NEWS BY MAIL.

Hokitika Guardian, 11 August 1925, Page 1

NEWS BY MAIL.

MR MACDONALD. LONDON, Juno 30. Mr Ramsay MacDonald, who was accompanied by his son, Mr Alastair MacDonald, and -Miss Isabel MacDonald was yesterday admitted to the freedom of Edinhurlh. At a luncheon afterwards in the City Hall Air MacDonald said: “I enjoyed the time of office as Premier. It was a great time. It was a high adventure. There we were, never having been in office, never before having been in authority in any department, never having controlled anything within the region of 'Whitehall, and suddenly called upon to enter those charmed and horrifying portals without the least preparation, called oil upon to run the country and keep up its dignity and its weight in tlio world. It was exactly like approaching a haunted place, wondering what was going to happen. It was tremendously interesting, and was one of the highest ventures and adventures that any body of men in the history of the country was ever called upon to undertake.”

THE DECLINE OF COURTESY LONDON, June II

Presiding at Newcastle yesterday at the conference of Ihe Catholic Young Men’s Societies of Great .Britain, Or Thomas Colvin, Glasgow, said that the present day gospel of utility, which was based on self-interest, left no time for the cultivation of the gentler virtues—reverence, courtesy, politeness, urbanity—which were the salt of the earth. The modern young man was too busy studying horse pedigrees in order to spot the winner or excited with the marvellous achievement of his centreforward or his brilliant cueist: while the modern young woman was too immersed in the degree she should dilate her pupils, pencil her eyebrows, or display her silk stockings to an admiring public io he troubled with the oldfashioned way of her mother.

There could he no two opinions that the moral laxity of the present day was due to a large extent to birth control.

SOUTH POLE AVI TALES. LONDON, Juno 17

A new era in Antarctic research—one which Mr I/. S. Amery. the Colonial Secretary, suggested may have important results for the whole world—was inaugurated at Portsmouth Dockyard on Saturday when Mrs Amery officially commissioned the rebuilt Discovery h.v hoisting the Falkland Islands flag aboard her. The vessel is that used by the late Capt. R. F. Senl't lor his first voyage to the Aniaretie 24 years ago. Now. under the orders of the Governor of flic Falkhmds, she is taking to the Antarctic an expedition which will spend three years investigating the habits of whales, inquiring into the possibility of opening new fishing grounds in South Polar waters, and doing other research work. ■Speaking at the luncheon. Mr Ameiv said that although he did not visualise the Antarctic as a permanent winter sports resort, he thought our outlook on Polar regions was likely to he materially changed. The immense seas of the Antarctic were of interest to us as I lie probable site of great fisheries. Io safeguard tn.e whaling industry the area between 20 and 80 degrees longitude had been marked off as under British control, and a corresponding sector meeting the Falkland Islands area had been placed under New Zealand control. SAM'S TO OPEN SAFES. PARIS, June It.

Five Italians, alleged to be members of a gang of burglars who have specialised in safe-breaking, have been arrested bore.

T(. is staled that this gang, several inemhers of 'which are si ill at liberty, honaied that no safe could withstand their united efforts. Some of the arrested men have confessed to a number of burglaries. fn Paris and suburbs a very largo number of burglaries have taken plaoo in tW past six months. Safes of tho most modern construction have heon ripped open with ease. The burglars appeared to carry the most complete equipment, including li.eht elect tic motors that work saws and drills, and cylinders of compressed gas. In no ease did they leave any finger marks or other traces to betray them, and some of them were tracked and arrested only when they tried to dispose of Dutch and Austrian banknotes the numbers of which were known to the. police. Lighter safes were opened by circular saws driven by a motor connected with the electric lighting wires. Those saws hit into the steel as if ii wore tho cover of a sardine tin.

Si I K STOCKINGS FOR NOTHING NEW YORK, June 17.

Tho young women of New York have adopted a new craze which threatens amusing complications. They are trying to buy silk stockings for nothing or next to nothing. The craze is the result of a selling device invented by a big Broadway firm. A young man or woman buys for 4s a stocking or sock coupon from a friend. They send this coupon with 12s to the drapery firm. In return they each receive three coupons. These they sell to friends for 4s a piece. When in course of time those coupons. each accompanied by ]2s., reach the firm six pairs of silk stockings or ten pairs of socks worth at retail prices 25s each are despatched to the successful seller of the coupons.

In the last month more than 100,000 coupons have completed their financial career and the numbers are now mounting by leaps and liounds. Servants, typists and clerks are enthusiastically engaged in passing along the coupons. SLEEPWALKER WITH REVOLVER. CONSTANTINOPLE, June 11. Divorce is lieing demanded by n woman of a Constantinople suburb on the ground that her husband is a sleepwalker. She alleges that she fears being murdered by him. This dread dates from a niglit when lie walked in his sleep over to a table, opened a drawer, took out a revolver, aid aimed it steadily at her. 'Without waking he then appeared to hesitate. and replacing the weapon, returned to bed.

There seems to lie some doubt whether Turkish divorce legislation which i> now being reformed and modernised will yet admit the plea of homicidal somnambulism as a ground for separation.