NEWS OF THE DAY

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 56, 9 March 1929, Page 8

NEWS OF THE DAY

An Interesting Exhibit.

An interesting exhibit in the Southland Musouin is a glass case containing live ferns. For ten years these ferns have been growing in the case. They are mot embedded in soil, only a little moss being round their roots. Only occasionally are they watered. Nevertheless they are remarkably healthy and will soon overtop \ the case. A putaweta seed, which for many years must have been lying dormant amid the fern roots, has recently germinated and a, handsome littlo tree is growing up.

Flight to New Zealand,

The Auckland airman,. Me. Frank Mace, is expected to leave England on his attempt to fly to New, Zealand on 18th March." Ho will probably start from Southampton, states an Auckland message. Tho\flight from England has been promoted by •an Auckland ' commercial v aviation company, which sent Mr. Mace Home in December to secure an agency for a particular jmake of machine and to fly to New Zealand in a machine of the" type. "The flight has been subsidised by an oil .company,' which has laid down supplies of oil along the route. Mr. Mace will follow tho route.taken by Hiukler on his return journey to Australia. This will bo from Southampton via Vienna, Constantinople, Bagdad, Basra, Bushire, Bundar-Abbas, Karachi, Allahabad, 1 Calcutta, ' Akyab, Rangoon, Victoria Point, Penang, Singapore, Batavia, Surabaya; Kupang, Port Darwin', Sydney, Melbourne t Hobart. and Invercargill. Mr. Mase's flying experience covers over 800 hours in 40 different 1 types of , machines.

The Office Boy's Mistake. The traditional howlers of school boys could scarcely produce a better example of mistaken endeavour than that of a new office boy .employed by one of Auckland'a largest firms, telegraphs "The Post's" Auckland correspondent. For some days during ] this week the firm received numerous sharp letters from customers and agenfs throughout New, Zealand complaining that no answers had been received to correspondence,' and that business generally was being held up through the Auckland firm's failure to communicate -with them. . The office boy; declared j that all mail had been posted, by him 1 for at least ten days at the Central Post Office.' -Sensing tho inoxperienco of tho youth, tho manager asked to bo shown, exactly whore the firm's mail I was deposited. He was taken to, the I Post Office by. tho boy, who assured 1 him that the iettors hid been placed ! in a large white box on the footpath. This proved to bo the Mayoress's War I Memorial, Library collection box. The key was obtainod from tho Town Hall, , and upon it being opened hundreds of letters were found inside. Tho box was rapidly becoming full. It contained :,the mail anxiously being awaited all over the'country, and this was posted immediately in the correct place.

Value of Cawthron Institute. "It is very apposite to the subject wo aro discussing to draw your attention to ouo of New Zealand's most valuable assets, the Cawthron Instituto at Nelson," said Mr. Samp3on Handley, tho noted London surgeon, in an address ou cancer at tho Town Hall last night. "I bclievo that institute was founded by a hard-headed business man—a man who was also a generous patriot, who decided to leavo his fortune for his country's benefit. I understand that the Cawthron Institute has already rendered great service, and that your hopes of exterminating ragwort, blackberry, and gorse are largely centred upon its activities." Speed Limits. "Motorists aro at sixes and sevens so far as the speed limits are concerned,", declared Mr. A. J. Toogood, chairman of the, conference of North and South Island Motor Unions, when ' speaking on behalf of a deputation whioh-w'aited on the Minister of Transport (the Hon. W. A. Veitch) yesterday afternoon. "We don't know where we are," he said, "and I think I am right in saying that different,decisions are given on the subject. There are speed regulations, but we don't know whether these regulations over-ride the Acts and by-laws." Another point raised by Mr.- Toogood was the allocation of fines. At present theso were received by the local bodies, but tho motorists desired to suggest that they should be paid into the Highways Board funds, in order that they might be used for the improvement of 1' the roads' and in other directions. Tho Minister said- he would be pleased to refer the representations to tho Transport Board. Dispute That Ended in Poetry. An incident in which two men of science figured some forty years ago was recalled on Wednesday evening by Mr. G. Jobberns, in the course of a lecture in Christchurch' (states the "Lyt; telton Times"). , Ho gave a sketch" of a little dispute between Sir Julius yon Haast and another' eminent geologist, Mr. A. M'Kay. According to'this account, Sir Julius found Mr. M'Kay working in a |flas>mill > and employed him in- excavating 'or moa bones and reptilian remains at Waipara, North Canterbury. . Later, they worked together on a deposit of moa bones at Moa-bone Point, near Eedeliffs. M'Kay, having joined the staff of tho Geologicrl Survey'in Wellington, wrote a paper on the deposit that opposed yon Haast's view's. This so angered- yon Haast that he abused M'Kay soundly. Sir James Hector refused yon Haast's demand that M'Kay's ' paper should be suppressed from the "Transactions of the New Zealand Instituto." Tho controversy caused excitement amongst New Zealand scientists. • It got, into the newspapers, M'Kay writing' to them vigorous and biting replies to yon Haast's attacks.' Finally yon Haast took it to the Eoyal Society in England, and there, apparently, it ended, after MJKa'y had'used it as the'theme for a poem. Mr. Jobberns "spoke of M'Kay's remarkable talents and- his imaginative powers as a geologist, and said that yon Haast's action in taking him from the flaxmill and putting him on to geological work was ono of yon Haast's greatest contributions to the study ( of geology in New Zealand, .