NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 1923, 7 January 1919, Page 4

NEWS IN BRIEF.

As a result of certain mines m the battle areas being affected by the German advance in the spring of this year, a burden of about S,000,000 tons of coal was thrown upon Great Britain. The great number of /lying, machines in France is making an unprecedented demand for castor oil Tor lubrication. The I idled Slates, the second world-produeer of castor oil, is stimulating the growth of the castor oil bean in (lie Soulli. The enduring strength of wood is evidenced in the excellently-pre-served Fairbanks House, in Dedham, Mass., built in 1030, and believed to he the oldest frame house in the United States. Its oak timbers were taken from England in 1035. Refusing to salute the Stars and Stripes lost Esther Larson her position as schoolteacher m South Omaha.. She declared I hat her religion forbade her to recognise any worldly government. She is a member of a sect known as the “Church of God,” or “The Soulsuvcrs.” The following fruits, vegetables, etc., have been in cultivation more than 4,000 years: —Almond, apple, apricot, banana, bean, cabbage, cucumber, dale, egg-plant, lig, grape, olive, onion, peach, pear, quince, sorghum, turnip, watermelon, and wheat. Germany, Russia, Austria-Hun-gary,-France, the Failed Stales, and Great Britain produce in favourable years about 5,000.000.000 bushels of potatoes for their 450,000,000 population, while the remainder of the world, with 1,200,000,000 people, produces but 1,000,000,000 bushels. Punching a bag got a Lebanon (U.S.A.) woman into trouble with her landlady. The landlady says that her tenant practised on a punching hag so hard and so frequently that she shook off plaster from the ceilings and walls of the downstairs tenement, and did damage amounting to ,Cl 5, besides compelling “a good tenant to move out in disgu.-l."