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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Advocate, 1924-9-25, Page 2Stories About Weil -Known People The Chair King. There is a man in London who can claim to have given more rest to the public than any other man in the country. He is Mr. W. M. Shanly, the "Chair King," whose alleles dot the royal parks and other open, spaces of London. With more than 30,000 chairs at Wembley, Mr, Shanly now Iias about 160,000 under his •control. The enterprise was started seventy., Years 'ago by his father, and he himself has controlled it for forty years.. Mr. Shanly supplied •chairs far gar- den parties at Windsor Castle in the days of Queen Victoria, and since then at Buckingham Palace for Edward VII. and the present King. Holiday- makers at a number of seaside resorts also use his chairs. Making Lord Balfour Blush. Probably the most famous bachelor of to -day is Lord Balfour, who has per- sistently shunned matrimony, in spite of rumor's efforts to couple his name with that of some fair lady. This "chronic" singleness has not been without its amusing side. Once when he was Mr. A, J. Balfour, he was stay- ing at an hotel when a postcard was brought to him. It read: "Baby going on nicely. I really think she has grown since you left" He blushed deeply and felt very em- barrassed—until it was discovered that there was another A. J. B. among the guests! Accuracy. Just a short one, told by Sir A. Con- an Doyle -and nothing to do with spiritualism. A Jewish immigrant was asked. to fill up the usual form. .The first cues- tion on the paper was "Born?" There was a epees for the name and the place underneath. The Jew re- gardecl it for a second or two, consider- ed the matter carefully; and wrote: • "Yee." A Peeress as Hotel Director. The ranks of business have received an interesting recruit. She is the Marshioness cf Carisb:•ooke, who has I just became an hotel director, Th"e i scene of her labors will be Strath.pef- , Ter Spa, about seventy miles from In- verness, where many people go to I take the medicinal waters. I Lord Carisbrooke is also interested in business, being a director of a great shipping line. He was, of course, form- erly Prince Alexander of Battenberg —he renounced his German title dur- ing the war—and was a great favorite of Queen Victoria. His career le un- ' usual in that he gave up a commission in the Navy to take up one in the Army. He has a iarge repertoire of comic songs with which he amuses his friends. Lady Carisbrooke is a clever musician and composer. The Real Story. That eminent politician, Sir Robert Borne, has been saying nice things aboht Glasgow, He recently gave the real version of the story of the. man who went to the booking -office at East- on and said; "I want to go to GIae- gow." The clerk is supposed to have answered: "You're a liar. you've got to go." The real story, says Sir Rob- ert, is that the clerk •replied; "You're a live wire; you should go." A Poem You Ought to Know. "Good-Nnghtl" The following poem by Thomas Bailey. Aldrich will be welcomed by young men who wish to learn how to say something charming to the Indy of their choles. Good -night! I have to say good -night To such a host of peerless things!! Good -night unto the fragile hand All queenly with its weight of rings; Good -night to fond, unlifted eyes, Goodnight to chestnut braids of hair, Good -night ante. the perfect mouth, And ail the sweetness nestled there— The snowy hand detains me, thea! I'll have to say good -night again! But there will come a time, my love, When, if I read our stars aright, I shall not linger by this porch With my adieus. Till C,en, good -night! You wish the time were now, And 1, You do not blush to wish it so? You would have blushed yourself to death To own so much a year ago— What, both these snowy hands? as then I'll have to say good -night again! Britain's Greatest Port. When the Prince of Wales opened the new floating dock at Southampton he set the seal of supremacy upon. Britain's greatest passenger port. This colossal floating structure, the greatest of its kind in the world, can "lift" monster liners completely out of the water in four hours All the world's super -liners now have their home in Southampton. To rise in a comparatively short time from an almost unknown coast town to a vast passenger junction connecting Britain with all the countries in the world has been the port's remarkable achieve- ment. Seamen laughingly call the Hamp- shire town the "mushroom" seaport," but things are to be apoomplished dur- ing the next few years which will make Southampton the finest seaport in the world. West of the new floating dock, on the Test estuary, are 680 acres of mid- land which are soon to be reclaimed from the ryes, and converted into a new port. Here will be built five of the largest ocean jetties in existence. Each will be 1,000ft. long and 300ft. wide, and fitted to .berth two super - liners, or four vessels of average ton- nage. The jetties are to be construct- ed on piles, and will face oceanwards, enabling the biggest ships to sail in and out of the docks at any state of the tide. Behind the projected new dockland provision is being made for the build- ing of another suburb to Southampton, and the plan includes business quar- ters., factories, and a. park surrounded by private residences. Ten times as many passengers use the port to -day as twenty-five years ago. .