News and Miscellany

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Feb 2, 1911

News and Miscellany

— By a majority vote of 18,000, New Mexico ratified her State constitution in an election, January 22.

— It is computed that there are 8,000,000 young people in the United States between the ages of five and eighteen years who do not attend any Sunday-school or regular church service.

— It is claimed by some of the labor union leaders that more than one hundred workmen are killed every day in the United States. The number of killed and permanently injured annually is 536,000. Three times more workmen, proportionately, are killed in the United States than in any European country.

— The opening of the Japanese port of Tsuruga has made it possible to circumnavigate the earth in thirty-seven days. Leaving Seattle or Vancouver by a steamer, a traveler may land in Yokohama in twelve days. By taking train to Tsuruga and steamer to the trans-Siberian railroad terminus, and continuing by the fastest train to London, he may cover the distance from Yokohama in sixteen days. By the fastest steamers and trains he may travel from London to Seattle in a little more than nine days.

— The new battle-ship “Arkansas,” recently launched at Camden, N. J., carries in its primary battery twelve twelve-inch guns, ten of which can be fired at broadside at the same instant, all aimed at the same target.

— Twelve anarchists convicted of conspiracy against the throne and the lives of the imperial family were put to death in Tokyo, January 24. Twenty-four were condemned to death, but the sentences of one half the number were changed to life imprisonment.

— The earthquake which occurred January 4 in the territory of Semiryetchensk, Turkestan, destroyed many cities, and it is estimated that 15,000 persons perished. Vast cracks in the earth, extending for nearly fifty miles, make rescue work extremely hazardous.

— Edmund Thery, the French economist, figures that the maintenance of Europe’s armed peace footing in the last twenty-five years cost approximately $29,000,000,000, which involved an increase in the public debt of the European states of nearly $30,000,000, and excluded from productive industry 195,000 officers and 3,800,000 men.

— According to Dr. Andrew B. White, former ambassador to Germany, the number of murders committed in the United States during 1910 was 8,975, an increase of 900 over the year preceding. Only one murderer in eighty-six suffered the death penalty. The number of murders in the United States is to the number in England as 116 is to 6.

— All Europe is suffering from excessive moisture. England has had continuous rains; in France the chief rivers are flooded; in Spain almost all rivers have overflowed their banks. Landslides and washouts have been continuous in Italy. The lakes and rivers of Switzerland are rising. In Russia the Dnieper has risen twenty feet, sweeping away villages.

— In London, July 26-29 of the present year, will be held a great universal race congress. The object of this gathering is to consider the general relations existing between the peoples of the West and those of the East, and between the white and colored races. It is hoped by this means to encourage between these various nationalities better understanding and more hearty co-operation.

— Recently explorations in Palestine have uncovered what are believed to be the oldest specimens of Hebrew writing. These consist of labels prepared for bottles of pure wine. They are found in what is claimed to be the palace of King Ahab in Samaria, and are reputed to be 3,000 years old. The labels were written with ink, and the writing differs in many respects from that of other existing Hebrew manuscripts.

— The advance of the bubonic plague is leaving an appalling record of fatality in its wake in the far East. It has traversed the length of Siberia and Russia, broken through the Japanese quarantine in Manchuria and Korea, visited a number of the Chinese seaports, and at last penetrated into the interior as far as Peking. It is causing much concern to the country, and particularly to the foreign legations in that city. The various legations have taken energetic steps to protect their inmates.

— According to a recent report of the Labor Bureau for the ten years ending in 1908, 29,293 miners were killed in mine accidents. The per cent of death to one thousand is 3.11, which is decidedly higher in fatalities than in other important coal-fields of the world. This is considered due to the fact that mining methods in the United States are crude, and safety precautions often disregarded.

— According to conservative estimates, the amount of British capital invested in the colonies and in countries outside of England, reaches the enormous sum of $17,000,000,000. In the United States $3,440,000,000 has been invested, mostly in railroad securities; $1,900,000,000 of British capital is found in Australia; $1,862,705,000 in Canada; India and Ceylon have $1,826,995,000. There is due England from other countries approximately as follows: Brazil, $470,000,000; Mexico, $435,000,000; Chile, $230,000,000; Uruguay, $175,000,000; Peru, $170,000,000; Japan, $268,500,000. China, Turkey, and Russia are likewise debtors to English capital in large amounts, and Egypt owes to English creditors $220,000,000.

— The secretary of the National Fire Protection Association gives some startling figures concerning the United States fire loss. In Europe the per capita fire tax is three cents; in the United States it is thirty cents. In Europe there are eight fires to every 10,000 people; in the United States there are forty to the same number of population. Berlin, with a population of 3,000,000, has an annual fire loss of $175,000, and its fire department annually costs $300,000. Chicago, with a population of 2,000,000, has an annual loss of $5,000,000, and its fire department costs annually $3,000,000. The annual fire loss in the United States is $250,000,000. Of this seventy per cent might be saved, as this proportion of fires is shown to be due to some specific hazard, which might be removed. The chief cause of fire loss in the United States is the prodigal use of wood as building material.