GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2326, 8 September 1921, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

During the last 12 months the Aquitaniu has steamed 100,000 miles, and carried 90,000 people between Europe and America, a record for a passenger ship.

Two new records have been established at Prexham —a death-rate of 22.7 per 1000, and reduction of the infantile mortality rate from 142 to 67 per 1000 births: A small terrier saved • a family from death at Leicester early one morning. Mr Peach, the owner of the dog, was awakened by the animal entering his bedroom barking. He drove it downstairs, but the dog returned twice and tided to pull the bed-clothes off him. Then noticing a smell of burning, he got up and found the place on fire. Six children were rescued with difficulty.

While the White Star liner Olympic was in mid-Atlantic on a recent voyage, Dr. Lasker, the ex-champi-on chess player of the world, played three games of chess, blindfolded, by wireless, with Mr Norman Lodge, Mr S. Bergman, and Mr J. St. A. Johnson on the White Star liner Celtic. The games were adjourned after 15 moves owing to atmospheric conditions. Resuming next day, only one further move was possible, but in each case the position was decidedly in favour of Dr. Lasker.

An old man of 75, named William Trew, who has never been out of prison since 1865, except for a few days at a time, was sentenced at North London Police Court to 12 months' hard labour. It was stated that Trew had been known for many years as a “kitchen thief,” as he only broke into kitchens, and left other parts of the house alone. On June 20th last, three days after lie was released from prison, he was arrested on premises, and it was for this he was again sent to prison.

Pleading guilty to using the mails to defraud farmers who advertised for wives in Cupid’s column of a Western matrimonial paper by representing himself as a girl willing to marry, Janies J. Stewart was sentenced by a New York Court to one day’s imprisonment in the custody of the United States marshal, and fined .€lO. Stewart, who says lie is the sole support of his aged father and mother, promised the Court that he would return to various prospective bridegrooms the money they had forwarded to him. He said he obtained nearly £IOO by this method of swindling.

Renaming Havana streets in honour of modern celebrities is a practice of the City Council that causes much woe to business houses, postal officials and tourists. Sometimes the name of a thoroughfare is changed for just a few blocks, and then the difficulty is increased. The people sometimes disregard the new names altogether. The council recently announced that hereafter O’Reilly Street would be known as President Zayas Street, and Calzado de la Infanta as Avenue President Menocal, in honour, respectively, of the President and retiring President of Cuba.

A 15-year-old Brooklyn girl. Florence Cobleigh, who married twice within five months, was plaintiff recently in two suits for the annulment of her marriages, on the ground that on both occasions she was under age, Tf was the first time in Kings County that two actions for annulment have been begun at the same time by the same plaintiff. The girl had only been out of school a few months, when, in November, 1920, she married Robert Brocklehurst, aged 19. They quarrelled and separated. In April, 1921, she married Otto George Beringer, aged 23. Both husbands believed she was 18.

“Polly,” an 18-months-old black, leopard, which recently arrived at the London Zoo, has surprised the keepers by upsetting all traditions concerning her race. The ordinary variety of leopard is admitted'to be even more ferocious than the tiger, and the black leopard is supposed to go one better —or rather, worse. For 17 years “Satan,” the last black leopard in the gardens, acted up to his name by bad behaviour, and died snarling, about seven months ago. “Polly” has proved as amiable as “Satan” was ill-tempered, and will suffer herself to be stroked ,by the keeper with all the “docility” of any domestic cat. ' A notable demonstration of bird instinct was witnessed by hundreds of people in High Street, Aldershot, recently. A large martin became imprisoned in a crevice of the highest point of some business premises, and hung suspended on the wall. Three other swifts promptly fastened themselves upon the prisoner, and by dint of pecking and pulling, succeeded, after a two-hours’ struggle, in releasing their mate. Dozens of birds flew in distressed circles 1 round the rescuers.

A baby who was dropped from a window into the waiting arms of its mother in the street below was rescued from a burning house at Fleet recently. Finding her house filled with smoke, and flames shooting up the staircase, Mrs Bettison, of Clarence Road, Fleet, realised that the only chance of escape for herself and her 18-months-old child lay through the bedroom window. Calling to a young girl to assist her, the woman, clad only in night attire, climbed on to the window sill and leapt to the ground. She escaped unhurt, and at once shouted to the girl who was left in the house to throw the baby to her. With -wonderful judgment the woman caught the child, which came to rest safely in her arms. The girl who dropped the baby was also rescued unharmed.

Maid snatching, a crime unknown to the statute books, is London’s newest form of thievery. It results from the shortage of domestic servants following the war. The technique of this new crime is mostly highly developed among the recently enriched war profiteers. More than one would-be mistress resorts to the telephone; not once in a while, but often and systematically. Others have the audacity to make personal calls on the maid at the house where she is employed, while the less daring wait outside the house when they know it is the maid’s night out. The maid snatcher wins in the Majority of cases. The bait of “more leisure,” “higher wages,” etc., is successful in tempting the average domestic worker, as it does most other workers. Nor is it the housewives alone who are guilty of these practices. The husbands are aiders and abbettors more often than not. So eager are they for domestic peace that they will take any means to attain their object.

“We are a long-suffering and very silly country,” observed Mr Bingley, the magistrate at Woolwich Police Court, when several Russians and

an Austrian were summoned for arrears of income-tax. The Austrian

was reported to have earned £6 to €7 a week, and the Russians also had received good money. Three of the men pleaded that they could not pay the lax now, because they were out of employment. Two admitted being in receipt of the dole, Hut the third, the Austrian, said he had not received anything from the Labour Exchange for five weeks. Mr Bingley: A good job, too! It’s a nice thing these foreigners coming here like this, refusing to pay their share of the country’s expenses, but going on our Labour Exchanges. Does anyone imagine that if our men went to Moscow or Vienna they would get £6 or £7 a week, and then get money from the Labour Exchange as soon as they fell out of work? Orders were made for the defendants to pay within a few days, <>r go to prison.

Captain Marehal, a French aviation “ace,” has died in Paris from bronchial* pneumonia at the age of 39. Marehal gained fame during the war by his flight over Berlin, when he distributed tracts informing the population that if France did not send bombing aeroplanes over Berlin it was solely because she was averse to shed innocent blood. Engine trouble, however, forced him to descend in enemy territory, and lie was sent a captive to Madgeburg, where lie met his fellow-aviator, Garros. The two escaped into France. Marehal was planning a trans-Atlantic aeroplane flight when death came.