OMNIUM GATHERUM
Bolhia and Siam are the only civilised ! or eemi-cn llised Powers without a national ■debt. I Nova Scotia's postal revenue is. it is . 6aid. increasing at the rate of o\er £160,000 I | a jcar. I Blacklead does not contain a single par- j tide of lead, but is composed, of carbon ( and iron. I Lord Nunburnholnie's widow is de- | scended from the great Duke of Welling- ' ton's brother. I In 1840, 951b out of every 1001b of sugar j were made from cajie. To day only 341b i j are so made. j A Tuikish turbaai of the largest size j contains from 10yds to 20yds of the 6nest I and softest muslin. j The Imcrcargill milk retailers have de- j cidcd to charge 4-d per quart for milk and | Is 6d per pint for cream. | The estimated total produce of potatoes i in Great Britain in 1907 was 2.977.910 tons— j nearly 500.000 tons less than last ear. Frogskins to the value of £670 were exported last \ear from Yokohama. From them are made purses, pocket-books, etc. A bridge recently built for the Ca.pe to Cairo railway over the Kafue River is j the longest briJge in Africi. It Measures j 1400 ft. ' *• According to Professor Ridgewav, tho English language is spoken by 650 n"Uhon people. Russian by 235 million, and Gei\nan by 215 million. i Mrs Jeanie Brown, of Atlantic Oitv. who has just married, has baen divorced three times, engaged 24 times, and has won two breach of promise oases. . There is a great demand for houses in New Plymouth at present. In two hours the other morning one land agent had no fewer than eight inquirere. i A new Russian walnut, the Eldorado, i has been introduced to rhe London market. I They are a little larger and cleaner in kernel than the English walnut. , The foundation etone of the first houea of the new buildings at Christ's College, Christ-church, will be laid by his Excellency the Governor on Saturday, February 22. | Af the Baldwin locomotive works. Philadelphia, the clerks are so expert in handing out wages on pay-day that 18,000 men. receive their pay in less than 20 minu+es. ' A medal struck for distribution to the natives of the islands visited by Captain I Cook on his second royage ha* been added to the museum collection at Wi'llmjrton. The largest buoy in thf world, stationed ar the anchoiage of .be Cunarders Luci- I tama and Mauritania in '■he Mer- Q v •"c- , ploded and se\erely injured Georg° See', one oT Hie workmen who -irs-s repairing \ i"- _ i Six s;ii Is were locked by an office boy , :n a fireproof and airtight room on the twelfth floor of a Cliicaeo skyscraper. The i bor found he could not reopen the door, i and the girls were almost suffocated when help arrived. A biologist says that the two sides of a face aio never alike. In two cases out of five the eyes are out of line ; one eye is stronger than the other in se^ en cases out of ten; and the right ear is generally higher than the left. A telegram from Dalbv. Queensland. slates that a man named Yens A. Hansen, the travelling representative of the Australian Widows" Fund, was found dead on January 28. Deceased left a letter stating that he was tired of life. Rabbits are invading the town of Oamaru. A resident of the south hill informs the Oamaru Mail that rabbits are rapidly in- | cieasing in that part of the town, one i householder having destroyed no fewer than 11 during the la^t we<ik or so. Chailotte Sa-ville. aged 15, of Bramley. near Leeds, died in the infirmary after swallowing a piece of chalk, which caused appendicitis. Deceased was a winder at a mill, and used chalk in her work. A deaf and dumb bride and bridegroom have just been, married by typewriter at Minneapolis, U.S.A., the registrar typing the questions and the bridal couple typing the answers on the same slip of paper. A northern paper states that the New Zealand Rugby Union is advised that 70 applications have been received for the position in the British team to visit the Dominion. The applicants include 27 international player^. In conversation with a Pjaas reporter
