NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1680, 1 March 1917, Page 1

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Treasury notes will be a permanent feature of our currency. In Great Britain the last Parliamentary register was made in 11)1-1. The war brought an enormous increase in the number of telegrams. The Russians were first in the air with a multiple-engine aeroplane. The strong-room of a bank is the safest “dug-out” for Zepp, nights. The first early closing legislation was attempted in England in 1805. In England no child under twelve can legally be served in a pawnshop. Best English ash, the older the better, is used in aeroplane construction. A milch cow at pasture requires from 1;1 to 2 acres of grassland to herself. There are 2,250,000 workers under the control of the Ministry of Munitions. A Russian rouble values about a farthing of our money, and a copeck 2s ltd. The oldest charitable institution in England is St. Bartholomew’s Hospital. Seventeen Zeppelins are known to have been Avrecked since the beginning of the Avar. A shell for a 4.5 gun costs 33s (id. Shells for big hoAvitzers cost £ll or so apiece. The income of charitable societies is held to be exempt from income tax in England. Eats are the one material that a country in Northern Europe must procure from without. A Cowes barber who cuts Avounded soldiers’ hair free has been exempted for another six months. The London lighting order applies to ('very house Avithin a lif-(een-miic radius of Charing Cross. The amount paid to 1 Ik* Earl of Denbigh for his live paintings by Van Dyck is said to be £3o(l,Odd. For an unauthorised person to open and read another person’s loiter is an offence punishable by imprisonment. Sixteen hundred society Avomen take day and night turns as helpers in the canteens at Woolwich Arsenal. Since the war began the German demand for “soap’ from neutral countries on its borders has been astounding. Fines for displaying too much light vary from ten shillings to five pounds. The average penalty is forty shillings. An ancient charier gave the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London power to lix (he price of coal within the city. “Zepp. parties” are the latest craze in smart circles in England. Several have been held at a avcllknown West End club. No fewer than 45,000 soldiers have been recalled from the. tiring line to take their place as skilled workers in the factory line. A Canadian linn at Newmarket, Ontario, is engaged in the manufacture of lead pencils, replacing those of German make. The Factory Acts of the 40’s put a stop to the employment of Avomen on night work. Only the urgency of Avar work has revived the custom. The Avatch carried by the average man is composed of 98 pieces, and its manufacture embraces more than 2,000 distinct and separate operations. The parchment used for banjoes, etc., is made from the skins of asses, calves, or Avolves, those of the last-named animal being considered the best. According to Nilsson, the zoologist, the Aveight of the Greenland Avhale is 100 tons, or 224,000 lb., or equal to that of 88 elephants or 440 bears. The latest nerve-trouble which Harley Street and other specialists are being called on to remedy consists of “recurrent and vividly dramatic Avar dreams.” All refined gold is not alike. Australian gold, for instance, is distinctly redder than that from California. The Ural gold is the reddest found anyAvhere. The Germans are introducing improved machine guns Aveighing only 261 b., Avhieh can be Avorked by a single man. They are also developing the use of searchlights.