GENERAL NEWS

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 10 February 1913, Page 7

GENERAL NEWS

A FLYIXG BICYCLE. A. prize ui i>l< for the first winged motorless bicycle to cover a distance of .Kilt (iin at a minimum height. of Sin lias been won hy M. Caul Uiclicr, the racing cyclist, at mo Pare dc* Princes. The price was only offered on November 2oth. The previous best achievement was a flight, of t)lt !()in at a height of -lin made hy the cyeiiso Bettich on October l!)Lh. The "u.ichino used hy M. Didier is an ordinary bicycle with one plane iixed :J. ihe hack of the ina( iiine. TOMMY •SKW.XT!' \'Vil WIXTEU. Tin 1 washing of school children was discussed at the December meeting of the Buckinghamshire Education Committee, when Mr .1. Tarver moved:—"That on grounds of health and of training in hahils cf cleanliness, it lie iin instruction to the architect, .in planning the at raugomeiit.s for tho proposed new council school at Chaive.v, to make provision for the installation of inexpensive done h or spray haths." .During the discussio.i Mr Wethc-red said that he was talking to one of the local medical officers of health the other day on the desirahility cf having haths in schools, when tlie doctor told him that a mother had said that "their medical officer was not to interfere with her Tommy at .school, as she had sewn him up for the winter."

PUOFITS OF SILVER COINAGE. In a orinage case at Melbourne last week Judge Bentonl (dieted from a Mint official the fact that a crown piece costs the' Mint eighteonpenco to make, leaving 3s Gd profit. The Loudon correspondent of the '-Scotsman" recalls that Lord Goschen, when Chancellor of the Exchocquer and Master of the Mint, was keenly a live to opportunities cf jrofit i" this held. He directed that dockyard men on weekly wages of less than £2 diould he paid in silver, which is just as coiievnient to the men as gold, and saves money to the Mint. Silver pays the. Mint well. Every shilling means nearly threepence profit, the exact metal value 'being 5).72d —7.5 parts of the coin are copper. Sixty-six new shillings weigh one pound troy, five shillings and sixpence weigh one ounce, and there is the trifling cost of minting to he added. Bronze coinage ,is also most profitable, which accounts for the -peremptory stopping of a recent incursion of French bronze. Every ton of pennies gives a Mint profit of £382. I PRTXCE OF WALKS—MAX.

The Prince of Wales has attained a J manhood from the royal point nf view, and 'he is beginning to enter into the .kingdom as heir to the Throne. Amongst other things he has joined ' the Marlborough Club, like his father [and his grandfater before him. We has .become a clubman earlier than did, King George or King Edward, but in his case, as in that of al 1 royal personages, the coming of age is at "18, and hot 21. The Prince has yet entered the club (says the London correspondent of the Melbourne "Age"), but when he does so, lie will be received theoretically in the same way as any ot'hr member. His royal rank falls automatically from his shoulders as lie passes the stalwart and brightly caparisoned cammis-aon-aire at the door, but it is understood that no one must speak to him unless lie first addresses them. Needless to say, the Marlborough Club is probably the most exclusive in Europe. As an American .-.aid who tried to force open its doors by weight of gold. "It is harder to shove a soverign through the ye of a needle than for an outsider to enter the Marlborough Club." CHUKLrSH MONKS. The "Xeues 'Wiener Taghlalt" nublished a telegram from Athens which states that Queen Olga of Greece intends to visit the twenty-one monasteries on Mount Atlios, thus breaking the rule forbidding a woman to set foot on the hold mountain —a rule which has been observed without a single breiK'h for 1500 vears (says the "Daily Mail"). The republic of monks who live at Mount At.li.ns liave a 1 re-idv distinguished themselves by their want of courtesy to crowned, heads, excusing their luicouthness by their statutes and by the legend that the Virgin Mary came hearing the Infant Jesus to her arms to indicate the site of the nionast'ries—since when no other woman has been permitted to ..set foot where she haSx-trcdden. These arguments were nut forward when the late Empress Elizabeth of Austria wished to visit the monasteries and she was not allowed to land, while a German Prince accompanied hy his wife was refused permission to visit the monasteries unless he left his wife behind him. The announcement that the King and Queen of the Hellenes promised to visit the mountain caused a great flutter among the monks, who hurriedly, summoned n council and decided that there was no course open to them but to alter their statutes and welcome their-Queen.