NEWS OF THE DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 141, 17 June 1929, Page 6

NEWS OF THE DAY.

The Mormon. "Your wife's a very hard-working woman," said the Hon. G. W. Forbes to a farmer up Kaikoura way the other day. "Yes," said the farmer, ''I wish I had a couple more like her." Broadcast of Concert. Last night station IYA relayed the first concert transmitted by land line from Whangarei. - The concert was given in the Whangarei Town Hall by the local municipal band, and _ assisting artists. Though the transmission was on the whole quite good, it was not up to the | f standard achieved on the Wellington relay, there being signs of interference at times, and a few momentary breaks in the continuity of trans- " mission. During the programme the Mayor of s Whangarei (Mr. Jones) and Rabbi Van Staveren, e of Wellington, who is holidaying in the North, £ spoke appropriately. £ Sloops Go Cruising. Every winter the sloops attached to the New Zealand Squadron of the Royal Navy make long cruises in the Pacific to show the flag in out-of-the-way British possessions. They leave this morning for those sunny seas. The Labur--1 mini is going to Fiji, and then on to the Ellice S group and the Gilbert group. In the course of t her long voyage she will also touch at several I isolated places where this annual visit is one of the few tilings that keep the islanders in touch v with the Empire. The Veronica does not go so l far north, her itinerary including the Cook j group, Samoa and Tahiti. Before" leaving the c Haitraki Gulf the sloops will carry out gunnery practice. They are due back in "Auckland on 1 October 10. 1 s Faithful Pussy. A young married couple living in Eastbourne »' Road, Remuera, set out yesterday afternoon on 3 a visit to relatives in Bassett Road, a distance 1 of approximately half a mile. They were decom--1 panied by their faithful dog, and —though quite ] unknown to them—by faithful pussy "as well. - The cat soon made her presence known, and trotted along quite briskly afttil the corner of 1 Retuuera Road was reached. Here the main l stream of traffic was too much for her, and she . disappeared, apparently going back home. Such j was not the case, however, for pussy "parked" herself in a tree, well out of the reach of dogs, ' motor cars, and even human beings. Five hours later the couple returned, and pussy announced [ hor presence by a joyful mew. Leaping down from the tree, she led tlie way homewards, and ' received her due reward in a saucer of warm milk. -1 Spanish Rotary Protests. Somebody has been libelling Spain, and the Bilbao Rotary Club has written to the Auckland Rotary Club to explain things—and incidentally put in a good word for tile exhibitions to be held this summer in Seville and Barcelona. The letter points out that the Bilbao Club has taken particular care to maintain tight boilds of solidarity with all the Rotary clubs in -Iho world. A protest is made against a "campaign of libelling .Spain, which diminishes her prestige before foreign countries. - ' The letter points out that she is the "cradle of nations, the luminary of civilisation," and goes on to say that "any foul intent to dwindle, in the present hours, the prestige of Spain, by drawing between the world and Spain a curtain of calumny and falsehood, has to meet the execration of every well-bred man, and, moreover, if to his quality of an honourable man. he joins that of being 'Rotary,' coveting to girdle the earth with a chain of affection." Ready-made Art. It is often said that too many people sit on the grandstand to watch thirty men struggle with a ball—it would be better for the nation if the crowd did its own playing. Mr. E. Douglas Taylor, Director of Music in Schools, who Is to represent the New Zealand Education Department at the music conference at Lausanne, says much U the same sort of thing about art. "At present," ( said Mr. Taylor, "too much of our art is made j for us professionally in proportion to what we j do and can do for ourselves. We pay dispropor- , tionate salaries to moving picture actors and < others to do for us what we should be doing our- { selves, but so hungry are we for art that we spend enormous sums upon it cheerfully in the way of second-hand entertainment. It is tiine , we devoted liiuch more of this expenditure to developing the artistic skill of the children and llien to providing for them these amateur j societies in which they can find scope and delight f afterwards. At present our amateur societies j are often isolated, struggling for support, even cutting one another's throats unintentionally. • Here, too. we need co-operation, amalgamation r and common interests." ~

Onchunga's Supremacy—at the Bar. Tlie rival clnims of Devonport and Onehunga were championed at tlie meeting of the Auckland Orphans' Club on Saturday evening. The Orphans' Clubs of these two aitUurbs were the guests of the evening, and when responding to the chairman's greetings, Mr. E. Aldridge, president of the Devonport organisation] thanked Dr. Magiiire for his sympathetic reference to the marine suburb. He said that Aueklanders were sometimes prone to forget that the peninsula of Devonport was a prime factor in the safety and beauty of the harbour upon which tile city of Auckland relied for its greatness. In his own experience he had heard Devonport described as "ojie of those sifiall North Shore boroughs." He a'sked the meeting to receive through him the fraternal greetings of nearly 11,000 people resident in his borough, which throughout was characterised by a civic spirit equal to that of the city on the southern shore. Mr. Sutherland, past president of the Onehuhga Orphans' Club, followed, and claimed for the suburb on the Manukau ah equal distinction as a protector of Auckland on the other flank. "We have 11,300 people," he said, "and what is more, we are 1 pl'tfild of possessing something which, eveli DevoMport caniiot parallel—our bar." The large audience greatly enjoyed this counter-sally. Eechristenecl Streets. "Eaukau Maori" writes: —While everyone with any knowledge of Maori history would be delighted to see the genuine old place.names of the Maoris retained, it is (jiiestionable Whether the .City Cpriicil's proposed wholesale recliriatehiilg of duplicated streets with Maori names qitite fills the bill. It is iiot suliicieht to choose a, iihesohnding collection of vowels; a name mtlst have Some association with the spot'to" which if is given. In the list that lias been circulated among city councillors it is proposed to get over tlie difficulty of duplicate names (which are worse than ever since the city began to absorb so many of the suburbs) by giving nearly all Maori names, which haS-e apparently beeii chosen for tlieir musical sound. Soliie of them are merely translations of tlie present pakeha iiams, as, for instance. Arawiiata Street for Bridge .Street: Matamiia Avenue for First Avenue;' Tahatai Road for The Strand, St. Belief's,- and so on. The worst objection to a wholesale Maorification of street names is the utter inability of the present generation to pronounce that beautiful language. The Wellington hydro-electric station is invariably called Manga-hay-o, when it should be something like "Mangahow," the steamer Otokia, with the accent on the second syllable, is called on the waterfront the Otoky-a, which is neither musical nor correct. Moreover, Auckland's population has been of late Tears swelled by large numbers of pc'ople from .the Old Country who ftumoi, l:o px|ie.eie'd 'to know anything of Maori, wheii yomig New Zealandera nre po woefully astray, so that ihc-so srilmrban Maori street imtlies will end up by just being as badly niaiigled as the aboriginal niunes In Australian towns—particularly Sydney. I;