TIT-BTS.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 3, Issue 255, 11 December 1914, Page 4 (Supplement)

TIT-BTS.

There are always about 1.200,(AH) people at sea.

About 10.000.000 golf balls are used in England every year.

All members of the Japanese Government wer° on half-pay during the war with Russia.

In besieging a town the first German shell is always directed against tho wireless installation.

A woman prisoner at Kingston, England, denied a charge of drunkenness by saying she was "perfectly unbooked."

In London once a flood of beer broke loose from a brewery, and 9000 gallons rushed headlong down tho strosts, drowning many people.

Longwy is known as the iron gate France, and was fortified by the French owing to its strategical position on tho Belgian frontier.

During April this year. 23 vessels with a total tonnage of 11!).000 tons were built on the Clyde. These figures constitute a record for a month.

An apple eaten More breakfast serves as a natural stimulus to the di gestive organs. In fact, any fruit eaton raw is nutritious at breakfast.

All other things being equal, a baritono voice in a man and a contralto voice in a woman will vear better ami last longer than any of the others.

Tho word preface" us3d in the beginning of books was originally a word of welcome to a meal, and was equivalent to "Much good may it do you."

Tho railway junction at Arlon. the capital of Belgian Luxemburg, is s'tuattd twenty-five miles from tli-3 French frontier, and connects Belgium, Germany, and France.

Lost children in Japan do not long re main astray, ft is tho custom for parents to label their children with uieir addresses go that in case tlr»v wander any wayfarer may send them home.

Thorn 's the chief fortress on the frontier of East Prussia, and it is of t.nmense importance to Germanv, for its cnptur 0 would open up to tho kussians on a of the main lines to Berlin.

What appeared to be a pathetic fungal cortege was stopped while on the v,ay from Zurich (Switzerland) to Bade) by suspicious German Customs officers'. who found that the coffin, the wreaths, and the pockets of the mourner.; were full of smuggled saccharine.

In tho sixteenth century there was a curious enactment in England whereby •v.ivt hawkers wero forbidden to bell plums and apples, for the reason that sen wits and apprentices were unable to reeis' the sight of them, and were con Soqwntly teuiptod to steal their employers' money in order to enjoy the costly delicacies.

The invaliding of numbers of our troops because of bad feet, anj the repf i ts of dysentery among the Austrians, ■ire a reminder that disease threatens .111 army even more than rifle or canicii. In LS7O-1 the German army was particularly favourably situated, yet 100,000 went into hospital Iteca'iso" of sickness, as against only 100,000 be-at'.-e of wounds.

A bamboo in Cornwall has grown to 12ft. in a fortnight.

The invention of the barometer dates Hack to the year 1G43.

Wounded soldiers are saluted whenever thev are met in Franc?.

Afghanistan serves as a buffer between British India and the Russian Empire.

Queen Mary, though she has tho finest jiwelo of any Queen in Europe, seldom wears an v.

New York is to reinforce its plainclothes detectives by several women, who will walk beats at night and protect young girls.

Tlie Normans who conquered England shaved the fac> and the back of the head so that Harold's spies declared they werj an army of priest^.

The latest chair for the victim of senickness has a movable so at vibrated by n ?loetric motor. Tliis is said to give .urprsing relief to tho sufferer.

Raising the enlistment ago to thirtyivo will admit thousands cf men who 'ought in the Boer War. the youngest if whom were barred by tho age limit it thirtv.

One of the British destroyers repaired if tor its excursion into the Heligoland Might, now proudly displays a brass plate with tho inscription: "Heligoland. September 1.1H1t."

The origin of the phrase. "Mind youi l"s and Q's." is said to have been a call of attention in tho old English alehouses to the pints and quarts being scored down to the unconscious or reckless b?er-bibber.

Over 1000 Moscow prisoners petitioftod the Russian authorities to lot them go to tho front. Many others offered donations for the relief fund. The Russian prison authorities report a r?markablo cessation of crime since tli 0 war begnn.

A correspondent 6tatt?s that the Americans have d'scoverod that blind girls are the beat telephone opera tort.

Boys and girls in Vienna under the ago of fourtean have been ordered to serve as hospital messengers.

Tlio artificial frontiers ot the C utlneut have made conscription a vital ueoissity to the countries affected.

At a spot near Basle, in Switzerland, b v taking a few 6teps ono can enter into tho Province of Alsaco. the Ouchy of Baden, or Switzerland.

Soldiers and peasants throughout Ituss.a wens informed that the re.cnt eeiipse of tho sun was natural, lest they should think it an evil omen.

In the British firing line at Mons and other fierce conflicts the rifles of many ol the men grew almost too hot to grasp, so incessant was tlie firing.

