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Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 83, 6 January 1928, Page 5

With intense artificial light that rivalled sunshine, a Trench biologist has succeeded in growing three generations of beets in a single year. The powerful illumination caused the plants to go to seed more rapidly and the seed to germinate in far less time than usual.

Shorn of its winter mantle, tho Blue Crater Lake, on the north-east end o Tongariro, occupying ono ol the eight or nine craters of the mountin, is a circular amphitheatre ot grim volcanic rock, black and grey, witu sides slo I ,1 “° down to exquisitely-tinted blue waters (says the “Star”) The distance across the water from short to shore is about ouc-third of a mile and many Aucklander has been charmed in the past few weeks at the first sight ot the silent beauty. At GOCOft. above the sea. the snow and ice of winter were stili iun-nielted-two months ago, and trampeis who were in that part of the* National Park even a month ago had an aiduous and toilsome climb befoie they looked down upon tho great sloping sides of the basin-shaped crater.

A race which took place more Hian C4l years ago was recalled by ty° oldimers” as'they sat watching.the trottin” at ispsom (says the Auck land "Star”). Although one ot the pair had struck a winner, neither liked the modern style of trotting. In the old days, they said, men used tc ’ ide their horses, not drive them, bixty years ago there was a trotting race irom Hawera to Patea, a distance of 20 miles. The big bony animals ot those days were real "overlanders, possessed of great staying power, and the winner did the distance in record time. Competition was keen, because the pnities interested were a doctor and a military settler, each of whom sought, t go ’one better than the other One of the homes expired after completing the course, and his skeleton was found many years later, when a sandbank opposite the Patea Domain was being leveHP‘l to make a road to tlio Patea Heads. Tlie old scat behind the high fence in the Epsom trotting grounds, almost opposite tho Auckland Infirmary, has heard many such talcs as this.