INTERESTING ITEMS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 319, 10 December 1910, Page 3

INTERESTING ITEMS.

The world's annual output of fine gold is worth £-84,000,000, and the British Empire supplies 61 per cent.

What is known as New York's wealthy family averages three and three-fifths persons, while the poor family averages five and two-fifths persons.

Mr Hubert Latham, the aviator, once made a long stay in Abyssinia and indulged in big game shooting. One day he brought down two elephants, male and female.

Mr Andrew Carnegie has been granted the freedom of fifty British towns, Dunfermline, his native burgh, granting the first, and Forfar, the home of his ancestors, the fiftieth.

Lord Bute has constructed trout hatcheries in his island home, and stocked them with 200,000 fry. The principal food of the young trout is horseflesh, and as much as 201b daily is consumed at the hatcheries.

The introduction of the dagger as a part of the City of Arms of London, instead of the plain cross, which was previously used, and the title of "Lord" prefixed to Mayor of London, were due to Richard 11. in connsequence of Sir William Walworth (then Mayor of London) killing Wat Tyler in Smithfield.

Sir Albert de Rutzen the London magistrate has a remarkable memory. On one occasion a prisoner thinking to get off with a light sentence said that he had never appeared in the dock before. The magistrate, however, refreshed his memory with the remark that they had met in similar circumstances many years before. "'E ain't a beak," muttered the discomfited one, amidst a storm of laughter from the Court, " 'e's a book."

Mr Winston Churchill was told by an acquaintance that a very dear friend was seriously iil with appendicitis. Mr Churchill determined to write a note of sympathy at once. He was just sitting down to write the letter, when svord came that the illness was acute indigestion. His note was worded thus: "Dear ——, I am very sorry to hear that you are ill, but am glad that the trouble is with the table of contents rather than with the appendix."

The Emperor of China sleeps on a bed of carved wood, magnificently inlaid with gold and iovrv. It is said, concerning the Chinese Court, the strictest observance of etiquette extends even to the parents of the monarch, who, on visiting their son, dare not omit to bend the knee, whilnt the younger brother of his Celestial Majesty is subject to observances no less rigid.

An amazing instance of good luck has befallen a man who was asked a few years ago for a loan of £SOO. "I have lost money heavily," the borrower remarked at the time, "but I will give you the title deeds of a rubber estate —although I do not suppose they are worth much." The lender has just disposed of the rubber estates to a company, and has made a profit of .£320,000.

Mr Henry Palmer introduced coaches for carrying the mails in England in 1774. For this improvement he was appointed Controller-General of the Post Office, with a salary of £ISOO per annum, with other advantages; and in ISI3 Parliament passed an Act to secure him £50,000; so that, from first to last, Mr Palmer received for his suggestion of mail coaches and his labour in carrying into effect not less than £150,000.

Wherever the King may be, country house or Royal residence becomes for the moment a first-class post-office. For years Mr Hiley was postmaster to King Edward, and his duties continue under the new monarch. Mr Hiley always travelled with the late King, and made arrangements for the delivery of telegrams and letters wherever his Majesty was, either at home or on the Continent, He organised in France a complete service direct from the ship's side at Calais.

Originally a land surveyor, RealAdmiral Peary was quite young when the idea came to him that he would like to be an explorer. He had himself told the story of how his ambition was first aroused in the following words: "One evening, in one of my favourite haunts, an old book store in Washington, I came upon a fugitive paper on the inland ice of Greenland. I read all I could upon the subiect, and felt that I must see for myself' what the • ruth was of this great, mvsterious integer."

A French general's wife, whose tongue-lashing ability was far-famed, demanded that an old servant, who had served with her husband in the wars, be dismissed. ''Jacques," said the general, "go to your room- and pack your trunk and leave- depart." The old henchman clasped his hands to his heart with dramatic juy. "Me J J can go!" he exclaimed, in a very ecstasy of gratitude. Then suddenly his manner changed, as with utmost compassion he added: "But you—iny poor general you must stay !"

Sir Alexander Acland-Hood, the Chief Whip of the Tory party, whose "rudeness and remissness" are said to have rather palled on those members of Parliament who came under his sway, is a Somersetshire squire, though he was born at St. Andrews in 1553, Pie was educated at Eton, Balliol, and Sandhurst, entered the Grenadier Guards in 187T>, served in he Egyptian campaign of 18S2, an 3 was A.D.C. to his brother-in-law, the late Lord Linlithgow, when Governor of Victoria. He was Vice-Chamber-lain to King Edward till, in 1902, he became First Whip of the Conservative party. Only a year after that a commentator remarked that he had "promised to drive his team —and he does it." He is a politician of the uncompromising sort, who can speak very much to the point, and is known in the lobbies as "the Pink 'Un."