News, Notes and Notions.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLI, Issue 22, 25 November 1908, Page 50

News, Notes and Notions.

'Amongst the week’s cables was one from’ America, announcing 'aanazemvnt over the cvnfensioßH of fraud and forgery on the part of a philanthropic citizen of Chicago, hitherto much respected for his probity and celebrated for his large donations to charity. Here, we have another instance of Jekyll and Ifydo, the two conflicting natures which exist in almost all of us. Modern life teems with similar cases, and we may be certain that not only has this Mr Peter Van Lissengcn deceived others, but most of all, himself, and that he feels rather aggrieved than ashamed, and would indignantly remonstrate if classed to his face with a pickpocket or any ordinary criminal. Probably he is religious, and not, curiously enough, merely on the surface, or for purposes of covering his tracks; but, despite the perverted twist which led to fraud, in a very sincere fashion of his own, Jabez Balfour monstrously and shamefully defrauded the people who trusted their savings to him, and was helped by his reputation for religion. It would be wrong to assume that his professions were altogether those of a hypocrite. He stated after the collapse that he thought he was acting for the best, and there is this to remember, that, had chance not revealed the fraud, and had Balfour been able to tide over financial stringency, and cover his defalcations, every promise he made would have been, or could have been, kept. (The Cecil Hotel and the vast blocks of palatial buildings on the embankment, which swallowed the hundreds of thousands, he speculated, are all successful now, and would have been in his hands but for the crash, and the discovery of bis amazing frauds. J-dfte another famous swindler of our day, Whittaker Wright, Balfour was much liked by all •who knew (Jiim personally, and was ndo red by the poor of his neighbourhood. Through’ the kink in their minds, these men are unable to see they are doing /wrong, and reprobate, other crimes and vices with just as much, and just as real horror, as any of those who have never stepped for a moment from the Straight and narrow path. r <s>•s•s> 'llie sssondary wife institution in. China has been discussed somewhat dur,ing the past day or so, owing to the fact that the late Dowager Empress had occupied that position. A very- general mis--conception of the position and status of the "secondary wife’’ prevails, and it may, therefore, be well to explain the same to readers of the “Graphic.” The man marries in China ,as soon as. he reaches manhood. .Some young girl of the same social standing, and who has the requisite means and qualities, is chosen for him by his parents. This is the legitimate wife. She is first, and remains first, always, taking precedence of «my ami all others who may lie chosen, The secondary wife is usually of the same class or social status as the first, nnd is generally chosen by the man himnelf: but this is, curiously enough, notinvariably the case. -She is received on her entrance to the household by the wife, and the man’s mother, if she be nlive, -and her position in the house is at once recognised. She must pay court and resjiect to the first wife, but has her own servants and her own rights. The secondary ivivivs stand in the presence of the first wife until requeatod to sit. and when •there are children these call the first ■wife mother, and she has authority over any important question of their up11.ringing should dispute arise. The first wife rarely exercises her rights in this fashion, however, and seldom, if ever, anterfi-rcs. The wives live in harmony together like sistefs, the first wife taking a priile in the good conduct and iliandsome appearance of the others, and tle-re i- no more jealousy than may occasionally occur amid a large family of grown up sisters in a household. The secondary -wife’s position is praolically as unassailable' as that of it lie first. It might lie legally (possible for a very itieb man to diumisa or put away a secondary wife, but custom ii» as strong as the law, and anyone Who did so would Jx- Socially, apd generally cwtr»cise<L' ' ''• "- ' ' '

