NEW ZEALAND EXHIBITION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 53, 2 March 1907, Page 7

NEW ZEALAND EXHIBITION.

DISPLAY OF GRAPES. INTERNATIONAL ASPECT OF THE - FAIR. Special Service. CHRISTCHURCH, Friday. There was an attendance of 10,540 at the Exhibition to-day. Both performances of the Besses o' th' Barn Band in the concert hall were well attended. ■ Two plaster busts- have been added to the collection in the art gallery, one of Miss Eileen Ward, daughter of the Pre-. mier, and the other a bust of a young hafi-caste maiden. The portrait bust of Miss -Ward is one of the best of its kind that has been executed in the colony. The sculptor is Mr Nelson Illingworth. Signor Bragato,-the Government viticulturist, has arranged for a display of New Zealand-grown grapes at the Exhibition. The first ton will be shipped from Auckland by the Talune to-morirow reaching- Christehurch on Wednesday next. The grapes were grown at the Government experimental station at Waerenga, in the Waikato. The first consignment will consist of Chasselas, a variety which is considered to be the finest eating grapes. Shipments of other varieties will follow as they ripen. As two tons of Australian grapes will arrive next -week the public will have an .opportunity of comparing the New Zealand and Australian fruits. The judges of several sections have completed their work, and only the Minister's confirmation of their decisions is needed before they will be made public. The following interesting return, compiled by the Customs Department, of the total value of exhibits under bond, according to the countries of their actual origin, sheds much light on the international aspect of the Exhibition, which has been questioned by some critics: —United Kingdom, £178,107; Australia, £20,832 (including Victoria £6001, New South Wales £10,408, Queensland £2128, South Australia £1331, West Australia £310., and Tasmania £4); Fiji, £444; Transvaal, £26; India. £263; Ceylon, £204; Burma, £9; Canada, £3766; United States, £7106; France, £2024; Spain, £16; Italy, £673; Switzerland, £196; Austria, £757; Germany, £3853; Sweden, £4; Norway, £15; Holland, £1748; Belgium, £671; Syria, £182; Trinidad, £2; Cuba, £S2; Fhilli pines, £154; China, £14. The total value of the exhibits under bond is £222,044. The Canterbury College annual sports will be held on March 16, on the Exhibition sports ground. Numerous and varied entries have been received for the Wonderland Pet Show on March 8. The date for receiving entries for the essay competition is extended to March 6. The Acting-Premier, speaking at the dinner given to visiting members of the Pr«ss Association to-day, congratulated those who had had to do with what had been a Exhibition. There were (he said) some people who "had an idea that the colony was going to lose a very large sum, but they must take into account the educational value of. the Exhibition. When he told them that the cost to the colony as a whole would not, he believed, exceed a sum of one shilling pel- head of the population, he thought —*be\- would sgree with him That the whole arrangements had been carried out commercially and successfully, in order to produce such a result.