LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 61, Issue 74, 8 January 1941, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The area of Tailored Street between Cass and East Streets is being topdressed by the Ashburton Borough Council plant. The work will be completed to-morrow.

While searching for sea eggs under the rocks at Whakatane a party of Maori boys discovered a n,limber of octopuses. The creatures wejre driven out of their Jairs with long sticks, and six of them were dragged up on to the beach and killed.

The name of Miss Margaret Ross was inadvertently omitted from the report of the Wc-sterfield farewell social to the Shaw family. Miss Ross sang a song, which merited a welldeserved encore. Miss Ross was accompanied by her sister.

The last month of 1940, with its 230 hours of bright sunshine, was the sunniest December in Wellington since 1934, when an all month record of 313.7 hours was established. It was also a warm month, the approximate mean temperature, which was 60.2 degrees, being 1.2 degrees above the average. The highest temperature of the month was 74.8 degrees, recorded on Monday, There was rather less rain than usual during the month, and slightly less wind.

Investigations regarding the probable percentage of germination for this season’s ryegrass seed carried! out by the seed-testing station at jP'almerston North indicate that it will be better than for the last three years. As the ryegrass crop is the most extensive of the Dominion’s pasture seed production, a good year will result in considerable gain. A particular disease which on, occasion has played havoc with germination is shown to be at an unusually low ebb this year.

Catholics of Alsace-Lorraine are being “tjried in the fire of a cruel persecution” by the Nazis, it has been revealed in a broadcast over the Vatican 'City, radio, states the; 'Roman Catholic newspaper “Zealandia.” Threequarters of the population of the two occupied provinces are Rioman Catholics. Among the oppressive measures are the closing of Reman. Catholic schools, the exclusion of sisters from teaching work, and the abolition of diocesan missionary schools. Hitler youth organisations have been established, and many young boys and girls have been sent into Germany.

Explaining his appearance on the platform at a recent meeting of the People’s Movement in Wellington,, Captain 8. Frickleton, V.C., stated yesterday that he had been invited to speak in, support of New Zealand’s war effort (sfiys a Press Association telegram). He was not a member of the movement and had no intention of becoming one. “I am.'not conaerned with party politics,” he said,, “but I am deeply concerned with the war effort. My presence at the meeting did not ally me with the movement, or any other political party. The only policy I am con T cerned with is the ‘win-the-war policy, and, as I see. it best, it can only be achieved by the combined effort of all political parties.”

Since they had been adopted 12 or 13 years agOj textbooks in general use in primary schools throughout the Dominion had never been, satisfactory, said Mr J. W. McGechie (headmaster of the IParnell School, Auckland), the other day. Much of the English, history and geography material was not presented attractively, and there were too few exercises in these subjects and also in arithmetic. Especially in country districts, he added, was it necessary, for a textbook to be a full and complete interpretation of the syllabus and with the present books work was suffering. It had been understood that new books had been begun two or three years ago, but nothing definite had been announced.

A further stage, in the completion of th? railway connection to Gisborne was marked when a train took lfiO passengers from Bartletts to Gisborne. The track between; Gisborne and Bartletts was completed two months ago, and since then, thie Public Works Department has been railing construction material from Gisborne to different points on the line as far as Bartletts, but this effort was the first attempt at .running a passenger train. The department borrowed! two carriages from the Railways Department for the excursion. There is now a considerable length of completed track at the Gisborne end of the railway, and 1 rails have been laid with only one short break as far as the Waikoura tunnel, which is completed and through: which the track is nearing completion. Preparations are well forward for linking up with work further on.

New Zealanders joining the air force and those training for the higher ranks in the army find themseiyes greatly handicapped at the outset through the low standard of mathematics taught in schools. To make up for this deficiency trainees for active service, particularly for some branches of the air force, have been compelled to spend much time and effort on intensive mathematical study. That the -neglect of mathematics is a serious matter was the view expressed by Professor H. G. Forder, professor of mathematics at the Auckland University College, who said: “Mathematics is a- key subject in our university work. If it is weak, physics, chemistry and engineering all necessarily suffer. It is important in .all branches of modern industry where machines, electricity or radio are involved, and it need hardly be pointed out that it is now an essential weapon; in bur defence.”

A former Wellington woman, now living in Toledo, Ohio, United States of America, idrites of the ceaseless activity of American women for the cause of England. “I have, never witnessed anything like it,” she says. “It is as though the consciousness of their position in the world without an (England, as they have known it, had suddenly struck the whole country. I went to a concert this week. Some man I did not know recited vejry'well indeed a ‘Toast to England,’ which I fancy is from one of Noel Coward's plays. As he recited the grand lines, someone on a piano supplied a soft background. It was the National Anthem. Then as lie finished the recital the pianist played fortissmo ‘God Save the King,’ and, believe it or not, everyone in the ball stood up and sang. It was a most moving thing. If such exhibitions are anything to go upon,” concluded the writer, “there is little doubt that the American people will be with us to the end, whatever it may be.”

The sum of £2300 has been paid into the central fund of the Million Pound All-Purposes Patriotic Appeal from the Ashburton Borough.

Hamilton, for its size, was a remarkably law-abiding town, said a senior police officer when comment was made on the few' arrests made during the holidays. He went on to say that usually at holiday time there was a noticeable influx of the undesirable type, and this, coupled with the fact that so many homes were closed while owners were away on holiday., often led to misdemeanours. Throughout the Christmas season there had also been little over-indulgence in drink.

When Mrs Beatrice Nairn, of Omokere station, 18 miles from Waip&iw.a, was descending the stairs of the homestead on. Saturday afternoon she heard an explosion and then fell forward down the stairs. When she picked herself up she discovered slits was bleeding from a wound in the back of the head. Being alone, she telephoned a neighbour for assistance. At the time she thought a hoy who had come to the station about two weeks previously had been shooting birds in the garden and that a bullet had accidentally struck her, hut it was later discovered that the boy was missing and that he had taken with him a .22 repeating rifle and Colt revolver, along with a failquantity of ammunition. A note was also discovered in which the hoy made alarming threats. The boy, who is 15 years of age, was later arrested by the Waipawa police.

Seventeen million telephones —about half of the world’s total —are controlled by the Bell organisation in the United States,, and, though New Zealand’s share of the world total is less than .6 per cent., a New Zealand telephone engineer, Mr Charles S. Plank, of Wellington, who spent two years in the States under a grant from the Commonwealth Fund Fellowship, was given every facility by the Bell organisation, with which he worked, being treated as if he represented an organisation of comparable size. The Bell organisation! had a staff of about 350,000, Mr Plank said. Its laboratory workers numbered 4600, of whom 2000 Were world-re-nowned engineers, physicists and chemists. They had reached an advanced stage of technical development and efficiency. As an instance Mr Plank quoted the fact that when he once put through a long-distance call' from New York to San Francisco over a 3'200t-mile land line, the time between his speaking to the operator in New York and his speaking to the wanted person in San Francisco was 31 seconds.

Mr E. Cholerton, of Messrs J. It. Procter, Limited, Christchurch, is at present in Ashburton, and may be consulted on all defects of eyesight at the Somerset Hotel to-morrow and Friday. —(Advt.)