GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 2519, 16 December 1922, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Which is (he wealthiest race in the world reckoning the average income per head of population? There is no doubt that in the near future the Osage Indians, numbering 2,000, and living in Oklahoma, in America, will enjoy this distinction. Oil has been dscovered on their territory, and, with the permission of file United States Government, they are selling the land to a company for nearly a million pounds down with a sixth of the profits on all the oil produced there. Two thousand tribesmen will share the proceeds of this transaction, and each will receive an annual income of £2,000, which is higher than the average income in any other eountrv.

The danger of leaving children alone in a house was the subject of comment: by the Lambeth coroner in recording a verdict of accidental death on Elsie May East, aged three and a half months. The mother stated tlml at about 0.40 p.m. she gave the child its bottle and then placed it in bod, the teat from the bottle in its mouth. She went with her husband to a club where they sat talking till nearly midnight, and when she got home she found the baby dead. Tile Coroner: This is the result of going to clubs. Your child died of suffocation. He added that he could not help expressing his regret that the parents, who were very respectable people, should have been so thoughtless as to leave the baby in a dangerous position. Had be thought it was anything more than thoughtlessness lie would have taken a serious view of the ease. Stowe House, the famous seat of the Dukes of Buckingham and Cliandos, is to be converted into a great public school modelled on the lines of Eton and Harrow. It has been bought with that intention' by a committee of which Lord Gishorough is chairman, and the price paid to Mr Harry Shaw, flic present owner, is £30,000. The Kev. I*. E. Warrington, vicar of country parish south-east of Bath, is stated to have carried through the deal. Stowe House is admirably suited for the purpose. It has magnificent rooms which can be easily altered to suit class purposes; there is extensive accommodation for ' boarding. and its beautiful woods and lields afford ample ground for recreation. .Mr Shaw, whose name was recently mentioned in connection with tlie alleged sale of honours. acquired the mansion and some of its art treasures in July of last year for £50.000 and there was talk at the time of Its presenting the house to the nation.

Said to be the oldest person in the world to l> naturalised. Dr. .1. Kosedale Ward, !)(>, has become a citizen of the United States. He held himself erect, was smartly dressed, and took the oath fervently. Outside the Court he lit a cigarrette and said to a surprised onlooker, “1 smoke GO cigarettes a day. I drink six to eight cups of coffee daily and cat what I like, but 1 have only two meals a day. My advice is, ’Don’t worry; let the other chap do that, and the heavy eating as well." " Dr Ward has had a remarkable career, lie says lie was boi’ii in 182(5, in Jerusalem, where his father was British Consul, and studied medicine at King’s College, London, in Heidelberg’, \ ienn,a, and Naples, and- "came out without knowing anything." He went to Africa with H. M. Stanley, and landed in The United State- in ]BBO. He was in Mecca about JB(i2 and became a Mohammedan, and in 18(17 he was interpreter for the Empress Eugenie in Era nee. He inarl icd in Germany, and all his live children were horn in America.

There is ;i groat commotion ill theDiiimoiid ('it.v.' Kimberley, concerning :i suggestion that a mixed lawn tennis maleh should he played in which the players would wear the garb of their opposite sex. One indignant citizen has declared: "It s an insidious attempt to convert our South African girls to the wearing of flint wicked, unmaidenly, immodest, and masculine garb —trousers. In my younger days I lie girl who attempted such a thing would have been severely smacked, and rightly so. 1 am given to understand that the wearing of trousers by girls was common in England during the war. 1 am not going to pass any opinion as to the rig’llt or wrong of the over-educated vote-snatch-ing, window-smashing women adopting the garb, but if our young womenfolk follow their lend the wai i, responsible for another great wrong. Years ago our girls were noted for their unaffected modesty and feminine charm, and, with the exception of the low‘skirt and open blouse type of woman, this is as it was forty years ago. In the interest of the girls of South Africa, I object.”