25 YEARS AGO

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 105, 28 January 1935, Page 8

25 YEARS AGO

Ape’s Evidence in Court (From “The Dominion,” January 29, 1910.) Mr. Akerman, the owner of a menagerie at Devoll's Landing in Louisiana, was murdered while feeding an ape, which afterward flew into a terrible rage whenever it saw Starr, an employee, and his wife. The Starrs were charged with I he crime, and. on conviction, were sentenced to imprisonment, for life. It is understood that the ape’s rage on seeing the prisoners in court influenced the jury more than the evidence, which was purely circumstantial. Heavy rainfall persists in France, and the Seine has risen 25 feet near the Louvre. Baris. The river has risen above the roadway, and is percolating through tlie embankment in many places. The electric, light in the Chamber of Deputies is useless, the machinery in the basement being under water. All the electric tramways are stopped. The Paris correspondent of “The Times” states it is scarcely an exaggeration to say that nearly half France is under water. Professor Macmillan Brown, of Christcliureh. returned to Now eZealand from Europe and America yesterday. During a lengthened absence he has made some interesting investigations. . . . He argues that tlie civilisation of Central America and Mexico started not from the oast but from the west by a people who arrived from the coast of Peru, and lie further says that lie has ample evidence Io show that the original civilisers were the Polynesians, who landed in their ocean canoes and even became the rulers of Peruvian cities. His investigations led him to the conclusion that the Polynesians began to arrive on the Pacific, coast of America when the race had still tlie blonde hair ami blue eyes, of which" traces are yet to be seen in the Urewera country in New Zealand, in tlie Pacific, and also in South America. The islands of the Pacific had been sinking for thousands of years, and great bodies of the people migrated to find a new home in South America. They went there probably about 10.000. years ago. They were a people who could cut and sculpture immense blocks of stone, and they raised buildings and built the now ruined cities. From them tlie Incas had learned to build their immense cities.

At the University Senate to-day. the question of including military science in tlie curriculum was considered. Tim military education committee's reeonunendation that military science be included as an optional subject in tlie course for B.A. and B.Sc. was adopted.