BREEZES

Wairarapa Daily Times, 18 July 1936, Page 4

BREEZES

Good Fellows! “Bailiffs are usually good fellows,” says a judge. “They can always be relied upon to help one out.” * * * * The Request. Two people in the stalls had been much more interested in each other’s conversation than in the play, and the man behind endured the annoyance for some time. At length he leaned forward, and, touching one of the offenders on the shoulder, said: “Would you mind repeating that last remark? I couldn’t hear it for the noise they are making on the stage.” * * * * Unique Vessel for Lakes. A unique vessel, the Franquelin, a motor ship of all-welded steel, recently paid its first visit to Montreal. The first of the new all-welded ships, the Joseph Medill, was lost with all hands at sea on her voyage out from England last summer. The Franquelin, which will be used for lake service, has many unique features which differentiate her from the usual line of lake vessels. She was designed after exhaustive study of the problems of Canada’s inland transportation, and will carry newsprint and pulpwood along the St. Lawrence route. * * * * Port' of Montreal. The biggest tonnage in seven years was handled during 1935 at the Port of Montreal, Canada’s eastern seaport metropolis on the St. Lawrence River. Total tonnage of import, export and domestic merchandise handled through the port was 11,654,426 tons, an increase of 328,621 tons over the previous year. Seven or eight years ago, Montreal was known chiefly as a grain exporting harbour. In 1928 grain exports amountcddo 45 per tent of the total. In 1935, the situation was altered to the extent that the grain exports were only 10 per cent of the total tonnage.

Canadian Mining Activity. Activity in the mining industry in Northern Canada is likely to be more pronounced during the present season , than at any time since the famous Klondyke days in the Yukon. The activity will be particularly noticeable in the Yellowknife preserve, a large area between the Great Bear and Great Slave Lakes. In 1935 a survey party sent out by the Department of Mines at Ottawa examined 10,000 square miles north of Great Slave Lake. The geological formation of approximately one-third of this area was found to be favourable prospecting ground for precious metals. Mining companies who have holdings in these fields are extending their operations. Reports of the discovery of gold about 20 miles east of the Taltson River, on the south shore of Great Slave, caused prospectors to stake 162 claims in that locality during March. At Great Bear Lake operations in pitchblende (radium ore) and silver mining continues tc expand. * * * * Gas and Food from Wood. Gas from wood to take the place of petrol, and food from wood, are some of the items of interest to the layman which have emerged from the Second International Conference on Timber Utilisation and Research, which was held recently in London. A German engineer, Gerhard Grumert, has designed an apparatus for using wood for the production of gas. He calculates that he can save up to 90 per cent in fuel costs. Driving a big saloon car from Berlin to the conference. in London, his fuel cost him only 14s. This consisted of chopped wood which he bought at any hotel or farm as he went along. Burned in his apparatus it is smokeless and odourless.

The gas is non-inflammable except when exploded in the engine, and Herr Grumert claims that suffocation by escaping fumes from the generator is impossible. Any wood will do, though hard wood is better as taking up less space, and with this one filling it will drive the car 150 miles. The British rights have already been sold to a firm in England. Professor Friedrich Bergius of Heidelberg told in the course of his address how wood contained many differentsorts of sugar, and how research had resulted in decomposing wood so that it gave two-thirds of its bulk in raw wood sugar, and one-third in the form of lignin (the insoluble or essential part of woody fibre), with no waste. The research chemists had found, said Professor Bergius, that besides sugar, wood contained other products, which included alcohol, yeast, glycerine, and crystallised glucose, which led furthei to their obtaining grease, proteins and carbo-hydrates—in other words, all the elements for animal feeding and for human nourishment.