LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXXV, Issue 8206, 2 August 1915, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The new Arbitration Court award which prohibits steamer stewards accepting tips from the- 1" travelling public, came into force to-day, y r

A slight shock of earthquake was folt at 2.28 p.m. yesterday afternoon. At Sumner, the shake was accompanied by a rumbling noise, tho direction apparently being north to South.

The following are the vital,statistics for the Ashburton registration district for the-month -of July, 1915 V—Births 31, deaths 10, marriages 8. Tho figures for July, 1914, were as follow: —-Births 29, deaths 14, marriages 9.

A deputation from .the W.C.T.U. waited on the-"Mayor..-, to-day, says a Christchurch Press Association telegram) to protest against, raffles for patriotic purposes. .'The.' . Mayor defended, the practice,; and referred tho deputation to members of Parliament.

Messrs Dalgoty and Company, Ltd., have sold Mr John Stringfellow's farm near Chertsey, of 463 acres, to Mi- A. Pawsey, at a yery satisfactory figure; also an excellent line of. 190 six and eight-tooth half bred wethers off the same farm to Mr J. Drummond.

Three cases arising out of insobriety were heard at tho Magistrate's Court this morning, before Messrs R. Clark and W. W. White, J.'sP. A first offender was fined 10s, in default 48 hours' imprisonment. For being disorderly while drunk, R. Hardy was fined 15s, in default seven days' imprisonment; and on a charge of a similar nature A. Harding, was fined ss, in default 48. hours' imprisonment. The latter was also fined 40s, in default 14 days' imprisonment, for .obscouo language.

"The time will come, I am sure," remarked Mr Clemont "W»nigge \ during the course of an astronomical lecture delivered at Auckland on Thursday evening (says the Auckland "Star"), "when all these wires will be done away with. Wo arc only on the threshold'of what can be done with wireless telegraphy. I am certain that the time will come when, with a wireless apparatus each can carry round with him, we will be able to communicate with our friends as easily as we now talk together face to face."

It was reported in the "Guardian" last week that just after the express train had passed tho Solwyn River on Tuesday morning a charge of shot struck the side of one of the carriages, and that some of the pellets had hit two passengers, who were "standing on the carriage platform. The police have made enquiries, and succeeded in tracing the person who discharged the gun, a lad of 13 years of age. The boy had taken his father's gun out to shoot some birds sitting on a fence, and the train passed, about 50 yards' distant, as the shot was fired. ■ .

After some years' persistent representation to the Government, tho Ashburton High School Board v has now obtained fulfilment of its hopes in connection with the establishment on one of its; reserves of an experimental farm to be run in conjunction with the school work. Messrs John Brown, B.Sc. (Agr:), N.D.A., Director of Fields, and ,W. J. McCullough, Acting-Fields Instructox 1 in the South Island,, paid a .visit:to the farm:;on Friday, and were impressed with the possibilities it holds. 1 They will intimate by letter at the next meeting of the Board the courses of instruction which it is intended to adopt.