NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1754, 1 September 1917, Page 1

NEWS AND NOTES.

A notice was sent to a native Territorial in the Mastcrton district to attend parade. The following reply was received from the father; —“I beg to inform you that my son cannot attend drill, on account that he is out in the country. The reason why he is out there is that his health is failing, and therefore the air of the country will be a credit to him. He is out for a period of two weeks. Please see that he is off drill.”

Some wonderful operations have been performed on some of the wounded men who returned to New Zealand in a hospital ship recently. One soldier had eight inches of bone taken out of the shoulder end of his arm; he could not move his arm in any direction, and yet use his fingers. Another man had had his left lung and chest taken away by a shell, yet his body had been practically rebuilt, and on first sight one would hardly know that he was injured. Many of them have served in Egypt, and a number of them were present at the big explosion at Mes,sines, one man saying he had been thrown 50 feet into the air by the force of this explosion and carried nearly 100 yards away. Another soldier had a similar experience at Armentieres.

A curious tram accident happened in front of Cole’s in Bourke Street, Melbourne, a week or two ago. A man, crossing, was struck by a dummy, and driven with such violence into the stomach of another man, who was also crossing, that the latter was knocked out and left gasping on his back. The man who was bit by the dummy was not nearly as badly affected as the man who was hit by the man who was hit by the dummy. Kneeling by the real victim, the first man, after some little time given to the recovery of his faculties, grasped the prostrate sufferer and ejaculated: “Great Scott! I’ve been looking for this fellow for sis years. He stole a horse and trap from me at Euroa.” The long am of coincidence ,is sometimes a dirty left,— The Bulletin.