NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 1967, 22 April 1919, Page 1

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Almost every country in the world can boast a gold mine. Northamptonshire made 33,000,000 pairs of boots for the allied armies. The Amazon River at its month has a width of more than 150 miles. The United States owns fully onehalf of the world’s stock of diamonds. During the conversion of iec into water 140 degrees of heat are absorbed. Silk is so cheap in Madagascar that the poorest people can afford to wear it. For 125 years the Marseillaise has been the national anthem of the French people. • Five hundred thousand shotguns are manufactured in the United States yearly. The average sized Alaska walrus is as big as an ox, and often weighs more (ban a (on. It costs (he United Slates Government £4OO yearly to maintain each soldier abroad. The finest rubber in the world is para, gathered in the Amazon regions of South America. , Daring the eight months the Australians fought at Gallipoli only 39 were taken prisoners. Of £17,000,000 collected in Customs duties at Bristol last year over £15.000,000 was from tobacco. It is estimated that four miles of an ordinary spider’s thread would weigh scarcely one grain. One pair of rabbits in four years, if none are killed or die, will lie increased to 1,250,000 rabbits. At 32 years of age, King Alfonso has occupied the throne longer than any other sovereign in the world. Between January Ist and November Ist, 1918, 5,2GG motorists were arrested for speeding in New York C : fy. Italy’s national debt is now more than £2,500,000,000, whereas when she entered the war it was about a::,, ooo,ooo. In Siam the natives obtain petroleum from the earth by digging pits about GOft. deep and dipping it om with pails. Before the war(ho London County Council received £llO a year for gas-mantle ash collected from (heir schools. There are no less than 27 distinct political parties in Russia, not to speak of subdivisions and shades of political belief. Nine million pounds is about to be spent on (bo New York City subway, in order to provide work for returning soldiers. Corrections made recently in maps of Greenland have shown it to be about 150,000 square miles larger than formerly believed. The name "sapphire” is usually restricted to the blue variety, but there are' also red, green, white, violet and yellow sapphires. Aeroplanes recently took part in a wolf Imnt in the United States. Airmen noted the wolves’ movements, and directed (be hunters. England is preparing for a suitable celebration this year of the 150th anniversary of the birth of the famous artist, Sir Thomas Landseer. Sir William Open, official painter for the British Government at the Peace Conference, is painting a picture in the large Conference room. By treating fish oil with hydrogen, a chemist has produced an oil suitable for food purposes and a solid substance closely resembling lard, which is tasteless. A facsimile of the ex-Kaiser’s'Act of Abdication reveals the fact that it was typewritten, a remarkable innovation in the case of a document of the kind.