GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 1991, 17 June 1919, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Ludlaw Grey, a Chicago lad, aged 13, is expected to recover from sleeping sickness, which lasted 49 days, during which he was fed artificially.

Applying for the licence of Carregyddyinallt Inn, Llanfairfechan, at Bangor police court, an ex-Met-ropolitan police sergeant apologised to the Bench for his inability to pronounce the name.

London’s parks are to regain their pre-war musical attractions this season. There are to bo more than 800 band performances. Open-air vocal concerts are to be provided as well. There will be dancing facilities at certain places, and there is no official ban on the Jazz.

A man charged with burglary at London recently, was stated to have been found, after a long search, at one o’clock in the morning hiding in a meat storage icehouse. The police said he was so cold he could hardly move.

Two men, one an ex-soldier with a. wooden log, were arrested for breaking into a Paris fiat. Both men denied theft, but (he police commissary unscrewed the soldier’s wooden leg and extracted £BOO in securities. The other man had £2OO concealed in his shirt.

Dr. Addison, President of (he Local Government Board, speaking on housing at London recently, said: — “In the past, on the average, local authorities had been responsible for about 5,000 houses a year, I shall be greviously disappointed if we are not well on our way to completing 300,000 within two vears of this day.”

“In reply to yours of June OTh, 1014.” This is how a letter written to New York by a German firm in Coblenz starts. It shows very clearly that the Germans consider the war has merely been an unfortunate interruption in business relations and are anxious to start off a^ain where they broke off. < The mail passing through Treves reveals many curiosities in this respect. “These highway robberies are becoming 100 frequent, and 1 am sorry to say the offenders are generally overseas soldiers,” said a London magistrate in a recent case in which a private in the Gordon Highlanders and two Australian soldiers were charged with assaulting Albert Roy Windsor, Australian Field Ar-. tillery driver. Windsor said that just before midnight the men stopped him in Waterloo Road. One of the accused took his papers from his tunic pocket and knocked him down.

Describing' her interview with M. Clcmcnceau, in which she demanded mercy for her son, who recently tired at and wounded him, Mine. Collin says that when she entered his room the aged Premier did not give her time to speak. “I sent for you,” lie said, “to tell you that your boy’s life is safe.” M, Clcmcnceau questioned her kindly concerning her husband and family. When he heard she was going to see President Poincare, ho telephoned himself to the Elysee Palace, where on her arrival the head of the State informed her that her son’s sentence had been commuted to 10 years’ imprisonment. The sanitary inspector at Durham recently reported that 42 houses in a street in Brandon Colliery were infested with ants. They were frequently found in numerous quantities on sheets and clothing around the fireside, particularly on baking

clays, and one housewife had told him that on several occasions she had found good specimens in the centre of a bread loaf. Above all, they display an avaricious propensity for cheese and bacon, and even attack young children. Young mothers had shown him their babies suffering from sears caused by the pests. Even fatness has its advantages. Mrs Antonia Volkovitz, a , restau-rant-keeper, discovered this when she was charged in the Montreal court house with assault. She stands six feet high, and weighs 4001 b. She stood wedged tightly in the dock, listening unmoved as the judge ordered her to be confined to the cells pending the inquiry. The guards tried to lever her into the cell, but it was of no avail. The Monteral court house was not built to accommodate giants, and, panting and perspiring, had to give up the job. “It’s no good, judge,” pleaded the woman’s lawyer, “you’ll leave to give her bail.” “All right,” replied the judge. “She can’t run very far, anyway.” A discovery has been made which may be of great value to mothers whose children are highly strung. A boy baby 21 years old could not be induced to take his bottles. Various foods were tried, and doctors consulted. Then the nurse hit on .the idea of a grama phone. The baby had shown great fondness for music, and the grama phone experiment proved highly successful. Under the soothing influence of music the baby, who had previously taken only soz. of food, which was not enough, took lOoz. without a murmur. Unfortunately the baby has shown a partiality for a particular tune, “The beets and carrots foxtrot.” Needless to say, the household and neighbours arc getting a little tired of it.

Relating the story of how M. Paderewski .renounced his art and impoverished himself to work for a great Poland, a special correspondent of (he New York Herald says: “After the British offensive on the Somme in 191(i, M. Paderewski was living in a New York flat. One morning’ he simply walked to the piano and shut the lid. It was a symbolic gesture of the closing of one side of his life and self-conse-cration to his dream. Since that day the great artiste’s amazing fingers have never touched the keyboard, and in the hotel where he lives in Warsaw the dust on the piano shows lhai it is mute. He lives in throe modest rooms at the Hotel Bristol, Warsaw, and has worked eighteen hours every day for the last three months. An American court-martial sitting in London is inquiring into charges against Capt. Edmund G. Chamberlain, a young American .airman, of falsehood and scandalous conduct. He pleads not guilty. It is alleged that a document purporting to be signed by British officers and to record certain flights by Capt. Chamberlain was in fact false. The document told the story of what was undoubtedly the greatest feat of airmanship of the war — as it was told; and the question to be decided is whether it was true. The story of Captain Chamberlain’s exploits as issued by the American Information Committee last year stated that he had: Taken part in a light with two German planes, smashed five of (hem, shot down two others, charged and routed a detachment of Hun infantry, “bluffed” his captors with a fake grenade, taken one of them prisoner, rescued a wounded soldier, swum a stream under fire while he drove the prisoner before him and carried the wounded man.