RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 144, 14 March 1939, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights On Current Events (By Kickshaws). A golden age is predicted for the world if future peace could be assured. Empire armaments appear to be the silver lining to the golden age. * * * Fighting is reported in the ABC building in Madrid. It would require an A to Z building to enable the average person to fathom the ABC of what is happening in Madrid.

It was recently explained that 5000 German troops mysteriously marching near the Czech frontier were merely carrying out their normal night training/ The sleep-walkers brigade, we understand, were in action.

"How is this for the up-to-dateness of a country lassie ” says "Enjoying A Joke.” "I’ve just been marking the work, and this strikes me as too good to keep to myself. Asked to illustrate 3j) 4- 2£, she wrote:—A drafter had 3g yards material, and then imported yards. How much did he then have? Even the children feel the import restrictions.”

It is reported that the annual migration of the eels of New Zealand starts this month. Experts now have a good idea as regards the movements of eels. It is known that they travel across the Pacific for many thousands of miles to breeding grounds in deep water. It is not known -what makes them do so, or. how they find their way. There are no sign posts under the ocean. Moreover, the miracle of how the eels find their way across thousands of miles of ocean is put in the shade by the miraculous manner in which the baby eels find their way whence came their forbears. This is particularly remarkable in the case of the eels that use the Atlantic. The eels of Europe and the eels of Eastern America share the same breeding grounds. Full-grown eels swim to an area north-east of the West Indies, breed, and die, The young eels of European parents set forth subsequently on a journey lasting three years to Europe, aud it is believed to the same pond whence came their parents. The American eels set forth likewise for their ancestral ponds in America. How or why this miracle comes about is unknown.

Many suggestions have been put forward to explain the uncanny ways in which creatures contrive to move at regular intervals from one place to another. The distances are often immence even for creatures not fitted with wings. Seals travel over 4000 miles every year on a great northward journey to the Pribiloffi Islands, west of Alaska. This migration begins in March, and takes three months. Incidentally, American patrol vessels now convoy the seals so that no harm will come to them. In winter whales move northward from the Antarctic regions, reaching as far north as the Equator. What guides them is not known. One wave looks much the same as another, and one horizon at sea is no different from an infinity of horizons. If one can explain this, it is simple compared with some other mysteries of the sea. A turtle found in South America lays its eggs in the sand by the mouths of rivers. It is vital that when the young turtle hatches and leaves the egg it should be close to high-water mark. This varies greatly from year to year. Yet, though the water may be hundreds of yards away when the eggs are laid, the female turtle invariably deposits her eggs in the sand almost exactly three yards above what will be high tide at the time when they are due to hatch. Man could only do it with the help of complicated tide tables, calendars and clocks.

We note with interest a suggestion that future cricket Tests should provide for 24 flours’ play. The idea, carried to extremes no doubt, will attract all that baud of cricket enthusiasts who feel that a mere hour or two of cricket, or even six hours, only serves to whet the appetite. glorious 24 hours of the day is another matter. It will stifle at its source those captious critics who complain that they never see a day’s cricket. A football match becomes an instantaneous affair in comparison. . It is over in a flash. Cricket will be listed among these semi-permanent games such as chess, house-bunting, washingup, and war in China. We would emphasize, however, that whereas a chess player cau take time off between moves up to several days, cricketers must train so that they will be ou their toes every minute of the 1440. It is one thing for a side to field for eight hours in a broiling sun, but another to field for ten under a flaring full moon.

We feel that the suggestion to make a 24-hour job of a cricket match is going to introduce some innovations, especially in the reports of the game. Blobs, the fast bowler, we shall read, showed no signs of tiring for the first 15 hours. He was noticed subsequently to be distinctly sleepy. In fact the last three wickets fell when he was bowling in his sleep. The umpire was appealed to on this score, as no provision has been made for sleep bowling. The captain of the batting team contended that a ball bowled during sleep was not a ball tit all. It was neither a no-ball nor a not-ball. It just didn’t exist, and was made of stuff of which dreams tire made, and, therefore, could not be iutroduced into the score book. The controversy immediately raised the question as to whether a batsman could bat iu his sleep. Moreover, it was claimed that a batsman who hit a ball into tomorrow on the stroke of midnight should claim six runs, as time must now be considered to have cricketing boundaries.

As for the spectators of 24-hour cricket, no doubt they will take steps to insure their own comfort. Special types of cricket beds, no doubt, will come ou the market. After all, one takes a sleeper when travelling; why not a sleeper when watching a cricket match? Special attendants will be provided to wake up spectators at some special phase of the game, such as watching Bradman getting caught in the moonlight. Others will attend as a cure for insomnia. Indeed, we shall have uon-crieketers watching the game lor no better reason than they watch the harbour ou ti moonlight night, or go to the pictures on account of the darkness that the ticket buys. Round important cricket grounds huge hotels will be erected to accommodate the wealthier patrons of the game. These hotels will have windows that front the cricket field. Indeed, they will probably have no other windows at all. For a nominal fee of, say, five guineas a night, one may watch the progress of the game all day and all night. That is all very well, but what about the running commentaries of the game. It will afford yet more problems for announcers and programme compilers.