NEWS IN BRIEF.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 2119, 24 April 1920, Page 4

NEWS IN BRIEF.

When an aeroplane rises 10,000 or 12,000 feet up, the air pressure is low, and if the tires, on the plane are inflated too much they will blow out because there is not enough resistance outside to counterbalance the air pressure inside. Mr W. Meredith has played in more international football matches than any other man, having played for Wales 45 times. The record for England is held by R. Crompton (34); for Scotland by R. Walker (20); and for Ireland by F. Stanfield 130).

Among old laws against kissing, those of Iceland appear to have been the most severe. Banishment was the penalty laid down for kissing another man's wife, either with or without her consent, and the same punishment was enforced for kissing an unmarried woman against her will.

Many claims arc put forward hj different places which profess to possess the largest bell in tho world. The largest bell-shaped piece of metal in existence is that in the Kremlin, at Moscow, the “Tsar Kolokol.” It weighs about 103 tons. But this huge example of the founder’s art has a piece broken out of one side of such a size that (lie bell at one time was used as a chapel, with the fracture as a doorway. No attempt has ever been made to hang or ring it.

There are 60 miles of wire in a rigid airship. Designers to Queen Elizabeth fashioned her gowns from the richest materials, including gold tissue,

crimson satin, (doth of gold, cloth of silver, while solved, drake-col-oured satin, dovc-colonred velvet, lady blush satin, and mantles of white plush striped with swan’s down.

The mound-shaped nests of the jungle-fowls of. Australia, in’ which the eggs arc hatched by the heal of the decomposing vegetation, are sometimes fifteen feed high and one luthdrod and fifty feet in circumference. They are believed to be the largest nests made by any creature. Owing to the diminution of (he density of (lie atmosphere in .proportion to the altitude, and a corresponding increase in (he average velocity of the wind, navigation of the air by aeroplanes or heavier-tban-air machines is considered impossible at heights exceeding 15,000 feet.

It is commonly asserted that the Burmese all smoke, ami that Burmese babies cry for a, cigar instead of crying for the moon. This is not so. But it is quite common to see a lot of little boys and girls in the street making mud-pies and puffing away at big cigars with equal enthusiasm.

Naturalists are grievously disappointed to learn that once again an Okapi has succumbed to the rigours of a voyage from its tropical homo to the cold latitudes of Europe. All attempts to export it have failed, and in 1903, when it was announced that ten specimens were on their way from the Belgian Congo to Leopold, not one arrived alive.

in 1912 there occurred on tho Alaskan Peninsula one of the greatest volcanic outbursts on record. Mount Kafinal, ;i peak 7,500 feel high, exploded. The noise it made was heard 750 miles away. Intense darkness, black as midnight in (he daytime, prevailed over a vast area, lasting for sixty hours at Kodiak, 100 miles away. Sulphurous fumes were distinguished in Pugent Sound, ],S(H) miles from the burning mountain. All vegetation was annihilated, and bears, rabbits, caribou and other animals went blind.

According to n scientist, the earth's solid crust, with- a specific gravity of 2.5 as against 5.7 for the entire globe—crust a*nd liquid or semi-liquid interior —consists of the various elements in tho followingproportions by weight: Oxygen, 47.29 per cent.; silicon, 27.21; aluminimum, 7.81; iron 5.46; calcium 3.77; magnesium, 2.68; sodium, 2.36; potassium," 2.40; hydrogen, 0.21; titanium, 0.33; carbon, 0.22; chlorine, 0.01; phosphorus, O.lOj manganese, 0.08; sulphur, 0.03; ’barium, 0.03; chromium, 0.01.

What is said to be the first shipment of Chinese coal to the American continent was made in June, when 1,000 tons were shipped from Chinwangtao to Alaska. It is considered doubtful if there is a Chinese native living who knows the whole of the forty-four thousand characters that make up the Chinese language.

Some of the big New York hotels spend £2,000 a year for notepaper and envelopes, a large part of which is used or carried away by persons who are not guests of the hotel. Among the Alps there are several post offices at a height of 6,000 ft. or 7,000 ft. One letter-box, from which the postman makes several collections daily, is nearly 10,000 feet above the sea level.

In England the average weeklycost to the State of a convict (sentenced to penal servitude) is £2 2s fid, of a convicted prisoner £1 10s lOd, a pauper £1 0s Od, and a pauper lunatic 18s Bjd.