LOCAL AND GENERAL

Dominion, Volume 15, Issue 160, 1 April 1922, Page 6

LOCAL AND GENERAL

The Postal authorities have received advice from Sydney that the Moeraki left at 4 p.m. on March 30 for Auckland. She carries 45 bags of mails from Australia, and 224 from the, United Kingdom, and 19 parcel receptacles.

Reporting to the Board of Governors yesterday, Miss M. McLean, principal of Wellington Girls’ College, stated that the school had had for a great number of years a scheme for the sale of second-hand books and requisites. This had greatly reduced the cost to parents, and she had never had complaints that the price of books of any form had been found burdensome.

At a farewell gathering held yesterday in his honour, Mr. J. Doyle, who is retiring from the post of chief sanitary inspector for the City Council, claimed to have made and published the first death-rate chart in New Zealand. Such a chart, he said, was perhaps the best index to.the state of a city- It was the city’s health history. The index card system in Wellington was the most complete in the 1 , country. It covered every house in every street, and gave the number of rooms, the owner, and the occupier. It also showed the unoccupied houses, and when they had last been tenanted. It was a record—a system—of which he was 1 particularly proud.' . ■ < Tlie world’s billiard championship for professionals will commence in London on Monday. McConachy, writing to Billiards.(Limited from England, states he is full of confidence and hopeful pt making a good showing. The heats in the championship are 8000 points, and the finals 16,000. The New Zealander is the only aspirant from outside of Great Britain, and has been drawn to play against Reece. The Minister of Mines (Mr. Anderson) has arranged to go to Nelson today in order to inspect the iron works at Onakaka and Parapara, and attend to some Departmental business. The iron works at Onakaka are almost ready for active operations. About fifty men have been working there for seven or eight months, the furnace is completed, and large buildings have been erected. The company that l? as the enterprise in hand may hs able to produce the first batch of pig-iron in ' the very hear future.

The Bank of New South Wales has purchased tho block of buildings on the corner of Blair Street and Courtenay Place, Wellington, and will open a branch for the conduct of all general banking business on Monday next. It is the intention to occupy the whole premises when the lease of the corner falls in shortly, but meanwhile alterations have been made to the shop adjoining, and this will be used. Mr. H Henderson, accountant, of the Wellington branch, will be in charge temporarily.

The trustees of Wesley Church, Taranaki Street, recently decided that the sittings should be free. The change will take place to-morrow.

A Dalefield lad who confessed to the police that he had been entering the homes of settlers and purloining women’s underclothing was asked his mo-' five, and replied “God knows I” For the past 12 months (states the. Wairarapa “Age”) Dalefield residents have been disturbed in mind owing to nocturnal visits by someone who seemed to have a mania for women’s attire. Bedrooms were entered at night time, and the visitor was often disturbed, but managed to evade detection. The case baffled the police, for the reason that jewellery, money, and other valuables' were never taken, and missing articles were at times found under hedges and in other places far removed from the scene of operations. It transpires .that the lad would at times get out of his bed late at. night, without the knowledge of his mother and brothers, walk over a mile and carry on his strange antics. The case is an extremely peculiar one, and will come before a Magistrate at the next sitting of the Court.; One effect of the operations of the Forestry Department is to secure for the State a reasonable share of the value of standing forest that may be made available for sawmilling. A case in point is provided by an official announcement that tenders are required for the purchase, of the milling timber on a block of 195 acres in the Manganui survey district, Wellington forest conservation region. The estimated quantity of milling timber on the block is 3 514,700 superficial feet, being 486 900 feet of white pine, 2,569,600 feet of rimu, 257,000 feet of matai and 201.200 feet of miro. The upset price is £5OOO, and, in addition, the purchaser will be required to pay a ground-rent of Is. per nc.re. One-tenth of the purchase money has to be paid in advance and the balance in fifteen equal quarterly instalments. At the returned soldiers’ .meeting last night a motion was passed asking the Citv Council to appraise the value of fruit stands in the streets and rive partially-disabled soldiers .tho opportunity of taking any of them, without competition. It was also dec'ded to ascertain whether the Hutt ■Valley fruit and vegetable growers | would co-operate with the soldiers ui this movement.

As the, result of the effort recently made on behalf .if the Wellington Returned Soldiers’ Club the president (Mr. W. Perry) explained that the amount raised had reached' £lOOO, which would be well spent in renovating. the building, used for a soldiers’ club, thus giving employment to painters, paperhangers, carpenters, etc.

The - Waterside Workers’ Band will play at Central Park to-morrow afternoon. A collection will be taken up in aid of the Russian Relief Fund.

At the general meeting of the Returned Soldiers’ Association last night, in reply to a question., Mr. Pascoe explained that the delay in erecting u. permanent cenotaph in Wellington wa* due to the fact that the educational authorities, who desired that the question of raising the necessary funds should be left-to tho school children. The matter had been-taken up with enthusiasm and £2OO had been raised, but other matters had interfered with the work, and it was found desirable by the executive to take the completion of the matter over. Steps were being arranged to do that in a comprehensive way, and in a short time they, would be able to say that everything required had been done. The difficulty was the matter of site, and no better place could be conceived than where the temporary cenotaph had been placed. At present two Ministers had opposed this being done, but he believed the obiection would eventually be overcome and proper regard paid to the memory of our gallant dead; .. , “There is nothing to cause us difficulty,” remarked Mr. W. F. Ward, chairman of the Wellington College Board of Governors at. yesterday’s meeting, when referring to the oath of allegiance which teachers must take under the amendment of last session to the Education Act. The masters of the Bovs’ College, he explained, had not yet taken the oath, but the mistresses had at the Girls’ College. He had personally, administered the oath to them en bloc.