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Evening Star, Issue 20321, 1 November 1929, Page 8

Iti is estimated that the apple export from Hawke’s Bay for the 1930 season is 200,000 cases against 150,000 last season. The export of pears is estimated at 50,000, _ compared with 36.000 last year.—Hastings Press Association telegram. Weighty and broad concrete foundations have been laid for the stores, the, last of the new buildings under the Hillside railway -workshops reconstruction scheme. The concrete had to be strong, because no piles are used. The site is on the Cargill road frontage. The building is to have a steel frame, tho same as the other new buildings, and it is to be of two stories. Probably this structure will bo'up in January. No time is to be lost in then removing the old fence or as much of it as remains, so as to enlarge Cargill road at that point to the chain width that it is at all other parts. It is noted by passers-by that trade advertisements are now appearing on this frontage of the new workshops. The Disabled Soldiers’ Employment Commission, which commenced its sittings in Dunedin last Friday, expects to finish this afternoon, and The members (Mr J. S. Barton, S.M., Sir John Luke, and Mi; S. J. Harrison) will leave for Wellington to-morrow morning. There expert departmental evidence will be heard, and the commission will then go on to Auckland, opening its sittings there on November 12.

“New York must now be one of tho wettest places in the world,” said a famous New Zealander to-day, on his return from a trip to the United States. “ There are reported to be 32.000 speakeasies in the metropolitan area alone.” Producing a neat card from his pocket, he said: “1 am a member of the Forty-fourth Street Press Club—an excellent speakeasy, where a whisky costs_ 75 cents. There is not the slightest difficulty in obtaining drink if it is desired, and quite a lot of it is good liquor. On the west coast and in the Southern States, however, it ia often very difficult. There is a complete organisation throughout the United States which provides that, as a parting gift to friends who are sailing for Europe, you can, by telegraph through any office, arrange that as soon as the ship is outside the terri torial waters your friends will be served with a bottle of champagne. The prin cipal discernible effect of Prohibition in America is the fact that the technique of drinking has vanished. Alcohol is gulped down, and one afternoon—a Sunday—l visited the home of some excellent people, and at 4 o’clock, when _ any ordinary family would he drinking afternoon tea, I was given a drink. The drink that I was expected to consume was brandy, neat!_ That seems a common experience in the United States. Drinking has not ceased, it lias become crude in form.”— Wellington correspondent. How long the supply of whales will last in the Antarctic is a problem which did not trouble the whalers who left Port Chalmers yesterday for Ross Sea. Their only concern was how many months it would take the “mother ship ” to fill up this summer. But the departure of the whalers did not finalise conjecture as to how long tho supply of whales would last. An old sailor, with a turn for figuring out things, made an attempt to solve the supply problem on the basis of figures which lie seemed to regard as reliable in the computing of his statistical deductions. Jt took forty sailing-ship whalers (he said), at the rate of twenty whales each a year, nearly a hundred years to clean out the Arctic. Now, about tho Antarctic, every ship will take from 700 to 750 whales each a year, or a yearly total of 9,000 to 10.000 whales. That total would have cleaned out the Arctic in ten years. How long will it take to clean out the Antarctic? “I don’t know,” replied the reporter

At the recent meeting of the Anglican Svnod the agenda was a particularly fieavy one, nevertheless time was found to receive a deputation from the Dunedin branch of the League of Nations Union, when the chairman (Rev. H. E. Bellhouse) and Dr Merrington were the speakers. Later during the session on social questions the following resolution was passed:—“The Synod considers the work of the League of Nations to be of paramount importance, and recommends that the clergy bring the various activities of the League more ' prominently before their parishioners.”

At the invitation of Mr Clitheroe, director of music, Mr Scott Colville, of the Westminster Glee Singers, had an opportunity of hearing the choir of the Teachers’ Training College. In thanking Mr Clitheroe and the members of the choir, he expressed the opinion that he had just listened to some ot the finest choral singing he had ever heard in New Zealand, and prophesied that batches of young teachers with a love for and a thorough knowledge of, good vocal music, when they had received school appointments, would make for gieat advancement in school music, and would inculcate in the minds and souls of their pupils a love for the .beautiful in music which would hare a lifelong influence for their good. It has been arranged that Mr Edward Branscombe, director of the Westminster Glee Singers, and one of the greatest living authorities on choral singing, will hear the choir and give an address on vocal art.

Mi' Forbes informed the House of Representatives last night that the following telegram had been received by the Prime Minister from the High Commissioner for New Zealand in London: “1 have viewed at the London Museum to-day a collection of contempcrary mezzotint portraits pf Prime Ministers of Great Britain from Walpole to the present day, which Mr Errest Makower, chairman of Makower, M'Beath, and Company, Limited, New Zealand, lias assembled, and is giving to the House of Representatives. Ibis collection is identical with those he has giver to the London Museum and the House of Parliament at Canberra, Australia, and is now slowly accumulating for Ottawa and Cape Town. I propose to forward the collection forthwith and cannot speak in high enough terms of its interest and beauty, it will form a most valuable (permanent addition to the amenities of the House.”

