NEWS OF THE DAY

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 97, 21 October 1936, Page 10

NEWS OF THE DAY

Napier Harbour. Revenue derived from the wharfage and harbourmaster's departments of the Napier Harbour Board during the past 18 months exceeded by £5273 the total for 1934-35, says the Napier "Daily Telegraph." The respective figures were £73,962 and £68,689. In 1933-34 and 1932-33 the figures respectively were £63,734 and £63,338. For the month of September the earnings totalled £4882, as against £5381 for the'same month of 1935, representing a decrease of £499. The Correct Time. The accuracy 'of the time told by Wellington's official clocks, and by the radio signals sent out, is statistically analysed in the annual report of the Dominion Observatory. Out of the 462 radio time signals sent out during the year, 441 were correct within a quarter of a second; 20 were between a quarter- and a half-second off the mark; while in one case a correction, between half a second and one second was necessary. The greatest errors in the clock on the Government Buildings were 31 seconds fast and 29 seconds slow, while the Post Office clock during the year was never more than six seconds fast or five seconds slow. > , Quality of Sole-leather. The wearing-value of what is worn on the feet affects everyone. The bootrepairer may naturally like having as much resoling to do as possible, but the wearer of boot leather prefers soles that don't need perpetual replacemen^. Hence the latter will be particularly interested in the leather research work which the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Is carrying on in this direction. The Department's annual report refers .to this work in the following paragraph:—<rDuring recent years many efforts have been made to correlate chemical analysis with the so-called quality of sole-leather. Quality in sole-leather as estimated at present is merely an expression of opinion, and no reasonably quick method exists of checking these opinions with actual performance in ordinary wear. Consequently the failure to correlate chemical analysis with varying opinions is not surprising. In addition, one important item of the official • chemical analysis—i.e., watersolubles—is based on an empirical test, which, owing to its nature, is unsatisfactory. The preliminary work on the true estimation of water-solubles has opened up a wide sphere of investigation which will,, it is hoped, throw some light on the functions of the water-soluble content of sole-leather in its relation to the essential quality— ie^r -^wearing JKahieJ 8