Miscellany: Ring

At Saint-Brieux, France, one Victor Rousoult was walking along the docks where he worked, when a dangling hook caught in the ring on his finger. The derrick from which the hook dangled hoisted ring, finger and Rousoult 100 feet into the air. Comrades saw, shouted. The derrick lowered Rousoult to the ground. When he was within a few feet of landing, his finger tore off.

Grandmother & Son

In Riverside, Calif., Gordon Stewart Northcott, while on trial for abusing and murdering four boys, heard his mother testify that she was not his mother, but his grandmother.

Bib

In Newark, N. J., Health Officer Charles V. Crafter mailed, to the parents of each & every newborn babe, a bib upon which was printed: 'I don't want to be sick. Do not kiss me." That was Officer Grafter's idea of one way to fight influenza.

Aged

Near Cairo, Egypt, last week, the police commandant discovered, living alone in a six-foot shack, an Arab who said he was born at the opening of the American Revolution (153 years ago) and who remembered the massacre of the Mamelukes by Mohammed Ali in 1811.

In the village of Latti in the Caucasian mountains, last fortnight, Henri Barbusse, French author, discovered a peasant named Nikolai Andreyevich Shapkofski who has a social insurance card showing that he is 146 years old and entitled to draw a pension of 50 rubles ($27.50) a month. Peasant Shapkofski has only one tooth left and therefore does not eat as heartily as he did a few years ago. But he still drinks plenty of wine. His last child, a daughter, was born when he was 120 years old.

Near Siler City, N. C., last fortnight, a woman reporter interviewed "Uncle" Ance Watson, 112, onetime slave, and his son, 75. Said Watson Sr.: "If my Missus didn't go to Heaven, den Heaven is sho scarce of white folks."

In Rochelle, Va., Mrs. Elizabeth Davis, 93, was cutting, last week, her third set of natural teeth.

Doggerel

In Baltimore, Md., in the psychological laboratory of Johns Hopkins University, a priest and several professors, social workers, dog fanciers turned their ears in the direction of Princess Jacqueline, brindle French bulldog, who was reputed to be "able to talk." They asked her to spell. She replied: "Wah the ell, wah the ell." They asked her to sing. She sang sourly. When she spoke, later, it was nearer English than French, nearer dog than English.

Latchkey

In Willesden, England. Magistrate Lloyd Williams upheld the right of a father to take away the latchkey of a daughter who stayed out after 10 p. m.