NEWS OF THE DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 289, 7 December 1931, Page 6

NEWS OF THE DAY.

The New Whau Bridge. Two-way traffic was permitted, on the new bridge , over - the Whau Creek during the weekend, and there will be no need to revert to singleway traffic. . The approaches are still in a rather rough state, but the. convenience, of the new structure is such that motorists don't mind putting up with such a small matter as that. In the ordinary course of events the approaches would not be concreted for several months, but a careful cheek shows that there has been much less subsidence in the new filling than might be expected, and it is quite possible that the concreting will be done early in the New Year. A Civic "Forest." "Sylvicola" writes: "The pines planted by the Auckland City Council at Cornwallis and adjacent reserves on the New Lynn-Huia Road are anything but a good advertisement for the experiment of introducing exotics into that eide of the isthmus. The trees have done very poorly, and the plantations are so patchy that there are whole acres where the trees have apparently died out. Very few of the trees seem to have found the 60il and the situation congenial. Possibly it is too exposed. At any rate the' plantations are so scraggy looking that it seems foolish to waste good ratepayers' money on them.. The trees that have survived don't look as though they were worth the cost of ploughing the firebreaks that now run alongside the road where it passes through these meagre-looking civic forests." Benefits Passed On. "External trade has already shown'some improvement," states a bulletin prepared by the Department of Economics of Canterbury College. The bulletin adds: "The excess of exports over imports is substantially greater than it was, and the improvement is being reflected in the banking figures. Interest rates have been reduced, and further improvement might reasonably be expected during the coming export season. Britain's money has become depreciated by about 20 per cent, and in consequence prices of imports into Great Britain have risen. So long as the New Zealand exchange in London remains unchanged, such increases in British prices, which are the direct result of exchange depreciation, would be passed on to New Zealand goods. The recent improvement in prices for some New Zealand products is therefore largely the result of the suspension of the gold standard."

The Tish Tale. Fishermen never change. Those yarns which they tell themselves with perfectly serious faces they would punish in their five-year-old son. Two fishermen were talking on a ferry. One told the other how he had landed what he thought must be "the grandfather" of all snapper down the gulf, near Coromandel. It was about a 30pounder. He carefully used the word "about." It provided a line of advance or retreat, according to the weight which would be given to, the fish in the yarn with which his companion was bound to cap his. "That's nothing," was his companion's eventual attempt, "the other day my son was fishing in the upper harbour, past Kauri Point, and he landed one which turned the scale at 401b. It was an enormous fish, so long," and he gestured with his two hands, to indicate a length that was elastic. His companion was somewhat downcast at this, and there was a little silence. Then he started again.

Mount Eden Improvements. Residents round about Mount Eden are very pleased with the way the new borough council is attending to the improvement of the hill and the surroundings. People living in the Stokes Road area appreciate the excellent path round the flank of the mountain, giving them a short cut into Mount Eden Road, instead of having to go all round by Cueksey'e Corner. The new; road linking up the present drive with Clive Road, Epsom, will also be a boon to the Clive Road residents. It will be a motor road, but only for private vehicles, and the pedestrians will not be inconvenienced by a stream of trade vehicles. The mountain is essentially a domain and should.not bo spoiled by too much motor traffic. People who have been annoyed by the bad odours coming from the rubbish tip on the council property on the right-hand side of the entrance to the drive, in Mount Eden Road, will be glad to know that this nuisance will cease, as in future all rubbish will be taken outside the borough.

New Lynn's Landscape. "Unemployment has had a quite unexpected effect on the scenery of New Lynn. The face of that sunny suburb lias been very much changed in places by the cutting down of rows of pin us insignis, whose dark green stood out so prominently against the lighter green of the fields. These pines were very characteristic of the neighbourhood. They were planted years ago for shelter, and had attained considerable height. During the present hard times people have had to fossick round for cheaper firewood, and the result has been that' scores of the pines have fallen victim to the axeman. People living on the higher parts of the borough notice that since the trees have disappeared they have been able to get a view of the waters of the Tasman and the Pacific —that is to say, they can now see both the Manukau and the Waitemata Harbours —a thing they could not do previously owing to the tall intervening pine trees. Few. people realise that from salt water to salt water the distance across the isthmus at New Lynn is only a mile and a half.

Too Many Controlling Bodies. An appeal to members of the club to consider whether there was not room in the district for the formation of a central corporation, to govern the duties at present carried out by a multitude of boards and bodies, was made to the Napier Rotary Club by Rotarian J. S. Barton, chairman of the Napier Commission. In introducing the matter, the commissioner quoted an excerpt from the British Law Encyclopaedia stressing the chaos which resulted from the.overburdening of a district by local bodies. Each of these overlapped in jurisdiction and rating powers, and each*.exercised its powers' without regard to the other boards. Referring to the position in London between the years 1827 and 1837, the writer of the time stated that it was a veritable scandal, and the country was covered with a jungle of jurisdiction. This state of affairs was followed by the establishment of the municipal corporation which took the. place of the many different boards, saving expenditure and introducing order out of chaos. The ipoint he wished to bring before the members was whether such a position had not arisen in the Napier district, and whether they would not be better served if such a corporation was set up. No Proper Books Kept.

People familiar with bankruptcy cases are never surprised at the primitive book-keeping methods adopted by some tradesmen. While- it is true they are not quite so crude as those of a notorious. shopkeeper. iu Auckland's very early clays, they are still pretty free and easy. This remarkable early trader, was illiterate. He kept "books" by means of queer hieroglyphics, Egyptian in feeling.' One day he sued a citizen for the price of a cheese. The citizen denied liability but admitted that he had once bought a grindstone. "Hang it," said the storekeeper, consulting his book, "I forgot to put a hole in it." During a bankruptcy meeting this morning the Official Assignee, Mr.: W. A. Watters, had occasion once more to remind the.bankrupt that proper books must be kept. The bankrupt produced two books, but neitHer of them showed anything in the nature of additions or a balance-sheet. Mr. Watters warned him that ■■.it-was essential to keep proper books, showing every item of expense, otherwise he could not expect to keep track of his position, and could never tell whether he was solvent or not. Bankrupt said lie would engage a proper bookkeeper in future. : j