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Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 11, 7 October 1927, Page 3

In many American industries weekly wages run very high. Iu making men’s clothing there is an average of £8 Jtls.; for blowers in blast furnaces. £lO 10s.; railroads (train and engine staffs!, £9 10s.; and anthracite miners, £'J.

Galloping daintily, uitli his back arched like a greyhound, a stoat was teen making his way with speed across the concrete highway and tram tracks at Onehunga the other afternoon (says the Auckland "Star”). Evading the busv motor traffic, .ho reached his destination, which was* a building , evidently served as a favourite haunt ot rats, weasels aud other species. Ihe stoat is not the fierce carnivora that tho weasel is said to be, but has one objectionable habit in surrounding himself with a fetid smell whenever irritated. lie attacks hares, labbits, game birds, aud has a particular liking tor fowls, a fact which is of more than passing interest to poultry keepers in the Mangere and Onehunga districts.

About a year ago the old overflow «eir at the western end of Lake Coleridge was undermined, and not being strong enough to meet the pressure of the water, gave way (says the Christchurch “Sun”). Since then the lake has been kept up fo within s-ix inches of its former normal level with a bank of sand-bags, which, (hough they lack the appearance of security, seem to hava done tlieir work quite well. Now,, however, a new weir, outside tho old ono and with considerably deeper foundations. is to be constructed. An engineer has been on the spot for two or three weeks and preliminary' work has been done. The new weir will have flapwings, to prevent the water from scouring out at the ends, and its completion will mean that the waters of the lake will again rise the six inches which was lost when tbo old weir broke.

The kowhai, perhaps the prettiest ot New Zealand’s bush flora, popularly supposed to bring rain in its wake, is in full blossom in various parts of Central and Southern Hawke's Bay (stales the “Telegraph”). The yellow blossoms contain a larger percentage of honey than most of their kind and a party of motorists. who called it* halt in tho shadow of a patch of bush, skirting the roadside, in the vicinity of Dannevirke, on a recent afternoon, were rewarded with tho sight of a tui. perched on the branch of a kowhai tree, busily engaged in extracting the honey from the bell-shaped blossoms.

Ono hundred and forty-two new accounts have been opened in the Dunedin Savings Bank head office since the move to ihe new chambers in .Dowling Street a fortnight ago, an average of ten per day (states the “Star”). It is pleasing to have such a further assurance as to tho thriffiuoss that is a help towards independence in old ago. A lar-e proportion of the depositors m this bank aro not financiers, but persons who have smallish incomes, and are ondeaycuring to build up to the £260 which is the niaxinumi of an individual deposit in this inititutioar.