The children are not beingdorgot-ten in all .the excitement of avidtion. Aerial navigation has fired the imagination of Parisians, and the ingenious French inventors of mechanical toys are producing models of the new dirigibles and flying machines. M. Jules Claretie, the Academician and manager of the Comedic Francaise, observed in his weekly “Chronique": “Automobilism and flying are the very staples of the art of mechanical toymaking in September, 1908.’’ So that if the local toy-men are enterprising, we may have another terror added to our domestic lives. It was bad enough to pick one's way amongst beetles and trains and motor-cars, but to be compelled to dodge the errant flying machine will be the last straw! ‘Twere a consummation devoutly to be wished. American clothing ing manufacturers announce that freak fashions for their countrymen are absolutely doomed. Henceforth they will adopt the London style strictly, and, sartorially speaking, the States will become once again a dependency of England. In recent years all kinds of enormities have been palmed off in New York as ‘'English fashion, and the latest from London.” Now the manufacturers promise reform and a strict adherence to London style. This fact is attributed to well-defined symptoms of weariness on the part of the public, who suspect that London is not so freakish as represented. Out here these “fashions” seem to be frankly represented as American —and nothing more weird in male clothing has ever been evolved. > > The very much belated report of the Commissioner of Police for London for the year 1907 —you must not hurry a policeman—states that the number of accidents which occurred in the streets during the year (not including the city) by which persons were killed, was 283, compared with 212 in 1906, and 172 in 1905. The number of accidents by which persons were injured was 16,772, compared with 14,060 in the previous year and 11,6,88 in 1905, and exceeds the number in any previous year. The carriages licensed included 723 motorcabs, 1205 motor omnibuses, and 1769 mechanical tramway- cars. The 1549 new vehicles licensed, included 626 fourwheeled motor-cabs and 404 motor-omni-buses. During the year 3134 policemen were injured whilst on duty. But what we want to know is the number of accidents this year since the great multiplication of motors in London. During the summer and autumn no fewer than 200.000 persons have paid for admission to the famous maze at Hampton Court Palace—the largest number for -many years. The receipts, at a penny per head, amount to over £BOO, and are sufficient to pay the wages of all the parkkeepers employed in the Palace grounds. The maze was probably in existence in Henry VIII.’s time, and though the walks are about half a mile in length, the area occupied by them is not more than a quarter of an acre. <s> S> S> The death of the Dowager-Empress recalls the curious position she bore to her son, the nominal ruler of China. She, being his Ancestress, was first in everything. She sat upon the Throne in the Great Audience Hall, while he sat on a stool at her left. He walked beside her chair when they went out, and stood always in tier presence. But when they dined together she used to sit in the place of honour at the end of the table. When their Majesties dined apart, their chopsticks and spoons, as well as the covers of the yellow porcelain dishes were of silver. When their Majesties dined together, the covers o; the dishes were all of gold, and his Majesty’s chop sticks and spoons also of gold. Personally, the Emperor was passionately fond or music, on a number of Chinese instruments, and had even tried the piano. He had a good car for music, arid could pick out any air he had heard upon any instrument at his disposal. He was very clever also in a mechanical, way, and could take to pieces and puf. together a clock with fair success. The Empress

Dowager was constantly fearing that he would take some of her favourite crazy clocks to pieces and not be able to put them into working order again, <S> O <> The pseudo-historic romance would be bankrupt without the subterraneous passage, which times out of number has helped the novelist and his characters out of a tight place. So that novelists meditating histories of the Servian dynasties are delighted to hear of the discovery in Belgrade of a subterranean passage, nearly one mile long, leading from the ancient Royal Palace to the fortress, with one branch passage to the Jewish quarter, where it ended in a cellar. The passage was found to open beneath a billiard table in the old Palace, and had a secret staircase. King Milan and his Ministers, Ristic and Belimarkovic, and later on King Alexander, knew of its existence, and the last named had the opening bricked up not long before his murder, as he feared an attack by way of the secret road. O ♦ The world-circling tour of the American fleet draws to its close. The homeward journey to America begins on December Ist from Manila. The fleet will arrive at Colombo December 14, stay there six days, and then depart for Suez, which it is scheduled to reach on January 5. The ships will pass through the canal and coal at Port Said as expeditiously as possible. They are to spend the month of January and a few days early in February in the Mediterranean, two or three vessels going each to Villefranche, Marseilles, Genoa, leghorn, Malta, Algiers, Athens, Naples, Negro bay, Morocco, and Gibraltar. The English Mediterranean Fleet, specially augmented, will probably meet them at Suez. The whole American fleet will then leave .Europe from Gibraltar on February 6, being scheduled to arrive in the t’nited States on February 22. $> <s> <s> The experiment, is evidently working itself out very well. While the fleet was at Manila. Rear-Admiral Sperry discussed, the long cruise from San Francisco witji the correspondents, and he declared that since the warijhips had been thrown upon their own without' tile convenience and support of a navy yard, the efficiency of the ships had been greatly increased. This, he said, was particularly true of the engineering department, but the symmetrical development of the entire fleet had steadily increased with the repetition of drills and with the additional experience of handling the ships under conditions of all kinds. The Admiral, reviewing that portion of the cruise since leaving San Francisco, expressed himself as well satisfied with the general results attained from the standpoints of discipline, seamanship and adaptability to circumstances. “lii fair Verona Who has not read “Romeo and Juliet”? There is a .sort of melancholy in the reflection that the ancient palace of the Capulets, which is associated with the story of “Romeo and Juliet,” has been destroyed by fire The city of Verona recently bought the old Capulet home, where the most famous of all love stories had its beginning. The house stood in one of the principal strets, and was tall and narrow and deep. In t|ie rear is the ‘famous orchard, where Romeo stood as he poured out his impassioned love to Juliet on the balcony above. What memories the old palace would have had for the Shakespeare enthusiasts of the future!

