WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 54, 28 November 1923, Page 6

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

NOTES AT RANDOM

(By

T.D.H.)

H.M.S. Australia will probably be sunk off Sydney Heads.—This shows how wise New Zealand was in establishing a sinking fund when it gave its battle-cruiser.

'The United States is enforcing the twelve-mile rum-running treaty with Britain before it is signed.—And is not even waiting for the Senate to ratilv it.

Germany’s new Chancellor, Dr. Heinrich Albert, as the cable message reminds us. is the same Dr. Albert who met with a little misadventure while travelling in the elevated railroad in New York in the summer of 1915. He was carrying a bulky portfolio of papers, and during the journey they were cleverly stolen from him. Next morning the contents of this portfolio -—or rather the purple patches in the papers in it—apepared under flaming headlines in the “New York World,’ and disclosed all sorts of plots to wreck American factories suspected of making munitions for the Allies. Dr. Albert, who was a German Privy Councillor. was acting as German fiscal agent in the United States. Captain von Panon. the German military attache at 'Washington. and Captain Bov-Ed. the naval attache, had been freely passing monev about to people who undertook to drop bombs in factories or do other good work for the Fatherland, and were much upset at the good doctor’s carelessness with his portfolio—“ English secret service men of course did it,” wrote Captain von Papen in lamenting the occurrence in a letter that came into British hands later on.

Dr. Albert was by the Austrian Ambassador at I) ashington for his “clever explanation” to the new-sDaners after his mishap. The papers in his portfolio, he declared, were simnlv a collection of letters sent in by irresponsible people proposing all sorts of wild and lawless schemes on which the German Government had no intention of' acting, and he was merely examining this correspondence to see whether it contained any suggestions of value for legitimate enterprises. It was an adroit wriggle, but subsequent captures of con espondfence between Dr. Albert and Captain von Papen showed him as very much mixed up indeed in tho passing round of money to fishy people for fishier services. .In the end Captain von Papen and Captain Bov-Ed were expelled from the United States, hut Dr. Albert left without, waiting for expulsion. Europe will be interested to see whether the Geheimrat Albert has unlearned the tricks he picked up in America—but no doubt he will not be so absentminded about portfolios in the tramcars this time.

Bandits are. robbing all the banks in America while the police are busy regulating the motor traffic.

More about Cannibal Gorge m the Nelson hinterland comes from “H.F., ’ wlw writes: “It is doubtful if the view presented by your informant is correct that Cannibal Gorge derived it-* name from a massacre perpetrated by Te Kxiuparahii on sonio South Island Maoris. That chief was too astute a person to penetrate so far inland into hostile country, with enemies to front and rear of him. * In 1868 tho Gieymouth Clu'ef Werita Tair.ui, known as Old Tainui, related that in the time of his father, Tuhuru, the West Coast was thickly peopled fronr the Buller to Okarito by the powerful tribe ot 'Ngati Waerenga, and in course of tune it camo to pass that being inspired with a thirst for glory, certain war parties crossed the mountains and made descents on the NgarTahu, residing at. Port Cooper, Lyttelton Harbour, and enioved the fruit of their conquest attei preparing the same in Maori ovens.

“The Ngai Tahu,” continues • •jj y ” “were not slow in returning the'attacks, and so an interchange of hostile visits was made with considerable losses on both sides. In the end the Ngai Tahu had the best ol.it, and resulted in the Ngati Viaerenga being practically wiped out, the great pa- at Ahaura taken with great slaughter, but a number of >nniates who escaped were overtaken at the gorwe, near Manna, where they weie killed and eaten, and for many a year the gorge was white with their bones, hence tie name q KoPi-o-kaitangata Cannibal Gorge. The of these raids is given in vol. 11l nte s An cient History of the Maori. 1 a detailed account of the banquet a Cannibal Gorge, but at the ,u “* cannot lay my hands on it, hut believe 1 s-mt a copy of it to Canon Nev ill, Dunedin, last year, for Possible jncoiporatmn in Ms book on New Zealand place names.”

What is probably the only piece of Roman workmanship still in; use> n Britain is a canal. During their ru in England the Romans cut the toss Dyke, in Lincolnshire, either for draui age or water supply, and, as wua. did the work so well that awwd years later it was possible to utilise it for a waterway connecting Tren and Witham. After remaining navigable for centuries, it was allowed o decav, but was restored to Perfect efficiency for boat traffic in 1840 at a cost of about £40,000.

“HP” writes: “In yesterday’s Dominion there was an interesting reto U.O K p.” who foiled native bush to make pas turage in the Rangitikei } his "as onlv sixty years ago. • sajs the pal a moli “and he was regarded as a madman.” There is some^ in « here, for 60 years ago would make the rear of this alleged first clearing 18b3, and long before .tins it had been proved that it was bv means an act of madness to fell the bush, for the sowing of grass seed—even in the Rangitikei. Why. away back n June 1842, the Kebbell brothers set up the first steam sawmill about seventeen miles from the mouth of the Afanawatu River so 'Xtabllshed as aS^iy S order to create aim a>- p aV jd doing What - nearly everyone else was doing at the time.” A woman is as old as she feels and how old she feels , d U’ en 4 s . on what, other people think of her looks. THE LYING COMPASS. If iov alone were gain, Test of all worth, and sorrow only loss, , Life were as homeless here as, on the main, . The wide wingwd ever wandering albatross; A fevered baffled quest Of what a lying compass feigns to fina, , A search for peace amid the waves unrest, For shelter in the bosom of the wind. But when assured at last No homo lies there we seek quite other shore, Our course shines clear and anchor *oon is cast Where neither wind nor wave need vex us more. —T. Thornely, in ,ih« London *’Dbserver? t