NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1730, 26 June 1917, Page 1

NEWS IN BRIEF.

A cable length is 120 fathoms, or 720 feet..

Asphalt is found in dried-np petroletfin hods.

Warm baths will often prevent the most virulent diseases.

Over 2,000 tons of horsetlesh arc annually eaten in Paris.

Wooden shoes are frequently used in Holland as ilower pots.

Torpedoes were invented about the year 1860 by Professor Abel.

Clergymen stand second in the list of inventors; mechanics (irst. Persons bearing the same surname are forbidden to marry in China.

Prussic acid is the most rapid poison in affecting the human system,

More than nine-tenths of the railway passengers in England travel third-class.

Austria-Hungary has slopped the transmission of pa reeds to prisoners of war in Turkey.

British Parliamentary Blue-books were first issued in 1081, but not sold until the vear 1803.

it is recorded that there are 25,(100,000 horses in the United Stales and .150,000 motor trucks.

The huge guns of modern navies

can only he tired about 75 times before they are worn out.

Visitors to the zoo last year numbered 1,084,210, the second largest total in the society’s history.

In marching, soldiers lake 7o steps per minute; quick marching, 108; and in charging, 150 steps.

British bootmakers have just received another order for 2,000,000 pairs of boots for the Kussian army.

The shortage of rubber in tiermany is shown by the tact that wooden tyres are being used on bicvcles.

The inscriptions upon British coins have always been in Latin, except during the Commonwealth — 1040-1000.

In a few days’ campaign in Tounto, Canada, £051,800 was realsed in subscriptions to the Patriitic Fund.

Several Yorkshire burial boards nave decided to sow oats in the meant spaces of tin* cemeteries tinier their coni ml.

It is calculated that in moving amiul from one place to another, tin 1 icople of England spend about .‘150,000 a day.

Out of 1.000 men who marry, 332 narry younger women, 57!) marry ,vomen of the same age, and 80 narry older women.

It requires tin l workmanship of 20 men, and the ime id much costly machinery, to make that dainty article, the thimble.

An ordinance has been issued in India making it obligatory for all male civilian'Europeans between 10 and 50 to register.

The medical sign used on a doc-tor’s.-proseriplion was originally the symbol of Jupiter, and was used to propitiate the god.

An electric light that an Ohioan has invented to illuminate the keyhole in a door is operated by a push button on the door knob.

The Italian Minister for Agriculture has revoked the decree prohibiting tiie expoVt of (manges for English and French troops.

During the past year the Great Western Kailway, of England, ran 14,500 special trains for the conveyance of troops and munitions.

Except for drivers, the ‘‘Tube ’ railway extension to Wat cord, which was opened on Monday, is worked almost entirely by women. The U.S.A. furnishes about twothirds of the annual world crop of cotton; the value of raw cotton exported to Britain in 1015 was £45,580.121.

New orchids, named after General Nivelie, Admiral Beatty, and Lady Jellicoc were shown at the Koval Horticultural Society’s exhibition at Westminster.

The purest, bred Arab horses are the Kochlani, whose genealogy has been preserved for 2,000 years. They are said to be derived from King Solomon's stables.

The 'miners of Caslleford, Yorks, have formed a £2,000 company to acquire motor-omnibuses to carry them to and from their work at the Frys ton Colliery, two miles away.

An “Anti-pro-Germau League” has been formed at Madrid with the object of defeating the schemes of German agents, which it is declared are imperilling Spanish neutrality.