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Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22444, 4 July 1938, Page 8

The log of a voyage from Sydney to the South Seas made in 1856 by the whaling barque Woodlark has been discovered among the records of the Auckland Magistrate’s Court. It is not known how the log came to be placed among the records of the Court, but it is possible that it was produced when the ship’s company was required to appear in connexion with the taking of the cargo from a brig from Adelaide, which was wrecked on a reef off Australia. The log shows that the voyage was unsuccessful in whaling, but oil was taken from the wrecked brig. Strained feeling between natives on board and the -white members of the crew is mentioned, one of the natives having been heard three times to threaten the lives of the white men. The last log entry was on June 29. 1856, the first having been "made on March 27.

With six solicitors holding office on the Auckland City Council, bursts of forensic enthusiasm are occasionally heard in the council chamber, but there was one stage at a meeting recently when the proceedings might well have been mistaken for a judicial hearing.' A weighty examination of questions of corroboration of evidence was conducted by one solicitor when the case of an alleged breach by a taxi-driver was under consideration and, in reply, a colleague pursued an equally legal line. Referring to his “learned friend” and addressing the council as “Your Worship and gentlemen,” a third barrister made an eloquent plea on the offender’s behalf. The final speaker, although not a legal practitioner, ventured the observation that the punishment fitted the. crime.

To carry the Gospel to the hundreds of thousands who wanted it, there was a desperate need for men and women and for medical assistance and money in the Indian province of Sind, the Rev. C. W. Haskell, formerly of Karachi, told a congregation of more than 500 at the annual missionary festival service in St. Mary’s,Cathedral Church. Auckland. Sind had a population of about 4,000,000, said Mr Haskell, but at the present time there were only four men—one European and three Indians—to carry on the Christian missionary work. Teachers were wanted to extend the knowledge of Christ, and it had been his unfortunate experience to tell some of the people that he could not send teachers to them.

Having been within 500 miles of the North Pole last year, Miss E. M. Holden, a visitor from Balboa in the Panama canal zone, intends to make a complementary trip this year by going as far south as possible. The bare Kills of the South Island have already reminded Miss Holden of Scandinavia, as have the steep hills ringing the princioal harbours. Welling- , ton by night with its illuminated heights presents an unforgettable sight, Miss Holden thinks, after being accustomed to see lowlying flats spreading out behind the docks.