GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 2375, 5 January 1922, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

A large number of mines are again reported in Hie English Channel. The steamer Hunt Semvort encountered one in latitude 49.30 iiorlh, longii udc .‘1 west, and the Cornish sighted one between Weymouth and Cherbourg. Another warning to keep a sharp look-out for mines has been issued to ships by the French Admiralty. ’Mr B. H. Geary, V.C., M.A., of Keble College, Oxford, was ordained deacon at Chelmsford Cathedral recently. Mr Geary, when a sec-ond-lieutenant in the East,Surrey Regiment, won his V.C. at Hill 00, near Ypres, in 1915, for successfully defending a heavily attacked crater throughout it night., being severely wounded. He will be a, curate of West Ham Parish Church. An ex-service man and his family —-eleven in all —who had been living in a cellar without windows or doors, were installed in one of two houses commandeered at Brighton recently. In the other, house, a father, mother, who hud been .sleeping in an office where the man worked, with their two children, were installed. They were ejected -.later, however, during the absence of the father at work. The children are now in the Poor Law institution.

Prince Mahidol of Siam, a brother of the. King of Siam, arrived in London recently from the United States with his young wife. The princess was dressed like a typical American girl. The prince himself, with his tweed trousers, his belted raincoat, and brown felt hat, might have been a stylish young American. He told a Daily Mail reported that he is in England for a couple of months to study the public health arrangements in that country. Applications for the £l,()00-a----year post of “laundry wizard” have been received from 70 scientists by the British Launderers’ Research Association, which advertised for an expert to reduce the high cost of laundry work. “Lnundrymen have been losing trade owing to the large number of customers who cannot par the present prices, and we hope that the investigations carried out by the new scientific expert will bring back those customers,” said the secretary of tsifi? National Federation of Launderers to a Daily Mail reporter. 'When the great tire broke out at the Magasins du Prinlemps, Paris, a few weeks ago, a eat was, with its three kittens, in the basement of the building. Scenting the danger, it carried the three kittens one by one out of the tire zone to a grocer’s shop about 100 yards away. How the brave little mother accomplished the rescue through blinding smoke must remain for ever a mystery. Its kittens safe, the cat sank to the ground with her paws badly burned and he}- skin a mass of blisters. The shop girls attended to the kittens and the devoted mother,

The greatest wind and rain storm ever recorded in Canada has swept the country from the south. The .wind rose to 72 miles an hour, with a rainfall of .38in. in seven minutes. There were many deaths and great damage resulted. Terrific storms swept the Great Lakes. One steamship captain was drowned. Buildings were unroofed at Toronto and Hamilton, and orchards were demolished. At Quebec a wall fell, smashing a taxi-cab, but the driver was not seriously injured. In a. Montreal street the wind lifted a Ford motor car and hurled it through a shop window. For many hours Montreal, Ottawa, and Toronto were practically isolated, the telegraph. and telephone wires being down.

Heir to 3U,UUO,()I)(J lire (nomiuall.y fI,2(H),U(J(J), u carpenter, Giacomo Lusardi, oi' (Jologna, Italy, who receives the huge sum through the death oi' his brother iu America, continues to work in his humble shop, above which is his living room. Gvery day the postmen bring him bundles oi letters, and people call in motor cars to place themselves and their homes at his disposal. He has been offered a nobleman’s palace for purchase, and . bankers without number have been offering to invest his money. Though only 311 years old, .Lusardi says that he would rather live on in his shop. He is used to hie there; he does not know the way oi palaces, and his present intention iy to continue to carve out happiness at his work bench as in former times.