NEWS BY MAIL. .

Hokitika Guardian, 13 February 1922, Page 4

NEWS BY MAIL. .

MATA iHARI’S LAST HOUR. i PARIS, December 14. “Don’t cry, Sister Marie. Messieurs am ready.” Theso are two of the entences spoken by the dancer woman • py, Mata Hari, as she .was about to save her cell for Vincennes execution j ;round in April 1917. Her wonderful j enrage is fully shown in the descrip- ■ ion by Comte -Emile Massard in this j ivening’s Liberte. j She would not, he says, .put .off .the i lay of reckoning by pleading that she j vas about to become a mother as had j jeen alleged. No protestations of her j counsel were of avail. Into a square of troops the condemn--2d woman eventually drove and alighted with the grace and assurance she would -have had if she had once more been reviewing the German Crown Prince’s battalion. “Present arms!” cried the officer in command. Trumpets blared and sabres shaked. This was her official farewell. “Now it is all over,” Mata Hari exclaimed, turning to her nun attendant. She kissed tier counsel farewell and gently escorted by two gendarmes, walked unfalteringly to the firing post. She refused to have her hands tied or her eyes bandaged. “Present!” then rang out for the execution. At 6 o’clock she gave a -last example of her smile that had upset the hearts of princes, Cabinet Ministers, and officers. She blew a kiss! “Fire 1” The coup de grace was given. SIGNED FROCKS. PARIS, December 14. “We spend £IO,OOO -a year on the silk and other materials that we . spoil ■in creating our .models,” said the manager .of a welLknown ifiimi of .modistes explaining today that the proprietress .has -decided to sign the firm’s name .tag attached to every costume sent .out, and to add to .it the (finger .print of the designer. “These original models, invented al such expense,” .he continued, “are frequently bought by agents of Germans w.ho copy them clumsily in a series, and Bhip them to America to be sold with our .name stitoliod on them as genuine Paris I rooks.” CHRISTMAS TREES LOOTED. BERLIN, Dec. 20. Berliners are excessively indignant at the high prices being charged for Christ mas trees this year, and in two parts of tho city to-day they have vented their rage on the purveyor by making off with his stock without paying a penny. A crowd surrounded a trader in the street near the Northern Railway star tion and seized his stock of 100 trees! In another street a cart laden with Christmas trees was overturned by the crowd. People seized the trees and disappeared helter-skelter down the neighbouring streets.

UNIVERSITY HOAXED. NEW YORK, Dee. 14. The duping of a large number of professors and of a greater number of the undergraduates at a university by Charles M. Stelz, alias Dr Vesberg, of Vienna, a 3rd year student in the school of agriculture, is the subject of a piquant story in the New York World. A week ago placards in the town of Ithaca announced a lecture on the teachings of Freud by the famous psychologist’s intimate friend and pupil. Dr Vosberg, of Vienna. The attraction of' such an intellectual treat was great, and when the lecturer, a tall, dark, bearded man, speaking broken English, rose to address the assembly in the City Hall after being introduced by a member of the university faculty, the room was packed with a brilliant audience, including several professors and their wives. Dr Vosberg quickly plunged into a discussion of the interpretation of dreams. The erudition displayed by the lecturer made a deep impression, and he was congratulated at the end of his discourse. Indeed, such was his success that the committee of practical jokers who had arranged the affair became panic-stricken, and dared not: reveal the identity of the “doctor.” ; Tt was not until postcards showing Vosberg with and without his beard and spectacles appeared in a shop in the town that the hoax was revealed. KILLED BY A TOOTH. NEW YORK, Dec 14. j A dentist who allowed a. patient’s, tooth to slip down her throat, causing: her death from inflammation -of the: lungs, was ordered to pay £BOO dam-, ages to her estate by the Supreme j Court of New York. Tho patient, Mrs Minns,, was put under an anaesthetic and had several. teeth extracted. When she returned home she was seized with a violent at- j tack of coughing, and when severe pains in the chest developed she was taken to hospital, Where sho died. A post mortem. examination revealed the presence of a tooth in one of the lungs. TRAPPED BRITISH FORCE, LONDON, Dec 12. The following further information of the frontier raid to the north of Quetta, British Baluchistan, has lieen received by the India Office: — A most gallant defence was made by a company of the 92nd Punjabs at Bnishor, 45 miles north-east of Quetta, when they were outnumbered and overcome by Wazir raiders on November 25. Gapt. F. Entwisle, who was in com main d of the company, was killed while leading n, counter-attack. The second in command, Lieut. A. B. Garrett, continued to fight until lie was killed, although ho had been wounded in the first encounter. A Sikh subadnr (native officer), who was killed fought to the last. The following is the casualty list:—, Killed: Two British officers and 39 Indian other ranks; wounded, 21 Indian other ranks; taken prisoners, 20 Indian other ranks. Seventeen of these prisoners have been released and on November 29 were reported to be on their way to Barshor. The two British officers killed were buried at Quetta on November 28th. It is believed that nil the raiders have recTOSsed the frontier. No doubt is entertained in well-in-formed qnartel's that the objective of the Waziri raid, says Reuter, was Quetta. The fact that it started from a centre at least 80 miles inside territory is significant. •