GENERAL WAR NEWS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1743, 20 October 1917, Page 1

GENERAL WAR NEWS.

ODD NAMES FOE BABY. The curious naming of children has never had such a vogue as during the war years. Even the Crimean War did not stranger names. “I protest against the oddity of names chosen for christening,'- '’ says a Lincolnshire vicar. “It is a religious ceremony, and it is hard to keep one’s face straight when desired to give a child ridiculous names. I was asked to, christen twins ‘Sonnino’ and ‘Retain.’ ; i though the latter was a giri! •• ! that’s all right,’ the mother asm : u | me, ‘we’ll shorten them to “S mnv"' | and “Petty!”’” “Zeppelin” i ■ | es in many registers. “I had diliieulty,” a doctor said, “in persuading a mother at my hospital not to call her child‘Kitchener Wants You,’ She came from an old Puritan family, and said Bible Phrases had often been used in her family, such as ‘Up-and-Smite-Them,’ and she considered these sacred words,, as the child’s father died in action.” MYSTERIOUS LETTER. A touching story comes from the French front. A soldier in an infantry regiment in the trenches, whose family had remained in invaded territory, went every day to meet'the man carrying the postbags, hoping against hope that he might get some news of his dear ones. Days, weeks, months went by, but still the little “Polibu” got nothing. Then, one morning, a long letter was handed him from a stranger, but . that did not detract from his satisfaction. At regular intervals his correspondent sent him letters until the day when the infantryman failed to return to the trenches with his comrades after the charge. Then only it transpired that the letters had been written by the regimental postman, who had noticed the pathetic look on the man’s face as he drew a blank day after day. THE ABSENT-MINDED FOREMAN. At a Midland police court, Herbert Hodson, head foreman over 500 employees at a T.N.T. factory, was lined £2O. He walked through an explosive room with a ligh’ted cigarette in his mouth. He pleaded that he was absent-minded, BAREFOOTED PATRIOTISM. A despatch from Constance to the Neue Zurcher Zietung states that the whole population of that town has been requested to go barefooted, “as it is the patriotic duty of every German to do so.” HORSE-THIEVING RAMPANT. Horse-stealing is increasing at an alarming rate in Vienna owing to the high prices the theives realise for the sale of animals, generally for slaughtering. At a recent market, carnage horses fetched £IOO to £175, heavy cart horses £l4O to £225, and horses for slaugh-. ter £lO to £45 apiece. “BETTER TO BE DEAD.” A Russian naval surgeon named Alexine Paris, who has just been released from captivity in Turkey, declares that the Turkish treatment of prisoners is horrible. He frequently saw prisoners tortured with the ,bastinado until the victims fainted. “It is better to be dead,” he declared, “than to be taken prisoner by the Turks.” CAPTIVE M.P’s. RETURN, Captain Stanley Wilson, M.P., arrived lately at Victoria, after his period of -internment in Austria. He was wearing'his staff uniform. “I am sorry to say I cannot make any definite statement as to the reasons for my return till I have consulted my chiefs at the War Office,” he told a pressman. “I was treated with the utmost kindness by the Austrian Government, and have absolutely no complaint to make. You see how well I am looking. I feel in perfect condition.” He added that on leaving his internment camp he was put on an Italian Red Cross train, and as soon as he had crossed the border into Switzerland he was' given perfect freedom of action and could leave the train when he pleased. He stayed for a week in Zurich.