JOTTINGS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 28, 3 February 1915, Page 5

JOTTINGS.

German prisoners in England are said to have caught the habit of singing “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary,” which they have translated into “Langor Wcg Nadi Tipperary.”

That the New Zealanders invalided Home from Egypt will be well looked after is emphasised by a vsitor to the Old Country, who says that ‘one of the finest convalescent homes in the United Kingdom has been secured. Loid Plunket is chairman of the New Zealand War Coating? it Asintiaim-, and is a Trojan for work, and takes a deep interest in the men. The Hon. T. Mackenzie is constantly going out to Salisbury, and is also a great worker.”

“One old Belgian man whom I s«»w step off a small boat at Tilbury Docks at once knelt down, and in reverence kissed the lanl which was to give him shelter,” re narked the Hev A Fowler last week at a meeting held in Remuera to form a branch of the National Reserve. “Hundreds of them came across in terrible plight,” ho added. “They were not white, hut were grey with the horrors they had gone through. The old Mother Country was there, however, as it always is for those in distress, to give them refuge and to welcome them with open hands.”

Paderewski has opened his house in Switzerland to refugees, and has been acting with noble generosity. His man servants and horses have all been commandeered for military service, and baggage has been removed from the station by means of a cow. Paderewski, as all the world knows, is a breeder of prize poultry, and it is said that some £2OO prize chickens have been ruthlessly slaughtered to feed the unbidden but not amvelcamo guests. During the first- Uo ue-fi.'i the war there were i'crty-live i.u luty refugees sheltered in the groat punic/s home. There are now twenty-five.

An enormous transport of horseflesh is now proceeding from East Prussia to other parts of Germany. Thousands of German and Russian horses have been more or less rendered unfit for service by the firing on both sides, and as the cost and trouble of curing them is too great, the authorities have permitted them to be sent to replenish the meat markets. The East Prussian horse-butchers now advertise “freshlyslaughtered and officially-inspected horseflesh, without bones, at Is 6d for 101 b, or I’d for lib.” Tn the goodstrains leaving East Prussia it often happens that several wagons are filled with these consignments of horseflesh.

Few people we fancy had any idea that the recent activities of the German cruiser Emden had any direct healing upon the motor trade, but it has now transpired that included amongst the cargoes of three of the ships destroyed by the Emden was some 4000 tons of crude rubber from the eastern plantations, consigned to London merchants. Four thousand tons of rubber would have made a lot of tyres, and it is just as well the exploits of that noted commerce destroyer have been brought to an end by the Sydney, or the price of tyres might have soared up considerably. '

In the battle of the Bight of Heligoland took place “the most romantic, dramatic and piquant episode that modern war can ever show.” H.M.S. Defender, a destroyer, having sunk an enemy, lowered a “whaler” to pick up her survivors; before the whaler got back an enemy’s cruiser came up and chased the Defender, and she was forced to abandon her whaler and its crew. Imagine their feelings—alone in an open boat without food, 25 miles from land, and that land the enemy’s fortress, with nothing but, fogs and foes, around them. Suddenly a swirl alongside and up, if you please, pops his Britannic Majesty’s submarine, “E 4,” opens his conning tower, takes them all on board, shuts up again, dives, and brings them home 250 miles! So the story was told in the. Morning Post, It might be a page from Jules Verne.