operations and ramming. AUDIENCE SAW REAL DRAMA. Applause for what a Dairen audience took to be a very realistic scene gave way to silent horror when an actor advanced to the front of the stage and .plunged a knife into his throat. He fell dead —across the bodies of two ’other actors who had collapsed before the dead man’s attack a moment before his suicide. Hie two victims, the audience had at first supposed, were struck down as part of the performance. Actually, they were attacked in deadly earnest, and neither was expected to recover. One of them was Liu Shu-Kou, one of China's most famous female impersonators. Female parts on the Chinese stage are always taken bj* men. Liu ShuKou, in feminine attire, was taking part in a tender love scene with another wellknown actor. Suddenly a third actor rushed out from the wings brandishing a dagger. Shouting “Revenge! Revenge!” he stabbed the two lovers, then strode up stage and stabbed himself. The spontaneous ripples of applause died down and commotion followed. The assailant was an actor recently dismissed from the company. VERY ABSENT-MINDED. Herman Sanders, 75, described as a financial agent, of Montague Street. London, was charged at Bow Street Police Court with obtaining credit for 6d by fraud at a Lyons tea-shop in New Oxford Street. He was ordered to pay a fine of 10/ and £6 6/ costs. Jt was alleged that he had refreshment on the first floor and afterwards made a purchase at the counter downstairs. He was given two bills and left, paying only one for the smaller amount. When stopped the second bill was found in a newspaper he was carrying. It was further suggested that he had done the same thing on two former occasions. Sanders, on oath, said that he had an oftice in Kingsway and was engaged in big engineering and chemical schemes in connection with the hydrogenation of coal from Austrian mines. He was also establishing cement works in Sydney, for which he was raising a quarter of a million capital, and he had other big schemes in hand. He had retired from business, but found that he could not live without work. He was very absent-minded, and forgot all nbout paying his second bill. He bad no recollection of doing the same thing before. Mr. Cairns, defending, said that Sanders was of the professor type, and it was inconceivable that a man of such distinguished and striking appearance would commit such a deliberate fraud under the eyes of the cashier for the sake of 6d. The magistrate, Mr. Fry. said that the fact that Sanders had done the same thing on three occasions counterbalanced the suggestion that he was careless and absent-minded.

FLED FROM OPERATION. Disturbed by the thought of an opera-' - tion which waa to be performed on hintfor eye trouble the following day, Mr. W. Stainton, aged 57, a farm worker, leftLincoln County Hospital at night in his pyjamas. Stealthily getting out of hi* bed in a hospital ward, he reached a balcony outside a window, and then climbed 16ftto the ground. He had only a coat over his pyjamas, but he walked into the town and waited for the first bus to Louth, 30 miles away. He thus made his way tohis home in the village of Muckton, near Louth. Although Mr. Stainton i* unable to see with one of his eyes, he declares that he will not go back to the hospital unless he is forced. REALLY “POETIC” JUSTICE. Summoned at Staple Hill Police Court, Bristol, for allowing a herd of Jersey cow* to stray on the highway at Bitton, Evelyn Hughes-Onslow, of Bridgyate, sent the following effusion to the court: At my poetical plead. The Jersey s agreed. Your leniency was simply astounding. Eleven admit this offence. We appeal to the Bench With gratitude ever abounding. She added: “Dear sirs, this is not meant for contempt of court, but to bring a little humour into this sad old world.” When the magistrates stopped laughing they announced that she would be fined 5/. “SUNSHINE” VITAMIN. It is a curious fact that one of the chief sources of the “sunshine” vitamin 1> is oil from the liver of a deep-sea fish- the cod. Dr. H. D. Haldin-Davis commented upon this puzzle in a lecture on “Sunlight and the Skin.” at the Institute of Hygiene, London. “It is difficult to suppose,” he said, “that a deep-sea fish, such as the cod, is exposed to a sufficient intensity of sunshine to activate a precursor in its superficial and it has been assumed that the Vitamin D in its liver is derived from the food it consumes.” A medical authority explained to a “Morning Post” representative that sunlight is necessary for building up the vitamin, and that ultra-violet rays were used when it was built up artificially. “The cod,” he said, “feeds on various marine organisms which have been in touch with the sunlight. These smaller fish may have been affected by the sunlight in only a very small way; but it seems that the cod has the property of ‘concentrating’ any vitamins it maj- find

in the fish which it eats, thus making its oil particularly valuable.” The food of the cod consists of herrings, sand-eels, and other fish, besides squids, mussels ami whelks.