General News

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23478, 5 November 1941, Page 6

General News

Australians’ Answer Recently enemy aeroplanes dropped pamphlets over Tobruk calling on the Australian garrison to surrender. The Australian reply, among other sentences, was “Come and take us. ine Tobruk paper, however, advised the enemy to word their pamphlets differently, something like this: “Everyone of you we get costs us 10, and it is getting a Mlt too thick. Come and give selves up. The German beer is the best in the world, and we have millions of here. Our prison camp is the most luxurious in the world with two-up schools every night, coursing every Wednesday, trots on Monday afternoon and gee-gees every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. It’s all yours if you please let us take Tobruk.”

First-class Prospects for Honey Season

Bees in Canterbury have wintered well and, the soil being in good order after the recent rains and able to withstand prolonged warm weather, prospects for the coming honey season are first-class, said the Apiaries Instructor for Canterbury (Mr H. Walsh) when interviewed yesteiday. Mention of a highly successful flew day, the first in Canterbury for six years, held recently at the apiary of Messrs' Barnett and Bray, Leeston, and attended by 60 beekeepers from all parts of the province, was made by the instructor. Demonstrations in beekeeping practice included queen rearing and hive manipulation and after questions were answered by the instructor an informal discussion was held. The instructor added that a feature of the field day was the number of amateur beekeepers present, who benefited greatly from the practical demonstrations and the inspection of up-to-date equipment. Shortage of Sand-bags An acute shortage of regulation sand-bags for. use by Home Guardsmen in trench digging and field fortifications has led the Timaru Battalion officers to explore the possibility of having them made locally. The Battalion Commander (Major E. D. Mcßae) told “The Press” yesterday that the problem had been solved to some extent by using second-hand corn sacks. The improvisation of sand-bags by this means has only been made possible by the co-operation of several firms and individuals who have voluntarily given their assistance. The sacks were given by the Timaru Grain Merchants’ Association, and they will be cut in three and sown again at the sides. The cutting was done by Timaru plumbers, free of charge, and an offer has been received by flourmilling firms to undertake the sewing of the bags. Major Mcßae expressed appreciation of the interest of citizens in the activities .of the Home Guard as shown by their willingness to co-operate where possible. Problem for Cricket Captains Rainy Saturdays may present a pretty problem to players in the Christchurch Suburban Cricket Association’s competitions this season. A resolution, put in to meet the special conditions of one-day matches, means in effect that the side batting first must end its innings two and a quarter hours after the official starting time, which is 2 o’clock. If rain falls and batting lime is lost in that two and a quarter hours, the side has still to declare at 4.15 o’clock, although it may have had only perhaps 30 or 40 minutes’ batting—leaving the other side, if the weather clears, two and a quarter hours to reach the total the first side had perhaps a third of that time to score in. Some members protested against this rule at last evening’s meeting'of the association, but the chairman (Mr W. C. Aitken) said he could give no other interpretation of the rule. It was just one of those things that happened in one-day cricket, he said. Auckland Property Sale One of the first property sales in Queen street, Auckland, for some years, has been made with the sale of Brunswick Buildings, opposite His Majesty’s Arcade, to Hill and Plummer, Ltd., oil, colour, and glass merchants. The purchase price was about £70,000. The vendor of the property was the Public Trustee. A six-storey building, with a frontage of approximately 43 feet to Queen street, the Brunswick Buildings run right through to High street, where the frontage is the same. The portion fronting on High street is really a separate building of four storeys; but the whole block is involved in the transaction. The depth of the property is 180 feet.—P.A. First “Food Laundry” Sir Ernest Gowers, London Regional Commissioner, recently visited Britain’s first “food laundry”—a building for the decontamination of food which has been affected by gas. Meat, sugar, rice, haricot beans, potatoes, eggs, split peas, and a variety of tinned and bottled goods which were assumed to have been in a grocery store and butchery affected by mustard gas were “decontaminated.” It was stated that sealed tins and drums, and glass bottles with well-fitting stoppers give complete protection from gas, and even waxed cartons, cellulose wrappings, and grease-jiroof paper afford some protection. In the case of nonpersistent gases a ‘4B-hours’ airing is often enough to make the food perfectly safe. Cheese from Sheep’s Milk Czechoslovak refugees are helping Britain to get cheese from sheep’s milk. They have had experience of ewe-milking in Czechoslovakia, which used to export 2000 tons of ewe’s milk cheese a year. The making of this novel cheese has become practicable by the invention of a new milking machine just designed in Britain, and after experiments at the Northamptonshire Farm Institute 400 ewes a day are now being milked by it. The ewes are put in pens in units of six and milking is done at a pulsation speed of 100 a minute. British farmers are now to be encouraged to milk their ewes, if only for a short period, after weaning the lambs. In both butter-fat and curd ewe’s milk is nearly three times as rich as cow’s milk, and each ewe could provide between 11b and 21b of curd a week for at least four months of the year. There are so many ewes in Britain that the people could, it is estimated, get as much cheese from them as they ate before the war and still leave some over for export. Relief of Air Raid Distress Advice has been received by the secretary of the National Patriotic Fund Board from the High Commissioner (Mr W. J. Jordan), that on September 8, accompanied by Mrs Jordan, he called on the chairman of the hospital for sick children, Great Ormond street, London, and handed him a cheque for £IOOO from the general funds sent by the board on behalf of the people of New Zealand for the relief of distress caused by air raids. —P.A, English Eau de Cologne Genuine eau de Cologne is now being made in England from vintage crops of the true floral essential oils and shipped to countries once supplied direct from Germany. The city of Cologne can no longer, of course, supply its most famous product, and the English makers declare that they too will continue to do so only while they can get fhe carefully chosen constituents of real eau de Cologne. Thus far they have been able to send it to many Empire countries including Canada, India and South Africa and also to Egypt, Hong Kong and Palestine. British Locomotives for Turkey British locomotive engineers are now building 24 railway engines for Turkey. They are part of an order for 68 locomotives for that country. The engines weigh 106J tons each and their speed is 70 kilometres an hour. Thirtyfour locomotives, nearly £250,000 in value, were sent overseas from Britain in the three months ending June 30—seven more than during the preceding quarter. During the quarter Britain also shipped 18 locomotive boilers abroad, a total of 56, valued at about £IIO,OOO for the first half of the year. Injured By Golf Ball A settlement for the sum of £ 1200, inclusive of £29 expenses and costs, has been approved by Mr Justice Smith in the action taken by Miss M. M. Caldwell, through her guardian, Mr F. H. Caldwell, against the Palmerston North Golf Club for damages for injury to an eye sustained through her being struck by a golf ball. The incident occurred some months ago, the ball being played from the tenth tee and travelling on to Park road.