ALLEGED CHILD DESERTION.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 44, 20 August 1908, Page 8

ALLEGED CHILD DESERTION.

[BT THLSGEAPH. — KBXS3 JLSSOOIATJON.] WAifGaLNUI, 19tJi August. A woman named Mrs. Letitia Broad, a Dunedin resident, was arrested to-night, on. a charge of putting. a. child in a coalbox on Monday evening. It is alleged that Mrs. Broad left Duoedin on Saturday with her adopted child, and .came straight to Wanganui, depositing the infant where it was found. She will appear before the court in the morning.

The local hon. secretary of the Navy League takes exception to yesterday's comments on the Fortnightly article on "The British Reply to Germany's Dreadnoughts." It is explained that the author's strictures were- intended not for the Navy League proper but for the section of extremists who recently seceded' from tho league. This secession was owing to the fact that the» large majority of the committee, including several retired naval officers of standing, discountenanced any panic agitation, and refused to set themselves up as critics of the Admiralty experts. From a perusal of recent numbers of the league's monthly journal, it is clearly admittedthat the decisions of the Admiralty in matters of national strategy must be accepted. On the other hand, however, it is contended that a strong force of public opinion, is necessary to back, up the Admiralty in its recommendations ip the Cabinet and to counteract the growing influence of the "Little Navy" ' group in th© House of Commons. As a record of their prowess in the football field the Petone Club desire that the five certificates of the five championships the club won last year should be framed and placed in the Municipal Buildings at Petone, where it will be a memorial for after generations. The Wellington Rugby Union, had the matter placed before it last night, and it was decided that the union would meet the cost of framing the photographs. Passengers by the Oswestry Grange, due in New Zealand from Home, via Australian ports, in a few days, are fairly representative of industrial occupations. They include ten engineers (five for Wellington), one evangelist, one barman, two leather-workers, four clerks, one preacher, one electrician, one gas inspector, one watchmaker, seven domestis servants (four for Wei-, lington), one surveyor, four steelworkers, one tailor, one engraver, two jcurriers, thirteen farmers and six , farm labourers, two housekeepers, one booksellers, seven joiners and two carpenters, two plumbers, seven miners,' one minter, two coopers, and several labourers. In all forty-six of the passengers come to (Wellington, some .with the option of proceeding to Napier or Wanganui. Complaint is made by workmen in the Government Printing ' Office that, the building is too small to healthily ac-f commodate the numbers''6f men who are called upon to work in it. It was confidently anticipated that money for enlarging it would have been placed upon the Estimates, but the anticipations were not realised. Quite apart from the most important aspect of health, there is the further drawback that the business of the office is incommoded through insufficiency of room, and.it is stated that owing to inability to find, space for installation of extra machinery, the staffs are kept working almost night and day, which entails a substantial extra expenditure of money through overtime rates having to bepaid instead of ordinary rates. One of the -party who travelled by the' train from Auckland to Wellington -on Tuesday took careful note of the duration of the various stops. There were nineteen in all, ranging from five to 45 minutes, and the stoppages totalled 3hr. 56min. As the total time occupied on the journey was 19J hours, it appearsthat the distance was covered in just< under 16 hours. The death is reported of Mr. F. M. Wallace, well known in musical circles, especially in Christcbnrch, where he* was for some time conductor of the* 'Jbiedertafel. Deceased, who was born in 1852, had not enjoyed the best of health for some years, and was living with his son. at Wanganui,