NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1743, 2 August 1917, Page 4

NEWS IN BRIEF.

The largest flying boat ever built lias been launched at Lake dveuka, New York. It carries twelve persons, and is only a hint of the aerial express trains we are soon to see. At the outbreak of the SpanishAmerieah War, President McKinley appealed for 300,000 volunteers. In less than 24 hours more than 1,000,000 answered the call.

, A medical authority on the virtues of various kinds of food, declares that the herring gives the muscle elasticity, the body strength, and the brain vigour, and is not flesh forming.

Diamond deposits have been discovered in the northern part of Cape Province, South Africa. Several valuable gems have been found. About 1,000 claims have been staked out, and several thousand licensed diggers are in the field.

In France they are preparing already for a great influx of tourists after the war. New organisations are devoting themselves to the improvement of hotels and railroad facilities, to the advertising of French health resorts, and to bet-

tering tourists’ agencies. The re-making of old clothes is one of the most prosperous industries in America. Old suits are torn to pieces, the wool and the cotton being chemically separated. The wool is then washed, dried, and respun, and made into a spick-and-span tailor-made suit.

As stormy weather comes on, sea - birds fly inland in search of food; wild-fowl leave the marshy grounds for higher localities; swallows and rooks fly low before and during bad weather; frogs arc unusually noisy before rain; shoe]) huddle together near bushes and trees.

By request of the War Office a lesson is to be taught in every school in the British Empire showing “how little scraps of nows may help the enemy,” and conveying the moral that no boy or girl should tell any other boy or girl anything about naval or military majtcrs.

It cannot be said that the navy has been given a large number of! V.C’s. during the present war. Of nearly 250 conferred, the senior service, including its branches, has won just over a score, while before this campaign its total was dl out of over 500.

An interesting impiiry is being made by the Army Medical Board into the many cases of shell shock and similar nervous conditions in the military hospitals. Aten of robust appearance often suffer most. It is suggested that fair-skinned people and those with grey or blue eyes have sounder nervous systems than others. Whether the greyeygd or brown-eyed are more or less resistant to shell shock the report may show. The histories of thousands of cases are being tabulated and compared.