PARTY FROM MOTUIHI.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 57, 8 March 1930, Page 12

PARTY FROM MOTUIHI.

ENDING THE QUARANTINE. PATIENT IS DOING WELE. PASSENGERS AND STAFF. With every indication of being well laden, and with a number of sun-tanned men standing on the decking, a launch arrived at the steps near Prince's wharf yesterday afternoon, and was soon an object of much interest. It was one of the concluding evidences of the recent activities at Motuhi, where passengers from the R.m.s. Aorangi have been in quarantine owing to a. case of smallpox having been diagnosed when the vessel reached Auckland in the course of her through trip from Vancouver to Sydney. ' The arrivals yesterday from the island were the Health Department's officer (Dr. J. Boyd), who has been in charge of arrangements, a number of passengers whose release had been postponed until the vaccine prescribed had taken, and thirteen of the fourteen stewards who had been engaged for duty at the quarantine station. Dr. Boyd stated that all arrangements at Motuihi had worked very smoothly. The patient, a single lady, whose parents were with her, was also doin°well, but she would have to be kept in quarantine until quite clear of the trouble. Also on the island were the ship's nurse, the Health Department's nurse, Mr. Knight, third officer of the Aorangi, and a steward. . Tribute to Arrangements. The Rev. C. Houchen, of St. Helier's who had been returning with Mrs. Houchen, from Suva, where he relieved Archdeacon Hands for three months expressed pleasure at getting home after the quarantine hold-up. "However we were well looked after on the island for the ten days," he said. Mrs. F. H. Whittaker and her children, aged 5i years and 2£ years, were on their way to spend a holiday in Auckland with relatives when detained. "I felt a little home-sick at first when we were all sent to Motuihi," she said, "but the Health Department and other officials were so considerate and kind that we soon resigned ourselves to the situation, and that was the wisest course. We could not have been more comfortable! in every way." The lady's only anxiety J

was that she had not heard, from her husband, who is a Government surveyor at Fiji. Mr. A. Tuart, in charge of"the staff of stewards for the Union Company, remarked that the stores being discharged from the launch were unrequired provisions. "We took stores sufficient for all the passengers for fourteen day's," he continued, "but it made a great difference when 86 passengers were released after two days and others since." _ All the stewards speak highly df their dutiful experience. "It wasn't as things evidently are at the quarantine station in Sydney," observed one of them whilst engaged busily unloading goods and baggage.