NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XL, Issue 1839, 13 June 1918, Page 4

NEWS IN BRIEF.

There are 420,000 men in the British Navy.

There are 7,500,000 men in the British armies. Only one ship in 200 of convoyed vessels has been lost.

Gre at Britain has 7,700 miles of coast line-to defend.

There are 370,000 “religious mendicants” in India.

Military hospitals in the United Kingdom number 2,000. Including Sundays, Canadians have 95 holidays every year. America’s Army pay-bill is now £20,000,000 a month. During 1917 we took on all fronts 115,000 prisoners and 781 guns. Of 13,000,000 men transported oversea, only about 3,500 have been lost.

The range of a German torpedo is five miles, and the speed 40 knots. Some 9,000 tractors and tractorploughs have been ordered in America.

In one week the aircraft patrol round the British Isles Hies 30,000 miles.

Soldiers in the Italian Army arc allowed cigars as part of their daily rations.

Shoreditch and Bethnal Green have only one doctor to every 6,000 population.

There are 2,022,000 men and 704.000 women engaged on munitions in England, Only 586,000 tons of paper reached England in 1917, as against 1,798.000 tons in 1914. ’ Benares, the sacred city of India, is visited annually by nearly 2,000,000 pilgrims. Dogs in Milan, Italy, are on rations, and their owners have to produce tickets for biscuits. The Ministry of Pensions has 1.145.000 cases on its books, and they increase by 18,000 weekly.

About 567 steamers are continually supplied in carrying troops and finny supplies from England. The manufacture of beer in England has been reduced from 36,000,000 barrels to 14,000,000 barrels.

One of our smallest colonies is the Falkland Islands. There are 2,043 people, who live in 359 houses, In the brightest moonlight it is almost impossible to see an aeroplane Hying at 10,000 ft. to 15,000 ft. The Fiji group of islands, which were annexed by Great Britain in 1874, number 220, all of volcanic origin.

Britain loaned £1,186,000,000 to her allies up to December, 1917, and £175,000,000 to the Dominions. If we had paid the same price for gun ammunition in 1917 as in 1915 the increase in cost would have been £43,000,000.

The number of articles handled each week by the central stores branch of the Ministry of Munitions exceeds 50,000,000. More than 17,000 women are employed as military nurses, and 28,000 others are employed in various work at military hospitals. The Bengal Government pays a. reward for sharks caught in the Ganges. This varies from Is for small sharks to 6s for those Oft. long. It is estimated that the present system of coal distribution in Great: Britain will save the equivalent of 700,000,000 tons being carried a mile.

The teak tree grows principally in Bimuah. The trunk runs to Bft. in diameter, and the timber is equal in most respects to the best oak. Up to August, 25,000,000 tons of explosives and army supplies and 51,000,000 tons of coal and oil have been shipped overseas from Great Britain. Excluding officers, non-commissi-oned officers, and invalids, there are in England some 30,000 enemy prisoners, all but 400 of whom are at work.