News, Notes and Notions.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLI, Issue 16, 14 October 1908, Page 48

News, Notes and Notions.

'Electioneering speechifying has commenced in earnest, mid the voice of the Parliamentary candidate is loud in the land. Yet, it cannot be pretended, that either side is showing any particular energy, or that any one is particularly interested —save, of course, in the matter of striking out. the top Line or not. That is the real battle to be fought out at the polls this time, and the only one on which the remotest excitement will be worked up. The capabilities of candidates for the position they desire to fill apparently troubles no one. Men who have never manag. <1 their own business with success, but consider they can arrange the affairs of the Dominion, are in the field by the <l< :-en and will, in many cases, get in. I inough the sheer apathy and lazin <>i Che electors. And, so long as th: ■ are prosperous, this will go on. Bip men can make big money nowadays, and don't want to waste time in Wellington. To serve one's conn: is well, but the average ui- n of .1 s . < 1 rs he can serve i •_ b; fcrtitnes for an- < v > -i to spend, ft is a pity, li m>. he downward trend of ....<al lif >d the speedy arrival of >■< ii'i such r ailed and disgraceful posit' ■: us th.:‘ . present existing in the I J S: a from which may we be < d. ;>ur youth too —as a people oi, . .di’.ng to do with the neglect ol i:i<-. and the absence of good n . vially good young men, io ' House. The great middle- < families of England are able t : their histories back far further li. 'li:’ majority of the modern arist i s. and they have their traditions. < u ber Of a representative family . into the Church, another sbn the c .mother read for the bar. and so f. one or two going in for comi ■ and very possibly municipal a . and following this, as a matter ol r.-e, Parliament, for in England i pal elections are entirely fought c, > a political and party lines. A 1 ener interest is thereby built up, co . .he muneipal elections are keenly co-, sted by representative men (care--1 chosen by committees of electors), f. Ju result is held to be scarcely less i riant than that which sends a man t ’ rliameut or leaves him ruefully exe -ng the pages of his bank-book, an . ion campaign in England being an expensive affair. <S> <S> A new terror has been added to the street traffic of Paris by fhe adoption of an unwelcome substitute for the familiar bicycle bell or horn. The new device cons sts of a small tambourine attached to the front fork of the bicycle. As the wheel goes round it sets a little wooden ir.illet in motion, and this beats rapidly against the tambourine with an irritating staccato sound, which startles nervous pedestrians and delights youthful cyclists. Sometimes the tambourine is of metal, and a particularly annoying form of the new device was heard in the Rue du Sentier, when a cyclist came tearing down the street with the mallet drumming on a miniature saucepan, the strident echo of which secured him a wide berth. <S « <®> An aspect of food-faddism which is far more gen nil than the no-meat fad or the fruitarian fad, is the violent likes and dislikes for certain dishes that are entertained by certain people. One "never eats" this, another “never touches" that; and the interesting point of the matter is. as the “British Medical Journal" remarks, the violence with which these tastes are expressed. The man who does not like cheese, or eggs, or macaroni, does not merely announce the fact. He expresses it with an air ■which implies astonishment that anybody should care for these things, nor does he try to conceal his-contempt for such a failing. The most appetising dinner can be ruined by this attitude on the part of a fellow-diner. It is hard to enjoy an omelette when one’s companion, in a voice that implies indignation at an intentional insult, has refused the waiter’s offer of this course. His air, as he sits fasting, conveys the impression that he is sitting with the possessor of a singularly coarse appe-