Superintendent Smith stated that the fire at the Colonial and Foreign Agency Company's premises brought the total number of fires in Christchuich dunng the past seven months up to 112. At this weeks meeting of the South Canterbury Board of Education the Rev. G. Barclay, speaking of the o-\ercrowding of schools, said he had recently been in one school where the children were actually sitting on the fireplace. A Greymouth correspondent states that there were 420 members of the Denniston Miners' L T nion present at the conference with the Prime Minister, and a ia understood that 36 of those voted against the acceptance of the Minister's mediation. Appealing to the Worcester Guardians for an allowance of tobacco, a woman inmate of the workhouse, aged 85, said she had 6moked a pipe for 70 years, and for went of it she had not been able to dige3t her food. The request was granted. A start has been made at mining in the vicinity of Big River, on the way to Preservation. Messrs Grey and party have apnlied for an allu\ ial claim and water race. The returns will be loked forward to with interest by a large number of miners. A 6ettler who resides npar the bush skirting the Longwood, while out rabbit shooting, had his attention attracted by the cries and strange actions of a tui. On investigating the cause, he ascertained that a stoat was making its way up the tree to the bird's nest. A new treatment for the drunkard is reported 'rom Denver (U.S.). Whenever an intoxicated man is taken to the lock-up he is photographed, and the picture is shown to him when he sobers up. The police say that the photographic cure 13 working wonders. Bananas are now ripened in London by electricity. They are hung in airtight rooms, which are flooded with electric light. The powerful tamps have the same effect ac sunshine, and the ripening of the fruit can easily be regulated. As showing the straits to which many of the settlers have been reduced in consequence of the bush fires, a prominent Wellington business man stated that he had purchased 60 head of cattle from one settler at £1 per head. Men in Belgium are not on an equality as voters. Unmarried men over 25 years of age have one vote, married men and widowers with families have two votes, and priests and certain other persons have three votes. Severe penalities are imposed on those who fail to vote. Mr and Mrs Arthur Young, of Ballymathpr, near Belfast, whose combined ages totalled 160 years at the time of their death, were buried in the same grave near Templepatrick, County Antrim. They were married 55 years ago. His Holiness the Pope Ims lace estimated at 6oniething like £250,000 in value. It is kept in cedar-wood oabinet-s in the Vatican, and as it is the custom of the royal and noble Catholic families of Italy. Spain, and Austria to pi cent their bridal lace to the Church, tho collection is an ever-growing one. The Napier Gas Company 16 a prosperous concern. An interim dnidend was paid on June 30 last, leaiing a balance of profit of £5430 8s 9*l. At the annual meeting j last weok it was agreed to pay a further i dividend amounting to £3746 15s 6<l. loaving a balance of £1683 13s 3d to cany ! forward. ' Sentence of two \ eai\« ' hard labour under ■ the Borstal s\stem was passed at Preston | on James Jeff i cv, 18. on several charges j of housp!,i"a.kinET. In one case he stole! £29 and 6tait«<l making a betting-book with his woikmatcs. The latter, however, fleeced him by backing horses after they had won, and he lost all the stolen money. In his New Year's address to the commanding generals of Germany's 23 _ Army Corps at the War Museum in Berlin, the German Emperor referred in severe terms fo the scandals in the army ac revealed during the Moltke-Harden trials. He cautioned the generals in vigorous terms to , exterminate every vestige of such a state of things. Gradually tho penny tramway coupons i are informally becoming legal tender for coppfr in Wellinerton There is at lca«fc one Wellinftt^u citi^n (&ays the Post) who
