LOCAL AND GENERAL

Feilding Star, Volume 8, Issue 2399, 8 April 1931, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

The Prime Minister’s earthquake relief list now exceeds £300,000. Randolph Rose, New -Zealand’s distance runner, is to be married this month. Rata school children donated £(. 18s iod out of prize money to the earthquake relief fund. As a result of the absence of autumn frosts the tomato crop in Central Otago is very heavy ibis year and the markets are glutted. Two parties of deer stalkers have already arrived at Stewart Island, though it is early yet for the roaring season. Roaring should he in full swing in about 10 days’ time. The increase in the price, of wool seems 10 be the most definite thing that has happened in Australia during the past 12 months. Nothing could be more cheering, nothing more opportune. “I have no hesitation in saying that a great many of the Government insj>ectors are a luxury which we cannot afford.” said Mr Norton Francis at a meeting of the junior Reform l.eague in Christchurch. Eugene O’Neill, of New York author of “Strange Interlude,” the nine-act play still running in London, is planning another play, the performance of which will occupy' three successive nights. In order to attract more tourists to Italy the National Fascist Federation of Commerce has announced an attractive reduction of 10 per cent, in all hotel rooms, and meals. The rate will be in effect during this year. The Railway Zeppelin train has made its appearance in Berlin. It runs on rails like an ordinary train, but is moved by a propeller like an airplane. Speeds of nearly mo mie> a,n hour have been reached in this streamlined car. The propeller is affixed in the rear and is a “pusher” type. Several Morrinsville gardeners have grown, exceptionally large potatoes, recently. One, a perfectlyshaped specimen of the Dakota Red variety, weighs ilb qoz., and others 2lb exactly and ilb 1402. Another resident dug up a root bearing 15 potatoes, all of them larger than a teacup. The oldest member of the South Canterbury' branch of the Canterbury' Aero Club, Mr Michael Carney', of Alford Forest, recently celebrated his 82nd birthday. Mr Carney is very keen on aviation, and made a. flight at Washdyke, Timaru, recently with Captain J. C. Mercer. New Zealanders, who were in the ‘‘Tenth Crusade” and passed a strenuous summer in 1918 in the notorious Jordan Valley will be interested to know that the waters of the sacred river have been harnessed and now generate thousands f horse-power, and the whole of Northern Palestine, with the exception of Jerusalem,• is now able *.r> light up with electricity instead of candles and oil lamps. A Christchurch motorist who made the journey to Timn.ru during the week-end saw many men carrying' their swags. Some of those walking from place to place looking for work were of a distinctly different type from ihe usual swagger. ,Several of them were young men, and in two cases golf clubs protruded from the bundle of clothes and sleeping gear the yonng swaggers carried. Numerous small flocks of swan have been lately noticed crossing Foveaux Strait on their way to the head of Paterson’s Inlet. Each eyar, usually in April, swans congregate in the upper reaches of the Inlet evidently preparing to escape the shooting- season, on the maniland. They have a natural sanctuary therb, ?as the shallow waters prevent boats approaching close enough to be ni gunshot range. During the to years the dredge of the Rimu 'Company has been operating near Hokitika it has worked an area of 230 acres on Rimu Flat, representing 15,502,359 cubic ardsy of gravel, which has yielded a total return of ,£440,630. The dredge is about tex he replaced by' a more modern one. The value of dredging to a district may be judged by the fact that in the 10 years about £350,000 has been expended in wages and other working costc.