Herlin provision nierclnnts who have arrived in Bucharest to obtain food supplies for Germany say tfiat treat n now 3s. 6d. a pound in their cnni.il.

The German Guards have christened the Highlanders who aro prisoners in a conoantration camp near Potsdam " tho ballet girls," in auusion to their k Its.

German officers carry doses of poison in their sword-hilts in case they should be mortally wounded and have to linger on battlefields in great suffering.

Byron wrote his celebrated poem ot the "Bride of Abydos" in ono night, and without mending his pen. The pen is yet preserved in the British Museum.

Alexander the Great is the only ex'lebrated man of history of whom it may be truthfully said: He was born in Europe died in Asia, and is buried in Africa.

In London the omnibus hor-so is worn out in five years, die tram horse in four, tho Post Office horse in six. and the brewers' in from six or seven, while the vestry horses last ,-ight years.

A curious needle was in the possession of Queen Victoria. It was made at tho celebrated needle manufactory at IVidditch, and represents the Trajan column in miniature. Scenes from the Queen's life are depicted on the needle, so finely cut that they are only discernible through a microscope.

The vibrations caused by the explosion of it 12-inch gun arc sufficient- to shatter windows at a distance of about a quarter of a mile. When gunn>ry practice is arranged to take place at big firing stations such a s Southsea, the fact is advertised to the townspeople whi protect their windows against being smashed bv padding them.

By means of some wonderful field glasses fitted with special prisms which they possess, the French can discover almost exactly the distance between them and the object op which they are focussing. The distance of an object up to a thousand varus away c.iii !>e determined t ( > within five yards, while tin distance of anything beyond a thousand yards can l>e measured to within ten yards of absolute accuracy. These field glasses cost from £6O to £'Bo a pa'r.

CURIOUS COINCIDENCES. In tho list of coincidences pertaining to acc 'lent a number of interesting examp.es are oi authentic record . It. has wen pointed out that very often jiernons have been surprised by events occuring, as 1 1 seemed, at tlie immediate suggest oil of tlie victims.

s .nio years ago a well-known American business man, who was accustoineu "■o make weekly trips between an Eastern city and Chicago, had the uncomtoi table experience of having a wliee: oreak i mined lately under hits seat while tno train wa s going at lull speed, li rta.s only by the most fortunate ot leaps that, he was able to escape losing his mo. Naturally, tins experience made a very deep impression upon him. U was almost a year later that he took the saino tram. and. by a strange chance, was assigned tho sauio chair. l)uring a chat with a friend whom he had just met, he glanced out ot the window and recognised the lamlsca.pe and the very spot ot his narrow escape. «o told the friend the story ot the broken wheel. Just a- he reached the c imax of his recital, saying, "Tlie t . o ld & livers go down my back at the bare thought of it. There it is again!" Incredible as it mav seem, the identical accidenl happened on the same train, almost between tho same two fields adjoining the track, and the victim of this oddest, ot coincidences barely escai>ed the eaniu way as liefore.

VISION 01' KIL.MENV. She saw- before her, fair unfurled. One-half oi ail the "lowing world >\hcro oceans rolled, and rivers'ran. lo bound the aims of sinful man. no saw a people, tierce and fell, Burst fre© their bounds like fiends ot hell:

Tl.ero Jflios grow-, and t| lo eagle flew, And rjhe lierked on her ravening crew, the citlea and towers, uere nraiit in a blaze. And th« thunder it roared o'er the lands and t/io seas; 0 n " ( | oUs thev wailed, and the red oiooij rail. And Jjo throatcued an end to tho raeo ui man.

She never lened nor .stood in awe. Olif'il i V OUs deadly pan. Oh then the eagle sw inked for lite. And bramzelled ud a mortal strife. « it. flew. 6 J,0 north, or flew s |, 0 south Sh, „* w .

VJith mooted wing ana waetir maen Hio eagle sought her eyr k . again: ' n, w( ma,V bil ° °""° r in llor ~,00f?. v And 'luv, , s!ot>l< iILT uolll| ded B (> '"re she m v another flight. 0 '' r nl ( ' 10 n <rlaiid I'on's img'it.

} . instructing ho, t ] afe mL j compo.Hion of sen ten or.. wrote V.1.0u fief i° Ue 3 m,sst -atoment of Iv Tii or w ' ron 6 grammatiralV 110 wore: " The hon has threo legs - and " Who done it - Harry sho said to one of her voun"•sters. g n , ho Maekb.wrd and sli„w where the lault he* in those two sonteneess. '

Harry s l<>wly approached the board evidently studying hard. Then he took tiie crayon and wrote:— it » Tho hcu UoTer oa c it. God dune