News, Notes and Notions.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLII, Issue 7, 17 February 1909, Page 50

News, Notes and Notions.

The wealthier members of the English aristocracy, who are just now wondering how they can contrive to make out a ease against “predatory” Radical taxation, have good grounds for feeding annoyed at an exhibition of tactlessness —- as it will appear to them from he political standpoint—of which the Drke of Westminster has been guilty. Her' ’s chosen the present inopportune moment, when Mr. Lloyd-George confesses that he must presently rob “somebody’s hen roost,” to issue a notice to the worn-out old workers on his estates, withdrawing the small pensions which it has been the long-established custom of his family to allow them, and curtly telling them that they must apply to the Government for pensions. The Socialists have promptly represented this incident as an example of the greed and meanness which they consider to be characteristic of the class of people who do not know what work means, and who derive their incomes exclusively through the toil of others. The young duke has certainly committed a rather stupid blunder. H> inherited a few years ago property valued at the enormous sum of £16,000.000. He is understood to draw from it an almost fabulous income, and there can be no question as to his feeling any need for economies at the expense of a few decrepit retainers on his estates who are tottering on the brink of the grave, Moreover, he must be as fully aware as everyone else in the country that a Government pension of 5/ a week is not sufficient for an old person to live upon who is without other support, and that by saving a few pounds in terminating the allowances, -he is Consigning at least some of the old people to the workhouse. His action is ; fortunately, not typical of the spirit of his class, as the Socialists prefer to believe. Kindness towards old tenants and servants is the rule, not the exception, among the Engaristocracy. <s■ <S> In a series ef 500 brains, tile lowest ami highest will, in fact, differ as much as 650 grams in weight, but there will be found no constant relation between th, weight and the intelligence. It is significant, indeed, that men of small stature, weak health, and even physical affliction, have, if anything more than an ordinary chance c< becoming famous. Their attention is draited, and they are stimulated to win out in spite of their handicap. Pasteur is a clear case of a truly great man. He was paralysed on one side from 1868 ’ant'd his death in 1895, but. as Berthollet says, it was after he was stricken that his inventive genius perhaps shone more brightly. Herbert SpeTicer, Darwin, and Von Hartmann hardly had a well day in their working lives. Pope was so feeble that he coubl hardly draw on his own stockings. Napoleon was of small stature and of weak health ami physique.

The professional reporter may become' extinct even before the war correspondent if matters develop much further. We are growing accustomed in England to the cricketer who makes his centuries and takes his wickets again in the evening on paper for the next morning’s journals (says the "Pall Mall Gazette”); but we have not yet quite reached the murder trial reported day after day by the prisoner, although some incidents during and after the Camden Town trial rather tended that way. But America lias attained this pitch of authentic impressionism. Mr. Jenkins Hains, the novelist, now on trial for murder, is supplying the Press with daily instalments of abuse of the witnesses for the prosecution, varied by compliments to the personal attractions of the dead man’s widow’. In time, no doubt, some enterprising pioneer of the newest journalism will engage not only the prisoner, but all the witnesses, counsel on both sides, the judge, and the court usher to record their daily impressions, while the jury will contribute aeounts of the progress of their views. <S> <?> <S> A social culture club was started recently by the teachers and pupils of Vashon College, in the State of Washington, U.S.A., with the object of improving the table manners of the young people. Fines were imposed on the members who broke the ordinary rules of good behaviour at table, and these are some of the fines: —Using toothpick in public. Id.; hand in-pocket at table, Id.; scuffling under table, Id.; not sitting erect at table, Ml.; tilting chair back, Id.: talking with mouth full. Id.; uncomplimentary remarks about food. Id.; placing another dish on plate, Id.; knife or fork misplaced. -Id.; spoon left in cup, Id.; incorrect holding of knife or fork. Id.: arms or elbows-on table. Id.; over-reaching, Ml.; eating from knife, Id.; buttering bread on table loth, Jd.; talking across from table to table. Id.; spearing bread with fork, Id. The effect on the table manners of the students is said to have been nothing short of a miracle. <§> <s> The Pennsylvania Kailroad Company is buil.i.ng the largest bridge in the world. It will connect the mainland of New York with Long Island, and, with its approaches, will be three miles long. The greatest span, over Hell Gate Channel, will be 1000 ft long. Tile bridge will be 140 ft over th-:- water, permitting the passage of the tallest vessels. The entire structure, except the piers for the arch, will be of steel, having an estimated weight of 80.000 tons. It will have four tracks, two for passengertrains and two for freight, and is designed for live loads on each of the tracks of two 190-ton locomotives, followed by a uniform load of 50001 b per lineal foot. The estimate-.? cost is between £3,000,000 and £4,000,000.