r A' curious incident happened at Amoy, iu China," when American fleet waa on its way to Japan. Local agitators circulated a report to the effect that the* ’ American battleship”\fleetpropose? to ?) seize Amoy as a base of operations in a forthcoming war against Japan. The people became alarmed and began leaving the city. ’ Then, to prevent a general exodus-'of the population,- the muncipal authorities issued a proclamation forbidding people going ti the interior to take heavy baggage with them. Two of the agitators Were arrested and punished v.-ith‘terrible whippings, being given 1,500 Wows each. • <S> <®> <3> The homely spider which worried Miss Muffit, and in general is nothing accounted of by housewives, may yet fulfil a more useful function in the economy of the world than the building of endless filmy air-castles. There is a strange factory in Madagascar where the French are trying to industrialise the spider. Here endless spider generations toil day and night ami die from overwork. But as a race .spiders are intractable. They spin- and spin for ever in the mango gioves, but when they are transplanted to the cells- of the. factory they- work erratically—when the mood is on, they may spin all day for two weeks at a time, with a resultant breakdown. Then Mr. Spider may take it into his contrary head to loaf entirely for a good period, and no amount of coaxing or bribing will induce him. to spin- The female “lialabe” is the more valuable. She is also the more ferocious. Site frequently up her young, and even, in a fit of rage, attacks her spouse. Being the stronger, she invariably overpowers him, and devours him at leisure. A fortune awaits the man who will civilise her. Meanwhile the spider-web gown—what witchery in its softness!—may soon be a reality, for the webs of thousands of spiders are being carefully unwound and re-woven into shimmering fabrics of ineoneeivableness lightness.

The Italian Government Is striving hard to keep'iitthe kingdom twenty letters written by the astronomer Galileo, recently discovered in an ancient Roman paJiaee. where they had lain several hundred years undisturbed. The letters are in an excellent state of preservation, the original owner having done everything to insure their safety in the place of deposit. The Italian noble who found the letters at once opened negotiations with an American collector. He claims that this collector, ■whose name is withheld, offered him 500,000 francs for his find, and he is unwilling to sell the letters for less, particularly as the law' forbidding the exportation of works of art from Italian soil does iiot seem to apply to the ease. The Minister of Cult argues, however, that the law does apply. For that reason he hopes that the aristocrat will eventually accept a sum within tt»e means of the Italian Government. Galileq’s letters are addressed to contemporary scientists, particularly astronomers, and deal exclusively with the astronomical problems and studies that made the great Italian famous for all time. <& <s■<£> It may be doubted whether a ••diseaseless era' 5 would not be as colourless and uninteresting to the ordinary human as Milton's heaven. What should we be if it v'ere not for our small ailments? Fortunately—or otherwise —Nature (that infinite humorist) evolves new diseases as fftst as Science flatters herself she has obliterated the old. The reflection is prompted by some remarks of Sir John Broadbent in England recently. Sir John said lie looked • forward to some Utopian era when such diseases as influenza, pneumonia, measles, and scarlet fever would become more or less extinct as a result of proper ventilation of offices, shops, public - buildings, and private houses, and other sanitary measures, such as the avoiding of overcrowding, the abolition of children's parties, and the habit of indiscriminate kissing. One can imagine the Parliamentary candidate in 1920 using an antiseptic sponge on his lips after kissing the baby!