GENERAL WAR NEWS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1769, 27 December 1917, Page 1

GENERAL WAR NEWS.

1,070 BOYS’AT ETON. The number of boys at Eton College last half is thej-highest yet reached, namely .1,070, including eight Belgians. Eighty-three boys left last half, and there are 121 new boys. ' FLYING WARRIORS’ RISKS. . According to the statistics of war losses received from ,the allied Governments, it there are other duties more dangerous in the present war than that of the aviator, It is said that the records of allied losses place the air service fourth in the percentage of losses. The Medical Corps has sustained the heaviest losses, followed by the Infantry, with the artillery arm in third jtxACe. The Government scheme for standai’d boots, which will be put into operation shortly, provides for the prodtietkm of half a million pairs weekly up to Christinas and half that number next year. The boots will be of solid leather 1 , but it is not thought that the price will be much lower than at present. There will be boots of a neater character, as well as heavy ones, so as to suit a!) classes. WHAT SOLDIERS THINK. A heckler in “field grey” provoked a painful scene at a recent meeting of. Tirpitz’s anti-Reichstag Fatherland Party. A university professor had just delivered a tirade demanding a Hindenbnrg peace—i.e., annexation of Belgium, Northern France, Poland, and the Baltic provinces. When he had finished a soldier on leave stepped to the plat-, form'and said that he had never heard of a single man at the front who cherished such wild aspirations as the professor to whom he had just listened. NEW FLAMING BULLET. It is reported that the British battalions who took Shrewsbury Forest and a series of strong defences in the so-called Bulgar Wood behind it, were fired at with a new kind of flaming bullet. One officer saw u Hun sniper fire three of these bullets at him, and a sergeant of his battalion, had his clothing set alight by a similar missile. It is stated that men wounded by these bullets were found to be on fire as they lay on the ground, and their comrades had to roll them in the mud to extinguish the flames. WHAT AIR BARRAGE MEANS. There are 360 bullets in an 18pounder shrapnel shell. Fired above ! the ground at the orthodox elevation they cover an area of 10,000 sq. yards. In the air their effect is even greater, for, even when they lose their initial velocity, they fall with force enough to damage, if not to wreck, an aeroplane, especially if they hit a vital part such as the petrol tank or an important stay or strut. If hundreds of these shells are bursting in the same direction, each sending out a spray of bullets like water from the rose of a water-ing-can, they form an almost impenetrable curtain. THE AMERICAN AIR ARMY. There has been a remarkably gratifying response to the call for airmen (writes the Washington correspondent of the Times). Thousands of Americans are being registered for flying. Sevex’al great universities are turning out cadets steadily. Twenty-four flying schools have been created. Arrangements have also been made with the allied countries for the final training of American cadets on foreign soil. These men are being trained in American uniforms, and will be turned over as finished airmen to the fighting forces in France. There is practically no limit to the number of aerial fighters which the United States can and will furnish in the war for democracy. HUN SHAMMED DEATH. Near a shell hole was a German who looked dead, says Philip Gibbs, writing from France bn* October 2nd. He looked as if he had been dead for a long time, hut an English' Corporal, who passed close to this body saw a hand stretch out for a bayonet within reach, and the man raised himself to strike. Like a man who sees a snake with his fangs out, the corporal whipped round, grabbed the German's bayonet and ran him through.