A startling demonstration of the ease with which a great city may be destroyed by bombs thrown from a dirigible airship was furnished on the night of December 16 at Los Angeles, California. The aeronaut, Mr. Roy Knabenshue, In a heavy rain-storm, ascended after dark, unobserved even by thoise who were watching for him, and dropped scores of confetti shells on the City Hall and other large buildings. Mr. Knaben shue travelled in a circuit of 18 miles and when he descended had theoretically demolished the entire town. The experiment was carried out with the permission of the military authorities, a,nd was to be repeated shortly over the skvserapers of New York. <S> The Parisians have a new catchword, which is the equivalent of "If you want to know the time ask a policeman, ‘‘ which held London in thrall for so long. You meet a friend upon the boulevards. "What time is it?” “I’ll telephone and see,” he answers. The joke was hatched by M. Sacha Guitry in a little two-act farce at the Theatre Antoine. The clock has stopped. One of the characters catches up the telephone book, picks out a name at hazard, rings up its owner, asks him the time, and then rings off. The notion was so new-, and so absurdly, aggravatingly possible, that the house rocked with laughter at it, and telephoning for the time has become one of the favourite jokes of Paris. <S> <s> Set a photographer to catch a thief must be the new rendering of the old adage. The subject of a flashlight picture is often a little nervous at his firs! experience, but seldom with such good cause as the Pittsburg iLi-S.A.) town Councillor, who made an involuntary record upon the camera the other day. He was keeping an -appointment with a contractor in order to receive payment of certain "boodle,” and just as he was counting over hundred-dollar notes, in order to see that honour had been kept among thieves, there was a flare and a puff of smoke, and the inhappy servant of the public- knew that he was betrayed. The photograph, we are told, "came out well.” and is now going the round of prosecuting officials. The Councillor is said to be a candidate at the forthcoming, elections. but it is improbable that this particular likeness will be chosen for circulation by his ward committee. <B> An American woman, Olive Herford, has dared to publish a skit upon the worls of Mr. i I’ :- -- .Dan: -■■•a. ths pourtrayer of Miss America idealised.. Her book is called " The Astonishing Tale of a Pen and Ink Puppet, or the Genteel Art of Illustrating,” and it is extremely clever, says an English paper, reviewing it. Th? bead are heads of Gibson girls :-im youths; the bodies are made up of jointed pieces like wooden dolls, to suggest the woodenness of the Gibson figures. But when put together they have the attractive and bold lines w inch Mr. Gibson has stereotyped. The pictures are nearly all of them full of cleverness, of artistic caricature. The picture of Bertie van Ordinaire dining between Angelina and Ethelberta, hidden behind his shirt-front and jampot collar, as they are behind beauty roses, is extremely clever. The letterpress is evencleverer. Ethelberta was

the heiress of Barabbas Rockydollar, th* multimillionaire, and Angelina the portionless child of poor B.shop van Brut, whose salary was la rely £50,000 a years —“ You are charmingly arch,” said Bertie to Ethelberta, as he took her into dinner. “ It is in the family,” she replied archly. “My grandfather was an archdeacon.” . . . Angelina’s feet strayed listlessly over the pedals of the piangelus. “ 1 hata music,” said Bertie, in low, vibrant tones. . . . Bishop van Brut will be remembered as the author of the famous 5000 dollar prayer that won the prize in the “ Jollier's Weekly ” competition. . . . “ My ancestors came over in the Edna Mayflower,” said Bertie, proudly, in an-

swer to old Roekydollar's first question. “ So did mine,” rejoined the old man, blandly, “but they were crushed to death on the voyage.” This book is admirable fooling, and the pictures are rather pretty, as well as very witty. There are many subtle points, such as giving the bishop, the butler, the billionaire, and the doctor the same face, and all three girls the same faee, and all the men at Bertie’s club the same face, to satirise Mr. Gibson’s sameness:—“ What is your fortune?” said Bishop van Brut, dryly. “My faee is my fortune,” replied Bertie. “You must owe a lot of money, then,” said the bishop, eyeing with suspicion the cigar which Bertie had given him. s><s><s> Mr John Burns remains easily in the front rank as an interesting study on the personal side of English politics. The exSocialist and stump orator continues to exercise his old art at intervals on the conservative majority which controls the London County Council —as often as a middle-aged man with a taste for music contrives to retain some of his youthful deftness of hand at the fiddle or piano by snatching occasional half-hours from a busy existence for hurried practice. But ordinarily Mr Burns is now a person of

grave and responsible air, precise of speech, confident and relentless towards his former associates in the handling of facts, exceedingly difficult to trip up, always careful in laying his mines, not seldom a statesman in breadth of view, and hesitant to the point of Toryism in his attitude towards experimental sociologists. How often he makes the Unionists chuckle by his efforts at judicial caution! Gladly would some of the leaders take him to their hearts, and, if the political rules arid conventions permitted, keep him snugly in the ehair of the Local Government Board when their party returns to power. Every day in the week since winter began he has found it necessary to impart a lesson in public economy and prudence to some reckless or foolishly philanthropic committee which has approached him with a scheme for spending other people’s money. He declares that under Parliamentary pressure he has already gone far in that direction beyond the limit which his own judgment approves. The Socialists, his bitterest enemies, declare that he now adds habitual niggardliness to his arrogance. He replies that, on the contrary, he fears he has been, from the national point of view, dangerously indulgent towards them. “Since I have been in office,” he has told a deputation from Battersea

(which first tried to wheedle and then to threaten him), "I have spent £700,000, and 1 have done more harm by that than I have done good in all my life before.”