HERE AND THERE.

North Otago Times, Volume CVII, Issue 17166, 24 March 1927, Page 3

HERE AND THERE.

Education in Japan. London, New York, Boston. and Berlin, may be famed student centres, but they are obliged to yield first place to rrokio. The Japanese capital's population is estimated at 2.000,000, and one in scwn attends an institution of higher learning. * Pennies in "The Plate." Nearly 1100 pennies were included in the collection at a recent crowdcd church service in Belfast. The Dean of Belfast later commented on the matter. "Go into Belfast's leading shopping centre," the D>ean | said, "and see what you will get for a penny. Give more to the church than you would to a beggar." * * & t | Nine and Twenty Knives. j The Rev. Thomas Spurgeon told ! the 'following capital story of a ; preacher who had had a fatal | lluency of speech, and relied on it ! when fullilling preaching engagements. One old church member ,determined to cure hira. He thereforc asked him to preach. The invitation was accepted. The time came and the visitor began his usual introduetion: "Brethern, I have been pushed for time to-day as to have Ireen quite unable to prepare a sermon. But if some of you will give me a | text I'll preach from it. Perhaps my brother here" — turning to the plotter near him— "will suggest a t-ext." "Yes, brother," came in ready rcsponse. "Your text is the last part I of> the.ninth verse of the first chapter of Ezra, ahd its words are : 'Nine and twenty knives.' " There was a pause, an ominous pause, as the preacher found his text. He read out: "Nine and twenty knives," and hegan at once, "Notice the number of these knives — ^just exactly nine and twenty; noc thirty, not eight and twenty. There were no more and no less than nine and twenty knives." A pause — a long pause. Then, slowly and emphatically, | "Nine and twenty knives." A longer pause. Then meditatively, "Nine j and twenty knives." Again he rest- ! ed. "Nine and twenty knives — and i if there were nine hundred and i twenty knives I could- not say anI other word." •S ! Land's End. | For beauty and for terror, for | wild1 grandeur, and for sculptured I grace of arch and- column carved hy i the subtle chisel of[the sea,, there | are few, if any, coasts which excel that of Cprnwall. He who, jour- | neying westward, touch'es the beau- ] tiful town of Penzance, should not i fail to visit Land's End. Standing, ! on the westward extremity of Eng- ' land, and formed of' granite cliffs ! and mighty boulders which rise ; about seventv feet above the level 1 of the sea, this rocky promontory ! looks forth upon the ocean with a front of majesty which awes the beholder. When the storm-winds are. blowing the windy cliff seems to shake beneath the 'phmging thunder of the waves, and when the winds are hushed, and Ihe sun looks forth, very lovely is the breaking of the sapphire sea on the dark rocks. The granite wai] around this coast is often worn by the weather into the form bf prismatic. cubical. or spljeroidal hlocks, piled in gigan-* tic cairns. These hlocks sometimes form logging, or logan stones, one, of the mightiest of which moves to the touch of the visitor at Land's End. It was on tliis promontory that. stirred by the solemn grandeur of the scene, Wesley wrote the hymn, "one stanza Ofi which reads: Lo! on a narrow neck of land, 'Twixt two unbounded seas I stand / Secure, insensii le. * * * Ex-Ge,rman Cruiser. Form the particulars of an insurance recently placed in the London market, it appears that the ex-Ger-man cruiser Goeben, now the Turkish warship Yavouz, is to' be drydocked for repair in a floating dock which has recently heen assembled at Goldjuk, near Constantinople, after heing sent out from Germany in sections. The insurance is something of a triumph for British und'erwriters, for the amount covered reaches nearly £1,500,000, the Yavouz heing valued at £1,100,OOft, and the floating dock at £360000, while there are certain ancillary insurances. The risk covered is that incurred during the lifting of the vessel by the dock, and though this is expected to take three hours at the mosL the policy covers twenty-four hours from the commencement of the operation. It is understood that, although German and Turkish interests alone are involved in the carrying out of repairs, less than £100,000 of the insurance has been placed in the German market. * * *

freshiy killed. The toad utilises this principle in protecting his own body from injury and possible death. If we take a cat, a dog or other animal, and f-orce it to paw or claw the toad, it immediately inflates its own body and then feigns death. The swelling of the body is purposely accomplished to malce a morsel of itself that no animal of a certain size can swallow, and the feigning of death will usually result in abandonment by enemies after they pronouncc the toad "dead." The spider is another creature that has for its standard rule in selecting things fit to eat; I "life." Things must be very active j to convince the spider that it is j a fit morsel for food. If a dead j | insect is dropped into a spider's i ' web, tlic little owner will ^ politelv I clip the web and toss the unwel- I - come food to the ground below. I like the toad, the spider recognises I the fact that activity seems to he ' the world -wide password, for when j his own life is thrcatcned he rolls | up into a ball. drops to the ground and plays off dead. Birds are very carcful about their haths. The old cat not only cleanses her body daily. but washes the kittens as well. But of' all Ihe animals the rabbit is, perhaps, the most san'tary. She is earefui about cleansine every part of her body. Even insects may of'* " " -hserved tak'ng their dailv nnluk^ono. /