-AND THE WORST IS YET TO COME w One Year to Live. Mary Davis Reed, Hagerstown, was ------ awarded second prize of 26 in the con- test recently conducted by the Balti- more Evening Sun. She received the prize for the following answer to the question, "What would you do if you had only one more year to live?" Surveying the Seas. Plans for the most complete survey of the ocean ever attempted have been inaugurated by a conference repre- senting scientific branches of the United States Government and allied institutions. One or more ships will be fitted out with a complete laboratory and equip- ped with the latestscientific apparat- us for the first cruise. The sea bot- tom will not only be mapped, but the composition of the water, its density, temperature, and currents which af- fect the distribution of marine plant and animal life, will be studied at all depths, Five -sevenths of the surface of the earth is covered by water. This water area can produce more food than all the land can ever be made to yield, and one of the purposes of the expedi- tion will be to take an inventory of such food possibilities. In No Danger Miss Manchaser—"He never loved at all who Ioved not at first sight." Mr, Hardfax—"And love is blind. So that lets me out." • Made -in -Canada Davenport Sold to Egyptian Princess As a result of the showing of Strat- ford furniture at Wembley Exhibition, England, the fame of the city is evi- dently to be ,spread into many far cor- ners of the earth.. An indication of this is found in a letter to a local tom- ' piny from its English agent announc- ing the sale of a Devoe:port bed to an, Egyptian Princess, Princc_s Fatma Fazil, Cairo. The letter announcing the eale states that many celebrities have become interested in thls type of furniture, and that the Canadian- trade section has received remarkably good treatment" from the Exhibition auth- orities. The Uses of Advertiserrient. Advertising has been much in the limelight lately, but it is questionable it any of the speakers'atthe Interna- tional Advertising Convention put the case for It more succinctly than Mark Twain did on one occasion. When the great humorist was editor of a Missouri paper a reader wrote to him saying that he had found a milder in his- oopy-of the current issue. Would the editor please soy if this was a sign of good luck? To this Mark Twain replied:— "Finding a spider in your paper was neither good luck nor bad luck for you. The spider was merely looking over our paper tosee which merchant is not advertising, so that he can go ,0 thea store, spin his web across the ti,or, and lead a life of undisturbed I.cave ever afterward." • "If I had but one year to live. One year to help; one year to give; One year to love; one year to bless; One year of better things to stress;. One year to sing; one year to smile; To brighten earth a little while; One year to fill my Maker's praise; One year to fill with work my days.; One year to strive for a reward When I should stand before my Lord. I think that I would spend each day, In just the very selfsame way That I do now. For from afar The call may come to cross •the bar At any time, and I must be Prepared to meet eternity. So if I have a year to live, Or just one day in which to give A pleasant smile, a helping hand, A mind that tries to understand A fellow -creature when in need, 'Tis, one with me,—I take no heed; But try to live each day He sends To serve my gracious' Master's ends," I Hen That Helped Industry. The secret of making sugar perfect- ly white was discovered in :a curious way. A hen which. had been through a clay puddle went with her muddy feet into a sugar -house and Ieft her tracks on a pile of sugar. It was observed that wherever the tracks were the auger was whitened. Experiments were made, and it was discovered that wet clay could be used in refining sugar. The sugar was put into earthen jars, of sugar -loaf form, and clay was put aver the tops and kept wet. There were holes at the smaller end of the jar, and the moisture soaking through the sugar dripped from these holes. By this means the sugar was made beau- tifully white. Sugar refining is now so big an in- dustry that wonderful machinery has been devised to cope with the huge de- mand; but the secret so accidentally disclosed laid the foundation of the process in use to -day. In France they are making bricks of ordinary loam. Soil that contains from five to eight per cent. of clay is put into moulds