NEWS IN BRIEF.

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

NEWS IN BRIEF.

A Russian is not of age until he is 20. The Straits of (Gibraltar are 14 miles wide. Press censorship has been abolished in Spain.'-v A Women’s. Military Congress has been convened in Russia. The earliest known cookery bdok was,printed in. Venice in 1475. In the Last “push” the tanks used | 3 000,000 gallons of petrol. 1 tickets are to be introduced | in ~1l Russian towns anu villages. I Articles to” the- Vu’ad, of nearly | £250,000 are pawned in Lotrdo.n every week. China promises to become, within a few years the largest market in the world. The Bank of England contains silver ingots which have lain in its vaults since 1690. Leather money was in circulation in Russia as recently as the time of Peter the Great. Granite is the only common i‘ock which shows no traces of either animal or vegetable life. All gold and precious stones in private possession have been requisitioned in Westphalia. About 300 species of turtles and tortoises are known. Some of these attain a very large size. Very nearly 1,400 million pounds sterling is invested in railway companies in the United Kingdom, • M. Gutehkoff, Russia’s ex-Minis-ter for War, has joined the army and volunteered for the front. A great auk’s egg, which a collector bought in Paris for about 2s, was sold subsequently for £315. Lightning conductors, on account of their copper and platinum, are being requisitioned in Germany. Bricks made of coal dust are used for paving in Russia. The coal dust is combined with treacle and resin. In Persia there 1 are no distilleries, breweries, or public-houses, and native wine is the only intoxicating beverage used. The case is reported from Pctrograd of eleven bricklayers on a nonwar job who earned in one week over £43 each. Nearly £300,000 profit was realised by bazaars in New York, Boston, and Chicago on behalf of the allies’ war charities. Lightning is the rush of one kind of electricity from a cloud to unite itself with another kind in a cloud or in the earth. Mitchell, the explorer, reached Cape Northumberland on August 20th, 1836, having discovered Australia Felix, now Victoria. Six sons of Mr E, Portal, of Hungerford, England, are in the army, navy, and flying services, and three have gained the D.S.O. “Brum II,,” the Euston collecting dog, has died, and it is stated that during his official life he raised £2,000 for charitable purposes. Mice and canaries for the ..detection of dangerous air and gases are playing their part on the west front, says Professor Haldane. The vineries at Windsor, England, are so managed that they furnish grapes for the Royal household during every month of the year. The Paris Figaro announces that it has received a second offer of 5,000 francs as a prize for the first aviator who drops a bomb on Berlin. The design of the. Service Medal has been 'changed to one of crimson, with white edges, and a white line down the centre. In four weeks the police of the Hitchin division collected 3,019 rattails, 1,020 fully-fledged sparrows, 1,186 unfledged sparrows, and 3,762 eggs. The value of all kinds of fish landed in England and Wales in one year is over £7,000,000, and the number of . men and boys employed over 40,000.