titc; and this is not conducive to enjoyment of the dish. The idiosyncrasy calls for correction, but the cause of it suggested by the “British Medical Journal’’ does not appear a very satisfactory explanation. Our contemporary suggests as the reason for violent dietetic likes and dislikes in later life, the fact that so many children are allowed by their parents to pick and choose which of two or more dishes they will eat. This is declared to be a “a licence which bears pernicious fruit in after life." In point of .fact, experience has taught many wise parents that to force their children to eat foods they dislike bears pernicious fruit at the time in the form of unfortunate table scenes; and, further, that the child who is forced against his will to eat rice pudding (for example) will grow up with an unconquerable aversion to the dish. Left alone, on the other hand, the taste for dishes disliked in childhood very often arrives in later years. «><s>❖ Edison has often been credited with inventing the most extraordinary things, and he is sometimes put to a great deal of trouble to disprove the erroneous statements that are made concerning him. Some time ago an American journal stated that he had invented a wonderful shirt which would last a man for twelve months without requiring to be washed. This shiyt, it was stated, was made of 365 layers of material —the composition of which no one knew but- the inventor, and all the wearer had to do to restore it to its original spotlessness was to tear off one of the layers, when he would have practically a new shirt. This announcement was reprinted in various other journals, with the result that Mr Edison received thousands of orders for an invention that he had never even dreamed of. <s>❖<s» She was a nervous-looking, middle-aged woman, and as the tramway ear stopped at the Id section, she rose to leave the ear. Suddenly she halted, and looked at her empty hand, then at the seat she had just vacated, then at the young man who had been sitting beside her. “Are you going to get off here." abruptly asked, the conductor. She turned again to go out. and then stopped, ami, looking pale, said, “Oh. dear, I’ve lost my purse.” “We can’t wait for you,” rejoined the conductor, while half-a-dozen passengers were looking on the car floor for the lost article. She cast her eyes too often at tlie young man beside whom she had been sitting to add to his comfort. He blushed as be surmised her suspicion. The search continued, and the driver was showing his impatience to start. “How many purses did you have?” asked the conductor, as he looked at her right hand. “Only one. of course,” came the excited reply. And then her eyes rested on the purse tightly clutched in her own right hand. ❖ <S> The penny-in-the-slot machine has been adapted for use in the medical profession by a physician described as “enjoying a certain reputation,” but whose name is not given. In this new and improved) form of apparatus the slot is for soveieigns,- either singly or in quantities. The machine consists of a human figure of iron enamelled in various colours. The chief organs are mapped out on the body,' and painted in different and appropriate hues, red for the heart, blue for the liver, presumably because “the blues ” are due to it, and so on. A slit corresponds to each organ. When you go to consult the doctor you consult not him, but his machine. If you have a sore throat, you put half a. sovereign into its throat. For heart disease a sovereign or two must be dropped into the cardiac valve. Insane patients, or their keepers, one supposes, put £5 into the brain slot, and if you have a leg that wants cutting off you drop a certain number of louis into the thigh or calf, as the case may be. In return, the automaton instantly produces a clearly printed prescription on a ticket, ami all you have to do then is to have it made up, and to get well again. In the case of amputations the ticket presumably consists ol a voucher entitling the

