GENERAL NEWS ITEMS

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2263, 14 April 1921, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS

A Paris Court lias delivered its ii tiding in the case of the six soldiers who were shot for desertion in the Vingre sector (Aisne) in December, 1914. The court annuls the decision then reached, and clears the names of the deceased, and it also grants a* yearly pension of 2,000 francs as from December, 1914, to each of their widows, and a pension of 1,000 francs to each of the three children of one of the contemned men, which pension in the event of the death of one child will be added to the pensions of the other two.

Mounted huntsmen and two whip-pers-in, wearing scarlet, with a small pack of hounds, followed the funeral of the late Major Clive

Wilson, D. 5.0., master of the Hotderness Hounds. As the funeral passed the hunting stables several favourite horses were brought out and stood in mute farewell. Horses and hounds preceded Ihe cortege from the church to the grave, where sailors of I lie Wilson Dine, in blue jerseys, acted as bearers. From the major's ’aged mother was a wreath with the pathetic message: “We shall soon meet again." Conferences in which anyone can take part are held once a week at the Munster Park Wesleyan Church, and Miss Lena Ashwell, the wellknown actress, recently delivered from the pulpit an address on ‘‘Church and Stage.” “Members of the audience,’'’ said the Rev. A. Cordon James, “are encouraged lo ask questions and to enter into the discussions. It all pronudes frankness and good fellowship. Miss Dona Ash well's appearance was (lie lirst, 1 believe, of an actress in the pulpit of a Wesleyan church. We recognise her -plendid,efforts to improve the drama.” A young Parisian stenographer, Mile. Pence Jnequnrl, who had never been in an aeroplane before, ascended at De Bourgel aerodrome recently, and at a height of 1,090 ft. leaped out to test a new type of parachute. iShe” made a perfect binding. Mile. Jacquart is a pretty brunette, wlm does the typing'll De Bourgel for the Society of Pilots. When the tests were liing made she was casually asked if she would make one attempt. She accepted at once, pul on the complicated harness of (lie parachute, and went through the test without the slightest hesitation.-

Inventors arc continually exploited, and rich men among thorn arc nire, s;ii<l Mr Godfrey Cheesemnrn ol the National Union of Manufacturers. Giving as an illustration tlic glass ball in the soda-water bottle, lie said the inventor was unable lo sell it for years, and linally gave it away for £2O. The man who bought it made £2,500.001), In the case of the screw stopper, I lie man who bought it made a fortune, and the inventor got practically nothing. Recently an invaluable invention bad been made for the telephone, but it was impossible lo sell ii in Britain, and ii went to'the United States. There is more disloyalty in this Dominion (says the Eltliam Argus) limn many people are aware of —a blatant disloyalty that should not be tolerated in a Dominion that has made .such sacrifices for the Umpire as New Zealand has made. Our sons did not perish on the field of battle to convert this country into a happy hunting ground for foreign emissaries, spies, traitors, and sedi-

lionists. "We have all these in our midst, and they require rooting out as cancer should be. Even in this town of Eltliam we have had one of the breed talking about revolution. Men of this type should be put into the nearest trough when they air such ideas.

The eastern mind, as it, shows itself in India, is in some ways a curious mixture of what is good and what we regard as foolish. Care for animal life is good, though the reason l'or it is often faulty. The reason is that the chief Indian religion supposes t.he possibility of the human spirit passing after death into an animal, and so in hurling an animal one may he causing pain to a dead friend. This belief leads to some curious scenes. For instance, recently a large whale was stranded on the shore," near Bombay, and the people a round, not only t rooped down to the place to see (he sight, quite strange to them,-but many of them made offerings —such as sweetmeats and other tilings quite unsuitable for a whale’s enjoyment —to tlic dead whale. The mixture in the eastern mind of what is good and whali- unwise makes the wise guidance of the people ditiicull.