GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 2135, 1 June 1920, Page 4

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Mile. Yollond, the French airgirl who recently created a stir by travelling 125 miles to Paris from her home at Le Crotoy, has again distinguished herself by looping the loop. This is said to be the first time that this feat has been performed by a woman pilot. ‘T don’t seen any profane or obscene language here. Those are only the classical words used by George Bernard Shaw,” said the Plymouth magistrate’s clerk, when Ellen Taylor was charged with using bad language. The ca.se was dismissed, the woman being advised to avoid “classical” phraseology.

“If they knew how much sentiment- nncl human interest there is associated with the purchase of precious stones, the public would be astonished,” said a jewel expert to a London paper. 1 ' Asked what was the most popular stone to-day, he said: —“On the part of women the demand is 75 per cent, for diamonds. They are .highly superstitions about their gems. Some say that rubies bring danger by lire, or others that the emerald is likely to cause an unlucky engagement, while it is common knowledge that many think the opal peculiarly unlucky.” During the voyage from New York of the ex-German liner Imperalor. which recently arrived at Southampton, a highly successful hanking experiment was conducted on board. This is the first sea bank that has been opened, and although no details of the transaction on board can he given, it is admitted by the officials that a very large sum or'monev uas handled. Wireless was'employod in transmitting money to passengers. For instance, a voyager who ran shot'! sent a wireless to his bankers in Loudon, and a Marconi-

gram Ava* despatched to the ship’s bank,, authorising the money to be advanced.

The King has awarded the Edward Medal to Charles- Whclpton, Edward Naylor, and Horace Bell, under the following circumstances: —While engaged at the top of a chimney 150 feet high at the Atlas Works, Sheffield, last August, a steeplejack was overcome by fumes. Whclpton, Naylor and Bell, who were not steeplejacks, but had formerly been used to working at a height, at once ascehded the ladder, and on reaching the top, which was only nine inches wide, they applied artificial respiration to the uneon-f scions man for tweuly minutes, and then, with great difficulty, lowered him to the ground in a canvas ambulance sling.

The love secret of a wealthv ChiI cago business man, a former officer in the American army, and a beautiful divorcee, whose bodies were found side by side in the latter’s Hat, was revealed by the silent, evidence of the woman’s diary and the man’s cheque counterfoils. 'What authorities first believed to lie a suicide pact is now thought to be a murder and suicide. Scrawled in a page of a diary in the woman’s handwriting was a poem, which is believed to be the key to the mystery: Sleep, my beloved, sleep: Be patient, we shall keep Our secret closely hid ,

’Beneath the coffin lid. Other evidence led to the conclusion that (he man, tired of his dual life, threatened to leave his paramour, with the result that she shot him as he slept, then sent a bullet through her own brain.

An Lilian named Coratoni, of Carolini, formerly an Alpine guide and now a workman, who is a native of Counnayour, slabbed a comrade three limes with a dagger, in a brawl at Martigny. Then, thinking that his victim was dead, he started for home on skis across the Mer de Glace above Chamonix. As he had eighteen hours’ start,, a parly of guides following him lost his traces. In the meantime Chamonix informed the Italian authorities, who sent up two patrols lo watch the Coi du (.leant, 10,915 feet high. One of the Italian patrols, all on skis, entered a hut-shelter meant for Alpinists in distress, where they found Coratoni calmly eating tinned loud. He said he was freezing, and had thrown away his dagger. His trousers were covered with congealed blood. Coratoni was handcuffed and led by the patrol down by (he shortest’ routes across the snow paths from an altitude 'of nearly 11,000 feet safely to’Courmayeur, where he was formally arrested and incarcerated ponding hiy trial. In the event of the dealii of his victim, his extradition will be demanded by the French Government. This feat of the french and Italian Alpine police in high mountains is greatly admired.