and subjected to great pressure. The bricks are said to have a resistance of six hundred pounds to the square inch. Ten years ago grapefruit was al- most unknown in Europe. Now it is coming into favor as a breakfast deli- cacy in England. The British now im- port large quantities from the United 'States, and brokers in London report that the demand is steadily increasing Where You Must• Vote or Pay $10 Fine.. All Australian citizens must vote in federal elections under penalty of $10 fine for failure to go to the polis. This, in effect, is the private members' bill which has just passed the Aus- ' tralian House of Representatives and . Senate. That the bill, which was not backed by the government, enacting compulsory voting should have passed ! Into law without exciting much in- ; terest was largely due to the fact that the experiment already has been tried out in the state of Queensland for more than nine years. The penalty for failure to vote seems small, but the existence of such a penalty has had a tonic effect on Queensland voters, according to fig ures of polling in the recent stag; elec- tions. - Not more than 75 per cent. of the I Queensland electors took the trouble 1 to go to the polls up to 1016, when the ' compulsory voting law for the state i was passed. The percentage then jumped to more than 88 per cent.. This high figure has not been quite main- ta!aed, as the percentage of voters in the election of 1820 fell to 80. This percentage, however, compares favor- ably with the states where compul- • sory voting was not .enforced. According to figures for the most recent elections in other states, the proportion of electors who voted was 54 per cent. In New South Wales, 68 in Victoria and South Australia, 67 in West Australia and 66 in Tasmania. Between a fourth and a half of the electors also failed to vote in federal elections. Compulsory registration, which has been enforced throughout the commonwealth several years, was but a prelude to the compulsory vot- ing law now enacted. Large But Sensitive. The Scottish comedian:, Sir Harry Lauder, has a fund of laughable stor- ies with which he agreeably occupies the pauses between his lilting songs. For example: "Yon's a great place," said Sir eTar- ry, speaking of a north country town that he had been visiting, "and I had a great reception there. Everything was just great and the women teo — sosne of them. In one street while I was there a tramcar collided with. a milk cart; two milk cans were upset into the road, and the milk splashed across the street. Solon a crowd gath- ered. A very short man—just a wee bit smaller than myself -was standing behind a stout lady, so that he couldn't -very well see what was happening. When at last he did get a glimpse of the milk Sowing in the street he ex- claimed: • . " `Lumme! What a waste! "The shout lady turned and glared at him, 'Mind your business,' she said sternly, 'and don't make personal re- ' marltsl' " Fog at Sea.. - 1 love the sea when her wild waters ass In terrible splendor; crest on creaming crest, Or when she wears upon a tranquil breast The ethereal jewels of the Southern Cross. 13ut when she broods in silence on the loss Of all her mirroredd stars I love her best- elysterious, veiled; when there is neither west ' • Nor east, nor wave nor wing of alba- tross, Upon the invisible ocean then 1 •seem— Beyond the fog where mortal vision' £ails-•- To "see a ship sped on toward golden sands Of my desire by spirit winds of dream, While fair there flashes on, her phan- tom sails The light of undiscoverable lands. —Mary Sinton Leitch. Last Resort. Doctor Smithers' dental chair was tipped so far back that escape was im- possible for Miss Jones, a spinster with a considerable reputation for conver- sational ability. Wads of absorbent cotton were tucked beneath her tongue, some patent appliance held her jaws apart, and all the lower hall of her countenance except one back; tooth was ooncealed under a rubber dam. The patient's mouth was full of water, ,speech was impossible, and the the poor, naturally talkative lady was suffering agonies of discomfort. The engrossed dentist paid no` hoed to her squirmings nor to the appeal in hex eyes. Fortunately, however, the patient's hands were free. Groping to her bag an the table near by, she brought forth paper and pencil and wrote: Help! Help! Let me up for air! I'm drowning!" A bliie light placed above the wind- screen will enable the police to dis- tinguish at night any of the magnifi- cent new Daimler cars belonging to the King. Chinese Don't Cage Birds All the Time. The Chinese lover of birds, says Herbert Beardsiy, 'writing' in the •Na- ture Magazine (Washington), does not Permanently coniine his pet in Its prCe- on cage, but he takes it out with him on his, walks, carrying it on a stick, to which one of its . feet is fastened by means of a thread long enough to al- low it ample freedom ;of . motion. Where the shade of some stately tree bids hint welcome, he makes a halt and ilia permits" the bird to perch and swieg on a supple twig, watching it even hour after hour with interest and ap- precation. We read further: "One of their most curious expres- sions, of emotional life is the applica- tion of whistles, to pigeons. 