News and Miscellany by Editor

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 4, 1912

News and Miscellany

By Editor

Notes and clippings from the daily and weekly press

— In the national cemeteries of the country lie the bodies of 360,753 soldiers and sailors. There are 207,075 graves in which lie the bodies of known dead, while an unmarked stone designates the resting-place of the other 153,678.

— Traffic officials of the railroads covering Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma are preparing for the greatest grain movement this fall that they ever have had to deal with. Estimates made by freight officials are that the wheat movement in the three States alone will approximate 300,000 cars, enough to make a solid train of grain 2,000 miles long.

— The greatest danger to Australia, and one of the greatest to the British empire, according to a writer in the current number of the National Review, is the vast unoccupied territory of northern Australia. Here is unoccupied territory much larger than France and Germany combined, with a seaboard of 1,240 miles, several good harbors, and a number of navigable rivers.

— An extensive campaign against Mormonism throughout the country is planned by the International Council for Patriotic Service. The association declares that polygamy is now a far greater menace to the American home than it was in the time of Brigham Young. The Mormon vote holds the balance of power in nine States, among which are several of the equal suffrage States of the Union.

— Every two years, so the statistics show, more men in Germany are carried to their graves by drink than the nation lost in the whole course of the Franco-Prussian war. A Danish national commission, which receives its information confidentially from reports sent in by every doctor in Denmark, finds that each fourth death among Danish males is to be set down to alcohol as either a chief or a contributing cause.

— It is a strange crisis that has been reached in Greece. The union of Crete with Greece is earnestly desired by the people of both countries, and would long ago have been accomplished but for the opposition of Turkey. Crete nominally belongs to Turkey, but since 1899 has been self-governing under the joint protection of Great Britain, Russia, France, and Italy. In October, 1908, the Cretan legislature declared the island a dependency of Greece, and many efforts have since been made to complete the union. Turkey firmly declares that the union will mean war with Greece. The Turkish army is strong, and such a war would be a very different affair from that with Italy, in which Turkey is unable to damage her enemy because there is no Turkish navy. War with Greece would reopen the whole Balkan question and threaten the peace of all Europe, since many powers have clashing ambitions in that part of the world. For this reason, and also because the four protecting powers are bound by promises made when they assumed the protection of Crete, the protectors have forbidden the consummation of the union.

— It is claimed that the average crow destroys 700,000 insects a year.

— Great Britain was the first country to form societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals.

— Emperor William II has ordered that the tract "Alcohol and Virility," published by the German Temperance Society, shall be given to every recruit entering the military and naval service of the German empire.

— Governors Island, in New York harbor, has been chosen as the site for the first hydro-aeroplane station to be established by the signal corps of the United States army as a branch of the aeroplane station at College Park, Md.

— The longest reach of railway without a curve is said to be that of the Argentine Pacific Railway from Buenos Aires to the foot of the Andes. For a stretch of 211 miles it is without a curve, and has no cutting nor embankment more than two or three feet high.

— For the fourth time in two years a large area in Constantinople has been destroyed by fire. This time, as usual, the lack of modern fighting apparatus was responsible for the spread of the fire, which burned hundreds of houses occupied by the poor of the city.

— The stepless street-car recently introduced in New York City has proved such a success that 150 more cars of this pattern are to be built. The entrance to these cars being in the center, there is more space for passengers, and danger of accident is lessened because there is no jumping on and off steps.

— Twenty women have been appointed on the police force in Chicago. This has been found necessary because the male policemen were too considerate of nicely dressed women who broke the laws. These policewomen are to be in the shopping district, ride on the elevators and street-cars, and arrest all women law-breakers.

— Three blind men were graduated this year from Columbia University, in New York City. These young men took the regular four years' course. They asked no favors and received none except those which every considerate person extends to the afflicted. In the examinations the questions were read to them, and they were allowed to typewrite the answers. They have to a certain extent worked their way through college.

— An exchange states that "San Francisco is looking forward expectantly to the meeting of the General Federation of Women's Clubs which will be held in that city June 25 to July 5, at which time 2,000 delegates will be in attendance, accompanied by thousands of alternate delegates and friends of the movement. The subject of marriage and divorce will, at that time, receive serious consideration; and it is expected that decisive legislation will result."

— The casualties to the Italian army in the war with Turkey to June 7 were 57 officers and 588 soldiers dead, according to the announcement of the Italian minister of war, just received by the Italian ambassador here. These men were killed or died of wounds received in battle. In addition, 2 officers and 325 soldiers were "lost," and are accounted for in the greater part by disappearance from the Eleventh Regiment of Bersaglieri, October 23 last, at Sciara-Sciat.