NEWS IN BRIEF

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2366, 10 December 1921, Page 1

NEWS IN BRIEF

Sir Harry Lauder’s Highland estate, Glenbranter (which he bought for his son, killed in the war), was offered for sale at Glasgow recently. The highest bid was £IO,OOO. The property, 14,000 acres . in extent, was bought by Sir Harry for £IOO,000. No sale was made. The builder of the Eiffel Tower is now 80, and he has just stated that he believes his famous tower will last practically for ever. He has been living during the hot summer in a little apartment built on the highest platform of the tower, where he has not suffered from the long heat wave.

The British Co-operative Wholesale Society owns 40,000 acres of farm land in England, 10,000 acres of wheat land in Canada, and (with the Scottish Wholesale) 40,000 acres of tea plantations in Asia, besides palm groves in Africa, currant farms in Greece, vineyards in Spain. In the attic workshop where James Watt, of steam-power fame, experimented a hundred years ago, at Ileallierfield Hall, near Birmingham, his tools lie just as he left them. The Watt Centenary Committee purposes to preserve this sanctuary of science to the British nation.

For famine relief in Russia, the Society of Friends had spent £250,000 of American contributions up to the end of August, and was asking Americans to contribute £1,000,000 more. This relief is in addition to that being arranged by the American Relief Administration.

Work has had to be suspended at the Vnl Saint Lambert glassworks in Belgium owing to a big decrease in the number of orders, due to the loss of the German, Russian, and Balkan markets, and the competition of German and Czeclm-Slovnk firms, which have been able to offer their products at halt the Belgian price.

There is a steady demand in Mesopotamia for the limited supply of long staple cotton seed available for distribution. The suitability and superiority of this seed over the local type have been definitely proved. Some 700 acres have been sown with seed supplied by the U.S.A. Agricultural Department. A joint-stock company has been formed in Chung-king for the establishment of an iron foundry at a cost of about £200,000. An Anglo-Chinese-Japanese syndicate has also been organised, with a capital of £1,500,000, to establish a large iron foundry on Shinwa Island, China, where it is planned to produce 200 tons of pig-iron per day. During July the American Relief Administration, of which Herbert Hoover is chairman, furnished 7,704,383 meals to Austrian children, an average of 248,528 a day. Since the Hoover organisation began its relief work in Austria in 1919, it has served 163,940,658 meals to the children of the country. Conditions are improving slowly. On August Ist; there were 217,000 children fed at the Relief Administration stations. On August Bth the number was 208,276, divided as follows: —Vienna, 89,548; lower Aus-

tria, 49,197; provinces, 69,531. The Grimsby herring trade with Germany is being revived, and recently the first cargo since the war of 600 cases of herrings was sent to Hamburg. For two and a-half years, up to September last, the number of unsolved murders in New York City are stated by the New York Herald to have been 383.

The American Consul at Bagdad, in a recent report ,states that the market for motor vehicles and supplies in Mesopotamia is overstocked at present.

A recently enacted law in Uruguay establishes an export duty of 4 per cent, ad valorem on washed and unwashed wool, cattle hides, and sheepskins and tallow.

Sousa, the famous band conductor and composer, has gone deaf, lie can hear but little of the music of his brass band. He is undergoing treatment, and hopes for recovery.

A watch hanging to a bedpost in the sun in a recent heat wave caused a fire in the town of Bucholt, Germany. The crystal, serving as a burning glass, set fire to the bed. Lieutenant Arthur Emerson was killed at Oklahoma City, U.S.A., recently while attempting to change from one aeroplane to another at the State Fair grounds. Six thousand persons saw him fall 200 ft.