'These whistles, are 'very light and.. are at- tacked to' the tails of the pigeon,.v by means of fine copper wire, asaa, that, when the birds fly, the wind lila:Peeing through the whistles sets • them vibrat ing and produces an •open-air concert. "The whistle are manufactured with great cleverness and ingenuity in Peking. They are two distinct types, those consisting of bamboo tubes placed side by side, and a type based s an the principle of tubes attached to a Va gourd body or wind 'test. They are lacquered in yellow, brown, red" and black to protect the material from the destructive infieences of the atmos- phere. The tube whistles have either two, three, or five tubes. The gourd whistles. are furnished with a mouth- piece and small apertures to the num- ber of two, three, six, ten and even. thirteen. These varieties, are dIatin- guished by different, names; thus, a whistle with one mouthpiece and ten tubes is .called the eleven -eyed one.' The materials used in the construction of the whistles are small gonads that serve for the bodies, and several kinds of bamboo for the large and small tubes. Found growing on a slope of Mount • Everest, at a height of 20,000 feet, ewe wild rhododendron has been success- fully transplanted to Kew Gardens. Until this specimen was found, scien- tists believed that plant life could not exist at a greater height than 17,000 feet. A Sine spectacle was presented when the Boy Scouts, representing noariy every nation in the world at the great jamboree at Oopenhagen, Denmark, saluted the king and queen of that country during a review. Courage No star is ever lost whose light We once have seen; Only obscured sometimes by clouds • That drift between Us and its radiance, which shines Calm and serene. No hope of ours can ever die, Though buried deep i By doubt or fear or unbelief— It does but sleep! ; Awaken it! Have faith it will Its promise keep! r With courage, keep your goal in eight, And toward it, still Keep climbing upward, ever up, Though steep the hill, There is, no height we may not reach, If we but will! e —Ida May Thomas in ''Success." "We Live in Deeds." We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should nount time by heart-throbs. He most lives Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. Baffle • Y• dames Edward Rowe, of Whitby, and Kenneth Farrell, of Mou1tForest, Canada.'.s..winners in the Empire's Bonniest Babies' competition, honored at the Canadian National Exhibition, where their prizes were press need to them by Hon. John S. Martin, Minister of Agriculture. w ere Remarkable Device Invented by Swede. A mechanical device so sensitive to pressure that the breath of. a child directed into a funnel can release enough power to lift many tons of weight, and so .sensitive to tempera tore that the heat coming from a man's band held near a metal strip will affect the same result, has been perfected in Sweden after three years of experimentation. and through tests in actual use. This remarkable multiplication of power is, however, only an incidental feature of the apparatus, which takes the place of a man in an industrial es- tablishment, opening and shutting all serts of regulating valves, automati- cally and with an accuracy that no human being could ever achieve. The new apparatus can, for ex .ample, keep the temperature of a room within a quarter of a degree of the value desired, and can keep steam pressure from changing more than two ounces per square .inch. It can also regulate electric ,current, speed, dampness or dryness, density of liquids, vicoeity and vacuum. This new regulator, which was in- vented nvented by a Swedish ,engineer, Ragnar Carlstedt, is ba,sed on one of the simplest of all mechanical principles, namely the harnessing of a flowing I current of water, _ In other words, if it; is desired to open or shut the valve of a .team radiator in a room, this work is clone by turning on water pressure from one of tke water pipes' of the hoc: e, instead .of turning the valve by hart The Deepest :Hollow. The deepest hollow known in the lands of the world is the one in Pales- tine at the bottom of which lies the Dead Sea. The hollow, containing this salt lake is actually 1.300 feet below the level of the sea. Many of the stones fo2minl,, the rock -work surrounding the Great Lake at the British Empire Exhibition are portions of Old .London Bridge, dis- covered during recent excavations. Canada possesses the only 'commer- cial source al" helium in the British Empire. Alberta natural gas .;con tains 0.3 per cent, Development of aviationshoi2ld render this extremely valuable . as; a non iuflaitzmalJle gas for dirigibles.