offers a coupon when he i 6 buying a paper £ in the street, and gets the little clip **| accepted. Other oases in which the coupons, jj in small quantities, have been received ac * cish are recorded. « At the close of the Boer war the publio * of Now Zealand were asked to subscribe to ,i hu)() for marking and caring for the '4 ui,n< sof New Ze-alanders who fell in rhe j \a i, Tho fund was called "The Now Zealand Soldiers' Gra-vcs Guild." Although se\eial oar^ lia\e elapsed since the close j of tho war, the fund is untouched. It amounts to £659 14s. J I Before Samoa was taken possession of 1 by (iennain the mi«.ionaript= had bcon ablo J |to gi\e promi=' % 'r students all the instruc- * tion in English they needed, but since 2 the authorities ha\e thought wise to pro- i j hibit tho teaching of English in schools, a name can pel feet his knowledge of tha language only by lea\ mg hi 6 native islands * altogether for a term. ' As -how.ng the enormous interest taken in Limerick competitions, the Biitish Post-inaetci-gener.il state* that during August, September, and October of 1906 the total number of sixpenny postal orders cold wa» 311.000. In the corresponding three months last year the number was 5,772.000, or 13 times as many. This means an immense profit to the Post Office Tho demand for white pin© from Australia at the present, time is very heavy, and within the next month upwards of three million superficial feet will be shipped from Greymouth. Hitherto the trade has been largely confined to sailing vessels, but owing to increasing demand the steamer Taieri has been engaged to load a cargo at Greymouth shortly for Svdn-ev. On Thursday (says the Milton Mirror) a man was arrested by Constable M'Rae in a state of helpless insobriety, the sum of £59 0s 7d being found upon" him. For a time 7d appeared the sum total of hi 3 wealth, but a good round 6um of pound notes wae very nearly thrown away; then the "fivers" were found snug and safe, crumpled up in a piece of newspaper. An ordinary farmyard duck, the property of a settler in the Matukituki district, hatched out a brood of duckjinge. Contemplation of such domestic felicity apparently aroused a feeling of envy in tha breast of a paradise duck, as during the absence of the mother duck she conveyed ' all the ducklings to her own nest some distance awa>, and mothered them in the best style. I It is stated that on the three tube railwajs, comprising 41.68 miles of single line, controlled by the Underground Electrio Railways Company of London, the number of automatic signals averages 15.85 per ' mile, and that these signals drop and rise 1.538,282 times a week. The weekly cost of maintenance is said to be £4 3s 6.68 d per track mile, 5 3.22 d per signal, and 0.457 d per train mile. ) A trade unionist apnlied for further help from the Wellington Benevolent Trustees, and was recommended to lay his casq before the secretary of his union. "It strikes me." gaid a trustee, "that that should be the 6ole object of a union' 6 existence. Some of them 6eem to be kept alive merely to fill the pockets of one r-v two. I wonder what (naming a wellknown union secretary) would think if he had to go back to work again?" I The treasurer of the Free Kindergarten Association acknowledges the following subscription* : —Mrs H. E. Williams, I Michaelis. Hallenstein, and Farquhar, Hallcnstein Bros. (Limited). P. Hayman and Co.. Bing, Harris, and Co. (Limited), Ross and Glendining (Limited), Murray, Roberts, and Co., Sargood. Son, and Ewert (Limited^. £1 Is each; Interested Friend (Picton). £1; Dr Waddell, Mr G. Bern- | stein Mr A. S. Adams, Mr W. Downio Stewart Mr C. H. Statham, Mr Strona-ch, Mr R. Gilkison. Mr A. C. Hanlon, Mrs M. Cohen, and Dr Roberts. 10s 6d each;! Mrs T. A. Fisher. Rev. W. Hewitson, Mrs F. Duncan, and Dr Blomfield, 103. 1 each : Mr Bennett. Mr Eudey. Mr J. W, I Smith. Mrs Naphtali. Mr P. G. Stewart, Mr Hodge, Mr J. D. White. Mr Davidson, Mr L. Mendelsohn, Mr C. T. Patterson. Patereon and Barr (Limited), Mr J. A. D. Adams, Mr J. Wilkinson, J. and T. Christie Kirk and Co. (Limited), Mrs Cutten. Mrs Blancy, and J. Brown and I Co., 5s ea-eh; Mr Branson, 4s; Mies ' M'lntosh, 3e ; Miss J. Campbell, Mr Smeaton Mr Patterson. Mr White, Mis 3 Farquharson, Mr Robertson, Mr Hoggane, i Miss Andrew, Mr Hodges, Mr Blackie, iMr Mathcws. Mr Dodd, Mrs Merry, j M S H-. Mrs Shearer, and Mr Driver. 2s 6<T each; Mi's Chalmer, Miss Cameron, Mi«-3 ■ Tavlor, Miss Farnie, and Mr M'Lean, d 9 each; Miss Forsyth, Is.
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Otago Witness, Issue 2814, 19 February 1908, Page 4
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2,231OMNIUM GATHERUM Otago Witness, Issue 2814, 19 February 1908, Page 4
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