At a meeting of the Otago Lahmir Representation Committee last evening a matter discussed was in regard to boys making application to enter the Public Service having first to sign a Form agreeing to obey the Military Service Act as a condition of receiving employment. It was claimed that the Government was exceeding its legal status as an employer, am! that if it could do this then private employers eon’ also make a similar condition. Clm .oretarV was instructed to write the National Executive and also the Parliamentary Labour Baity asking whether the Government was _ acting legally in making such a condition of employment. The executive was also instructed to present a report to the next meeting in regard to making preparations for the next election's.

Tho Mayor of Dunedin (Mr R. S. Black) is officially advised that their Excellencies Sir Charles Fergusson and Lady Alice Fergusson will come to Dunedin for their final visit on the morning of December 12 by the express from Invercargill. ITv? host Office advises that the Tahiti left Sydney yesterday for Wellington with sixteen hags of mails and thirty-three parcel receptacles for Dunedin. The mail should reach here on Tuesday afternoon. The big flood in Dunedin this year was in March. From then till yesterday the clearing up of the Leith bed has been an important work. _Mr Malcolm Stevenson’s men took his horses home last night, having finished the job as far as it is to be carried in the meantime. Tho stone-lifting and the straightening and related jobs have been tackled to a point well up the Valley, almost to tho schoolhouse. The clearance all the way from the Woodhaugh bridge is not and does not pretend to be as thorough as it could be if a Brobdingnagian array _ had been enlisted, maintained by a mint. Some small stretches of the stream that are in passable order have been left for the present. But the undertaking has been prosecuted as ably as possible with tho means at command, and the improvement will certainly reduce danger. Enormous masses of stone are stacked at various points of the road, and from these the corporation staff is now crushing street-forming metal of a high grade.

Those of our citizens who are already thinking out holiday plans will be interested in the fact that the issuing of railway excursion tickets is fixed to begin on December 13. The Dunedin Corporation has completed the surfacing of the ramp approaches to tho railway overbridge between Frederick and Hanover streets, and tho work of kerbing and channelling is now going on. These operations are being paid for by tho Railw.ay Department. When they are quite finished the railway engineering staff will put up tho necessary fencing—not a big job—and then tho traffic will he allowed to stream aver.

Throe judgments for plaintiffs by default were given by Mr J. W. Watson, J.P., and Mr N. Dodds, J.P., at the Port Chalmers Court to-day. The cases were; Thomson Scott v. J. L. Lewis, wages, £4 4s, with costs (255); Walter Morgan, Ltd. v. Edgar H. Cleverley, account stated, £l9 Is 1, with costs (58s) ; Mr Clemison v. Harold T. Folley, rent, £ll 14s, with costs (545).

A week ago to-day the Weir-chartered steamer Lawbeath arrived at Port Chalmers, with a large quantity of phosphates. 'The waterside workers refused to work the cargo, which is consequently still in the vessel’s holds The watersiders decline to discuss the position with the captain or agents, and decline even to state that the ship is held up from union headquarters in Wellington Mr H. M'Kay (secretary of the Otago Aero Club) has received a telegram from Captain White stating that in his Simmonds-Spartan aeroplane he made a record flight to Christchurch yesterday afternoon. Ho left hero at 2.30, and, after a good trip, landed at his destination two hours and twenty minutes later. Captain White’s plan at the moment was to leave for Wellington this morning. It was unfortunate that tht southerly gale of yesterday should have upset any joy-rid-ing programme that had been arranged. Although the conditions were not° such as to prevent experienced air men from flying it was considered inadvisable to give passengers a bad first impression of a flight by taking them up and exposing them to all the discomforts of “bumping.” According to the original programme, Captain White war to have taken Mr M'Kay tc Pembroke, and no doubt some disappointment will be felt among those who had gone to the trouble of preparing a landing place in that district. However, the labour will not have been in vain, for Captain White will return to for the next race meeting, and during his stay a visit to Pembroke will be made. The Director of Air Services, Wingcommander Grant-Dalton, yesterday inspected the Marlborough Aero Club’s plant and both aerodromes. Advantage was taken of his visit to put two further trainees up for their tickets. Those were R. N. Linton, of Seddon, and A. E. Cloliston, of Westport, both being successful. The commander flew back to Wellington in a service Moth. —Press Association telegram.

The steamer Ruapehu advises that on October 30 in latitude 45.06 south and 171.39 east she passed a large tree trunk 30ft long. It was waterlogged, and covered with barnacles, and is dangerous to navigation.—Wellington Press Association telegram.

Your eyes are Nature’s most precious ~,,'t Take care of them Consult W V Stunner, optician. 2 Octagon. Dunedin - r.\dvt.]

Novelty is the keynote of a dance to be held at Macandrew’s Bay, in aid of funds for local improvement, on November 5, Guy Fawkes’ night. At midnight the masked dancers will assemb’e on the foreshore, and there burn the effigy of the celebrated Guv of powder-plot fame. A Guy Fawkes’ dance is an unusual entertainment.

The result of the art union organised by the Otago Ladies’ Hockey Association, which was drawn last night, appears in this issue. '