NEWS ITEMS.

Gisborne Times, Volume VII, Issue 355, 4 March 1902, Page 3

NEWS ITEMS.

doctrines which were not accepted by tho army. . . . No, I don’t think these secessions will have much effect on the army. It is not expected that- more than a dozen or so will follow Mr and Mrs Cl.b'oorn. They will not cause a split.” Mr and Mrs Chbborn organised the army in France and Switzerland. Five years ago they removed to fresh fields of labor in Holland and Belgium, where they have since resided. J. A. Dowie, the Prince of Humbugs, or, as he calls himself, “ the General Overseer of the Christian Catholic Church of Zion,” was born in Edinburgh in 1847, and went to Australia with his parents in 1860. He soon found himself preaching at street corners, and later he announced himsejf as a divine healer, with a special mission from the Lord to the wicked and sinful. A reverend gentleman in Texas, who is of a mechanical turn of mind, has invented or constructed a flying machine from a plan derived from one of the visions of the prophet Ezekiel. He believes that “ the Almighty was graciously pleased to show many novelties to Ezekiel,” and

among these ho finds tho design for a flying machine which he is sanguine will prove a great success. He forwarded a photograph and description of his machine to the Scientific American, and announced that a company had been formed to carry out his ideas, the company being named “ The Ezekiel Flying Machine Company.” If Noah’s arks are considered proper Sunday toys, these will probably be re-

garded us suitable machines for travelling in the first day of the week. The amazing spread of Christian science in America, which is beyond chaliange tho peculiar home and manufactory of “fancy religions,” may be explained by the theory that there is an analogy between young nations and young individuals, who are naturally more gullible than their seniors. But tho more concrete explanation, that Christian Science flourishes beeauso it pays its professors handsomely, is supported by the evidence

of the notorious Mrs Eddy herself, the founder of the cult. With an interesting mixture of irreverence, blatant assurance,

and conspicuous lack of any saving sense of the absurd, Mrs Eddy explains that at first “ when God impelled mo to set a price on my instruction in Christian Science mind-healing,” she could think of no financial equivalent for the impartation of that divine power. Perhaps what the lady means is that she considered that nobody would be likely to pay as much as she would have liked to ask. However, she “ was led to name £6O as the price for each pupil in one course of lessons at my college ” (a startling sum for tuition lasting barely three weeks). “ This amount greatly troubled me. I shrank from asking it, but was finally led, by the same strange providence, to accept this fee. God has since shown me in multitudinous ways the wisdom of this decision.” No doubt, Mrs Eddy's pupils have been led, by the same strange providence, to fleece the credulous in like manner, if not in like measure; it is significant, too, that the Text-Book of the Faith costs from 12s to 255, and could be put on the market, if the spread of the cult were not of less im-

portance than the accumulation of profits, at half-a-crown. Mrs Eddy has declared that she “ can do nothing with money”; in view of these simple facts perhaps what she meant to say is that she can do nothing without money. At the Cercle Philidor, Paris, on Christ-

mas Eve, Dr Lasker, the chess champion, gave a superb exhibition of his skill by playing single-handed and simultaneously

forty games against two score of the best players in the club. Play commenced at 8 p.m. and lasted until 2.30 in the morning. During the whole of the six and a-haif hours Dr Lasker went from table to table, making a counter move to that made by his opponent while he was engaged with thirty-nine other players. At the end of the tournament Dr Lasker was declared the victor in thirty-five games, the loser in three, and two games were scratched. A story recently was widely circulated that two large Newfoundland dogs were enrolled as regular members of the Paris police force, their duty being to assist the “Agents Plongeurs,” who are equivalent to the British Humane Society officers, in life-saving. The narrative gave some graph’c details how every day they exercised by plunging into the river and rescuing a policeman who pretended to be drowning. A trial of the value of these noble animals the other day however, had a somewhat unexpeoted sequel. A sort of lay figure having been thrown into the river off the Quai de la Tournelle, Cesar the larger dog jumped in, and brought it safely to land. But Ture, his mate, was waiting at the landing stage, evidently jealous of his success, for he promptly grabbed the rescued bundle and tried to get possession of it. Cesar set his leeth into the trophy all the harder, and between the two of them they very soon tore it to pieces. The condition of the man dragged in an exhausted state from the river only to become the bone of contention between ; two fierce dogs would be indeed unenviable. A high premium seems to be placed upon the foreigner’s power in the Chinese courts, at least in a certain county in Eastern Shantung. A certain man had a lawsuit which seems to have gone against him in spite of all ordinary measures. He

suddenly feft for Chefoo, but soon returned and announced to his adversary that he had bought a foreign title. To prove the genuineness of his claim to official rank, he donned a suit of foreign clothes and flourished a cane. This was enough 1 The opposing parties sued for peace and gave up their case. A sensational departure in the sphere of industry is reported to have been decided upon by the Austrian Government in order to counteract what are believed to be the evil effects of American competition in Austria: —“ The Minister of Commerce, acting on the advice of the National Council of Labor, intends buying American machinery for manufacturing boots and shoes, and supplying it gratis to Austrian manufacturers. This measure is to be adopted as the only means of saving the Austrian boot and shoe trade from utter ruin.”