RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 153, 24 March 1939, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights On Current

Events (By Kickshaws). Britain’s youngest farmer is stated to be 16 years old. Old hands at the game explain that he is too young to know better.

We note that the democracies are talking about a joint declaration, but, if they aren’t quick there won’t be any joint left.

It is claimed in London that the Anglo-German naval pact contains no provision for denunciation. It is just: that sort of pact which puts Hitler on his mettle.

“C.H.” writes“ Will you please tell me something about the leaning tower of Pisa? Why it is leaning? Did Newton ever drop a stone from the top while he was studying the subject of gravity?” [The Pisa tower is 183 feet high. In 1829 it inclined 15J feet from the vertical. In 1910 the inclination had increased by another foot. It has been claimed that the tower was built on the lean for sensational purposes, but it is usually considered that the deviation from the vertical has been the work of time combined with unsound foundations, and the subsidence of the ground. The painting of San Ranieri, in the Campo Santo, produced a century after the tower was built, depicts it as upright. A commission which investigated the tendency of this tower to lean reported that th® deviation was still continuing slowly. Work of reinforcing the foundations was taken in hand some years ago. The commission reported that the tower was good for another 50 years. It was from this tower that Galileo was said to have carried out some of his experiments with failing bodies.)

One hears rumours of Hitler moving German divisions all over Europe as if they were 'bits of fluff or at the most a small cardboard box. Actually the movement of large numbers of troops is a highly complicated job, requiring considerable experience and technical ability. Admittedly there are now two types of divisions used by the German army, motorised and not motorised. Nevertheless, considerations of time and space make it quite impossible to move divisions over the face of Europe as if they were tourists. There are roughly 15,000 troops in a German division plus a whole heap of other odds and ends such as guns, ammunition, food supplies, vehicles, and the like. The 15,000 men in a division require to be fed every day. This in itself is a task of no small magnitude. Indeed it involves the arrival on time of about 30 tons of foodstuffs. It will be seen, therefore, that movement of troops, except in small numbers, is not a thing that can be undertaken without considerable arrangement beforehand.

Very few people appreciate the surprising length of a division on the march. The road space required for a German division on the march is 10 to 12 miles. Foot slogging is going out of fashion, but there are occasions where it must be done, such as in areas in Ruthenia and elsewhere. It is considered good going if a division marches 15 miles in a day. In contrast a German motorised division may make 100 miles a day. The question of using the roads to convey troops has engaged the best brains of Europe. Roughly 1000 vehicles are required to move a German division. If any pace is to be made it is unwise to allow more than 10 vehicles to the mile, or say 100 miles of road space for the whole outfit. This is very unweildy. Indeed, the matter is complicated by the fact that it is unlikely that much more than 100 miles will be covered in a day. The last vehicle therefore leaves about the time the first arrives. Rail transport is the oue satisfactory method in Europe where large bodies of troops are concerned. Even so some 20 or 30 trains are required to move a division. The total day’s run is unlikely to exceed 150 miles. It is probable that if Hitler wished to move troops from Czechoslovakia to Rumania via Hungary under the best possible conditions for swift transport, he might average a division every two days. Even s_o this would require a month to move 15 divisions, or probably longer. It will be seen, therefore, that plans for the present series of events were laid months ahead.

Claims that millions of rabbits are overrunning parts of the South Island arc probably no exaggeration. Quito a lot is known about rabbits these days, except how to exterminate them. It has been shown, in Australia, that two dozen rabbits let loose at any suitable area will grow in six years into a community of over 30,000. That allows for all the normal losses and perils that beset the life of a' rabbit Mathematical computations give us the maximum figures. In theory, a pair of rabbits and their progeny averaging a litter of three bucks and three does would produce 1,000,000 rabbits in three years. Naturally, this increase never takes place in reality. So far, no really satisfactory method has been found to exterminate rabbits. Australia alone spends over a million pounds a year in trying to exterminate her rabbits. So far the rabbits have won. Judging by news from the South Island, the rabbits of New Zealand are less on the run than in the runs.

There have been many estimates regarding the number of rabbits which are equivalent in grazing to one sheep. Many experts put the proportion at five rabbits to a sheep. Even if one were content with a proportion of ten rabbits to one sheep, the loss in grazing must be enormous. In three years a pair of rabbits, In theory, will become equivalent to 109,000 sheep unless something drastic is done to kill off the rabbity. Some idea of how the rabbit affects New Zealand may be had from the fact that every 10 years we export about 150,000,000 rabbitskins. It is probable that in the same period a total of at least 300,000,000 rabbits are destroyed in various ways. It Is most unlikely that even one-quarter the total rabbits are destroyed, which leaves us with a rabbit population equivalent to the grazing of at least 10,000,000 sheep; or roughly one-third of the total sheep iu New Zealand are rabbits, which, perhaps, is a little Irish.

“In your column recently I notice you quote Piccadilly and Pall Mall as examples of curious street names iu London,” says a reader with an indecipherable signature. “I expect it is superfluous to dash to the nearest ink pot and pour out the information that ‘Piccadilly’ is named after the ‘piccadil,’ a sort of ruff which was very fashionable in days when ruffs were worn. The most modish maker of ‘piecadils’ lived and worked where Piccadilly now is. Pall Mall is called after a game, ‘pellmell,’ which was played on that spot when it was still common land. I think it was a sort of knucklebones.”