bearer to have one leg or arm cut off in some surgery. For all other ailments the doctor is so perfectly sure of his methods of treatment that he has made out his prescriptions once for all ne varietur. We should like to know his name, but not necessarily to consult him. <S> ❖ The information that the American negroes are being seriously stirred by the preaching of one of their race to the effect that Adam and Eve were coloured folk, and it was only some time after the creation that “poor white rash” made their appearance upon earth, has suggested to some minds that the theory is a novel one. In point of fact, it is not only old as regards the American negro, but it is held in varying degrees by coloured races the world over, and nowhere more firmly than by some of the more advanced among them in Africa. Five and forty years ago, in the course of a series of scientific lectures to working men, no less distinguished a student than the late Professor Huxley mentioned the theory for the purpose of demolishing it. <s> <s> •€> A fable that concerns the social life of France is told in connection with the output of the Universities. In the vast army of youths with education -but without private means, there is extraordinary keenness to pass by examination into the Civil Service. The promotion is slow and the pay wretched, but the position . appeals to the Frenchman's taste for belonging to an ordered, symmetrical hierarchy. It is an authority in the world of education who tells the story. A student was caught in the act of assisting himself towards a degree by copying from a “crib” a piece of translation set him for examination. The fact became public, and his family was much scandalised. His father, who occupied a good position in the Civil Service, said: “My son, I had intended that you should enter the Administration. After what has happened, that is impossible. You must go into commerce. I have a cousin in Paris in the export trade who will give you a trial.” The disgraced youth was sent to the capital. He is still under thirty, and is making an income of over £lOOO a year. Had he been educationally a credit to his parent, and entered the Government service, his annual salary would now have been £ 120. <S> <s> <s> Several vultures imported from India by a London firm, and which escaped recently from their cages by disporting themselves among the chimney-pots of St. George-in-tlie-East provided the Londoner—always on the look out for fresh sensations—with a sight that was scarcely less incongruous than that of the peacock which some years ago was seen on the roofs of several houses in Pimlico. Instances of topsy-turvy Nature are particularly frequent among members of the feathered creation. Not long ago. on the arrival of a London train at Luton, a swan was found seated on the roof of the last carriage preening its wings as unconcernedly as if it were on some. ornamental water, whilst at Earl’s-conrt a few years ago a goldencrested wren —the smallest of British birds—was discovered on the summit of the Big Wheel. Another real fish out of water was a cockerel, which was found at Lincoln some time ago in a piano organ, having been placed there no doubt to escape the notice of the police. At the wrong moment, however, the imprisoned bird began to crow, and the organgrinder got off with two months. An owl has been known to make its way into the Lyric Theatre; a year or two ago a young eagle was captured on the roof of a house in Fleet-.street; a pheasant was found in a garden in Totten-ham-court-road; a puffin—essentially a sea bird —flew into a window of a house near Grosvenor-square; whilst a hawk blundered into an express train on the North-Western Railway—in pursuit, no doubt, of its prey—and entangled itself in the hat rack, where it was easily secured. 3> 4> A very sensational discovery is reported from France. It is announced that the movement in favour of abolishing the lingering remnant of armour still in use in modern armies has leceived a suoueu check by the discovery of an unnamed inventor, whose ingenuity prorates to restore armour to the place which it formerly occupied in warfare. At present

the showy cuirass which lingers in the British army 5b purely spectacular, a showy ingredient of the circus side of warfare. Soldiers constantly assert that

cuirasses will never be used again in actual fighting.- They weigh seven or eight pounds, they cdst £2 or £3, and they; are not even proof against a revolver bullet, while, as against modern rifles they might as well be madie of brown paper. The French Government has for some months past been making an exhaustive series of experiments as to the value of the new composition, and they have practically decided that the inventor has made good his claims, and that in the warfare of the future this new kind! of armour is destined to play a very important part. It is asserted that the new material possesses four or five times as much resistance as chilled steel; that it is practically invulnerable to rifle bullets, that it does not weigh any more than the existing cuirass; that it can be manufactured at half the price, and even if it should be pierced it can be made as good as new almost without any expenditure of time or material. Experiments which have been made go to prove that the soldier provided with this new armour ean expose himself to the fire of modern rifles, at a distance of 100 yards, and suffer as little from their fire as if he were being assailed by pea shooters. ■s><s><?> The French criminal undoubtedly presents the most resourceful and ingenious of swindles. As an example take the case of a gang of swindlers, who had an eye to business with the shopkeepers in the twelfth and thirteenth Rrronissements of Paris in August. They began by investing their money in a horse and wagon. As to the goods, they were not very particular. Lumps of clay dug up in the suburbs, and wrapped in handsome parcels, sufficed as stock-in-trade. With this they started out on doing the shopkeepers. One of them sat in front of the wagon as the driver, and another at the back. The -latter was to take up the good. They represented a wholesale provision dealer, as was evinced by the sign on the wagon. A neatly dressed woman preceded them at each of the grocers’

where they were to call. She said to one shopkeeper after another that she had just moved into a house near by. and needed ever so many things, of which she handed a list. The grocer was delighted) with so promising a customer, but was sorry that he did not have any of the articles she desired. He would order them at once, and in a few hours she would have them. Scarcely was the woman gone when the two men with the wagon rove up. They just happened) in each case to have the articles. The grocer, to get in a good supply, buys £l2 worth, pays the men in cash, and they, after a cheerful “Au revoir,” drive off to the next. The grocer opens the parcels after they are gone, and, to his amazement, finds that the handsome packages contain nothing but clay. This thing went on for several days, and the police have a fairly big list of grocers with whom the swindlers did business. But, as was to be expected, it was not long before the trio were arrested, and their wagon and horse placed in pawn.