GENERAL NEWS.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 15 January 1918, Page 4

GENERAL NEWS.

A drowning fatality nearly occurred I on Wednesday at Corsair Bay, Lyttel--1 ton, when Edward Bloom, a lad eight years of age, son of Captain Bloom, of | the schooner Lily, fell from a platform by the bathing sheds into deep water. The lad was unable to swim, and had I gone under for the second time, when George Morris, an eleven-year-old boy, pluckily dived in and swam to the lad 'a assistance. Both lads were taken from the water by some bystanders, apparently none the worse for their immersion. The incident was witnessed by a number of women and children who were bathing on the beach, and the particulars will probably be brought under the notice of the Royal Humane Society. George Morris resides with his parents at Linwood. A city now in the hands of the British and noted for its tanneries is Hebron, near Jerusalem. This city, according to the Bible, was built seven years before Zoan, and Zoan was originally Tanis, the chief town of the Egyptian delta in the second millennium before Christ. Hebron was known, according to • the Book of Joshua, as Kirjath-Arba, and was inhabited by a race of giants. The tanneries of Hebron engage in the tanning of skins for carrying water. The skin of the animal is made water-tight and sewed up with the hair on the outside, after which tanning material is pumped into the bag which is so formed. After

being fully inflated by the tanning fluid, these skins are allowed to remain in this condition until thoroughly tanned, when they are used as sacks for carrying water. ;

{Some of the New Zealand soldiers who recently returned to Auckland speak very highly of the kindly treatment received in the Old Country from the British people, says the "Auckland Star." One returned man syiid that it seemed to him as if the people in London tried to do too much heard since I returned to Anckland," he said, "that a different story has been told, but my experience was that everywhere I was well treated, and I know that was also the case with chums. It was quite common for a man to stop me, open his cigarette case, and say, 'Have a smoke, New Zealand.' I can tell you we had nothing to complain about regarding the action of tho people in London. They tried their best to impress us with the fact that they appeciated our coming to help fight the battles of the Empire.' > Shops for the sale of horseflesh slaughtered under Government inspectors, have recently been opened at Portland, Cincinnati, and other cities in the United States, and a rapidly increasing demand for the meat set in. The horses cost about £2 to £4 a head, and the meat was sold at less prices than beef, mutton, or pork, the different cuts ranging from 2%d to 5d ,per lb, while at 3%d per lb sausages were selling faster than they could be made. Seeing that the bones and other waste parts of the carcase were worth several shillings, and the hides 30s each, there should be a good profit in the horseflesh trade. It is estimated that there are 3,000,000 to 4,000,000 horses in the United States that could be dispensed with to make room for better animals. The carcase ef a horse only weighs some 40 to 47 per cent, of the live weight, which is a much lower percentage than in the case of cattle.

Says the Auckland "Observer":— l From millions of throats throughout the 1 Empire on the Day of Prayer welled forth words that were in essence hate of the enemy—for we are not going to march to victory on the feet of Love. Organised prayer is organised war. That Day of Prayer was as much a part of dispositions for attack as the moving forward of an Army Corps, and for the same object—Victory after the fight. The mere forms of words do not constitute prayer. When Lloyd George said, "We'll give them Hell I " he prayed as fervently as ever did the most polished bishop in the finest ritual— and with the same object as prayers were said throughout the Empire on that universal Day of Prayer. We have heard much about the psychological weapons used by the Germans—all with the intention of willing victory. But whoever wills victory in a church pew must make victory with lethal weapons. If the one spurs the Christian to the other, then a Day of. Prayer is a fine adjunct and inspiration to a Day of Slaughter, and Days of Slaughter are necessary preliminaries to a Day of Peace.

Unusual circumstances were described before the Auckland Military Service Board by Reginald H. Taylor, fruiterer, Queen Street, a Second Division reservist, who had been classed CI. Appellant said he was an insurance agent, and. went into camp with the 19th Reinforcements. He sent his wife to England, and sold his home, involving a loss of about £200. After being in camp for four months he had to undergo an operation for appendicitis, and was discharged and granted a pension for a few months. Believing his discharge to be final, he brought his wife back from England and endeavoured to resume work as an insurance agent. Owing to the effects of the operation he was unable to do the work, and he entered into partnership in a fruiterer's business. He was next called up by ballot and classed as CI. Appellant added that he was willing to serve, and" had done his best to serve, but i after his previous experience he strongly objected to going into the CI camp as an experiment. In adjourning the case till April 10, when appellant's domestic arrangements are expected to undergo a change, the chairman remarked that it was a case of "hard luck all through," and the Board might feel inclined later to put him into B class.