LOCAL AND PERSONAL

Hawera Star, Volume L, 29 July 1930, Page 9

LOCAL AND PERSONAL

The death is reported from Auckland of Captain Charles .12. Hood: aged 72, a, marine surveyor and formerly harbourmaster at New Plymouth. At the first meeting of the board of directors ror 1930-31 of the Normanby Dairy Factory Co., Ltd., Mr. F. IV. Atkins was re-elected chairman and Mr. A. Thrush deputy-chairman. At the New Plymouth Supreme Court this morning, Mr. Justice Blair and Mr. J. L. C. Merton, president of the Law Society, paid tributes to the late Sir Robert Stout, and Bench and Bar stood for a period in silence as a tribute to the former Chief .Justice.

At the annual meeting of the Normanby Co-op Dairy Company to-day, the chairman expressed the regret felt by all at the death of Mr. R. H. Clement, an old and valued shareholder. A vote of condolence was passed with his family and relatives, all present standing in silence out of respect to his memory.

The action of a Wanganui garage proprietor in advising the: police when a drunken motor driver •arrived ait. Ins garage, was the subject of comment at a. recent'.sitting of the Wanganui Magistrate’s 'Court. Both the 'senior sergeant and the magistrate commended the proprietor’® action. The magistrate added that, if the driver had been allowed. he might- ha ve driven away on one o>f the more difficult road's of the district.

A lawyer who was optimistic enough co apply recently for ,;u refund of f ei6 ® paid into the Auckland Supreme Court did not meet with success. He, had taken steps to have a company declared bankrupt, but was able to report that the debt, had been paid, in fwL He asked Mr Justice Smith to make an order or a recommendation that the filing fee of £6 should be refunded to the petitioning creditor. “I do not know that I can do that,” replied His Honour. “But the petition has not been gone on with,” urged counsel. "No.” said His Honour, “but the petition is on the file and it lias had very satisfactory results apparently.” A smile went round the court. The discovery of a length of 200 ft. if plaited flax rope, such a® was used by the Maoris bcioro the coming o± the white man, at the spot near Wairoa where a moa skeleton was found recently, has caused considerable interest,/ The rope is very old, but, of course, was not contemporaneous with the moa. There are all sorts of conjectures as to what is was used for. Probably it was left there by an exploring party, or else was used as a means of escape for some hard-pressed tribesman in the Maori War.