Death of Fish.

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 61, 9 September 1937, Page 8

Death of Fish.

For some unknown reason dead snapper, kahawai, elephant fish, and stingray are being washed up on the south beach at Manawatu Heads. Some time ago flounders and river fish were killed in large numbers when flood waters discharged into the Manawatu River from the Main Drain, but in this instance the fish affected are all of the deep sea variety, says a correspondent of the "Manawatu Standard." Land and Wages. "The rates of wages in all occupations are not determined by the Court, but by the'price of land," says Mr. Justice O'Regan in the pronouncement of the Arbitration Court fixing the standard wage, "a fact which was well understood by Edward Gibbon I Wakefield when he proposed, as ah | essential feature of his scheme of colonisation, that a fictitious price should be placed on land 'to ensure a plentiful labour supply by preventing labourers from becoming land owners too soon.' It is not generally realised that the Wakefield plan, instead of being of historic interest merely, is actually in full operation in this country today." Big Bag of Shags. Having noticed many shags flying up the Ohau, wrote Mr. R. Webb, of Levin, to the Wellington Acclimatisation Society last night, he discovered their colony on top of a high ridge, very steep and with trees much smashed about by the wind. He climbed the ridge and killed eight with the shotgun and later gathered a few friends to revisit the spot. Five of them made a raid there last weekend with small rifles, which were more economical and more suitable than shotguns. "We had a great day," he wrote, "and were successful in shooting 147 shags, and'then many escaped. We shall have to make another raid later on. The shags contained trout, small eels, and carp from Lake Horowhenua. The shags were so numerous that some of the high dead trees looked just like plum trees loaded with fruit. We wished that the 2s bounty which applies in Rotorua ap-. plied here." The bag was verified, said Mr. C. E. Aldridge, by Ranger T. Andrews. - The writer, it was supposed, did not know that the Wellington Society had been.paying 2s per shag's stomach for some six months. Governor Hobson'g Death. Oh September 10, 1842, the death occurred of Governor Hobson. A Government Gazette Extraordinary was issued that morning with a black mourning frame announcing the fact, and also notifying the order to be observed in the official procession at the funeral three days later. This is an interesting document, and one is in the possession of a resident of Russell in the Bay of Islands. The document is all the more interesting in that it is probably the only New Zealand Government publication to depict a coffin as the central feature of a State announcement. In the announcement the titles of the high colonial dignitaries of the time are grouped round a representation of the coffin in the order in which they, were to follow the remains of New Zealand's first Lieutenant-Governor to Grafton Cemetery, in Auckland. The same Gazette also announced the clos- j ing of public offices until after the funeral, that is, for three days, but in 1842 the amount of business transacted was not as great as it is now.