LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLIII, Issue XLIII, 4 January 1924, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A resident of Mangaore, Hear Mangahao, who motered in to Shannon on Christmas Eve, discovered on arrival (relates the Manawatu Evening Standard) two of his prize chicks perched on the rear axle oi: his car. / "It is purely a North Island inven-; tion. I don't care who knows it. It; is simply for the purpose of getting new roads for the North Island." —This, comment upon the Main Highways Act! was made by a member of the Ashburton County Council. : 1 Yesterday a "Wanganui farmer expressed the opinion that Californkn j quail were becoming such a. nuisance: in some parts of the back country that! it would be necessary to get them put in the same category as rabbits and shot at all times of the year. He said that the grass sowing season was fairly close at hand, and farmers had enough to contend with without quail eating all the seed. —Chronicle^ Bathers who were preparing for an aftern&on dip in the sea at the Waingongoro beach yesterday afternoon deemed it wise to forego their expected enjoyment when they saw a 6ft. shark laaily swimming in, the breakers between the beach and what is commonly known as "the lagoon." The deaiizen of the deep was plainly seen at intervals, and came within 12ft. of the shore. The spectacle of a man in an intoxicated condition urging people to keep to the left was witnessed in Willis street, Wellington, on« Christmas Eve (says the Times). The drunken one was walking unsteadily on the white line in the middle of the footpath, and pointing out triumphantly to passers-by that "he was keeping to the left, and they should do the same." "There were a fine lot of young fellows coming out on the kemuera," remarked Mr A. JRawson, who was a passenger to the Dominion by that boat, to a Levin Chronicle reDorter on Saturday. "Judging from " them I should say New Zealand was getting some of the cream of Britain's young men. They were some of those who say to themselves that the conditions at Home are not good enough, and get out of it, while the other sort who j have not their enterprise and courage ' stay at home and grumble at things as they are." ''There is not a' private hotel in Oamaru, and I don't believe there is one in New Zealand that can - l;e run on its own and be made: to oay,"' said Mr W. Jones at a sitting of the Conciliation Council in Oamaru. -'Then they must be living on their losses/ stated a union official. "No," replied Mr Jones, "they only live because the employers do about twice: the work that is done by any of their employees."

Writing on the subject of proper farming, the Taranaki Herald gives some sound advice to farmers. Inter alia the Herald says: "The slump will have had one good effect if it persuades farmers in Taranaki that they must l«ok for profit to the nroducts of their land rather than to its sale. Land is not likely to keep rising in price as it did in the past, and therefore it will not be possible to make easy money by constant buying and selling. The moral is that farmers should hold their land and strive to make their-money by improving it so as to" make it produce more. Even in the old days many who sold well found it very difficult to find a new place to suit them, and wasted much time and money in endeavouring to do so. Today the risk of loss is greater. The wise man on the land farms it, and does not use it as a means.for speculation." .

A terrifying experience befel two Petersham (Sydney) girls recently. Ihey alleged that they were taken out to a bush area in a motor car, which at times speeded through the streets at nearly 60 miles an hour, and on arrival there were attacked by the driver. The two girls, whoi-are sisters, one aged 17 and the other 20, told the police that they arrived in Sydney from Manly on Sunday night too late to catch a tram home. A man approached them, and offered to drive them to Petersham. The girls consented; but instead of going towards Petersham the man rushed his car to Tom Ugly's Point, and pulled up near some scrub. The man attacked the girls time after time, it is alleged, and they were roughly handled. They were rescued by a motor cyclist and a man in a cart, and taken to their home. Detective-Ser-geants Saddler and Kennedy and Detectives A. E. Jones and Watkins made enquiries into the case, and traced a motor car to Katoomba, where an arrest was made.

A Waverley resident has an ingenious idea which he intends putting into operation shortly to assist him when schnapper fishing (says the Press). Briefly, the idea is to wade out at low tide and sink an iron standard in the sand with a pulley attached to it. Through the pulley there will run an endless line, which will be manipulated from the shore. Hooks will be attached to the line, and by pulling on one portion the hooks will be carried out as near the pulley as the angler wishes. By pulling on another portion of the line the hooks can be brought back to the shore and rebaited, afterwards being pulled out again, the object being, of course, to save throwing the line out every time the hooks are baited. Whether the gadget will work remains to be seen. j

The system of Bible reading, introduced in the Cashmere Hills public school a week or so before the school holiday began, was found to work smoothly (says the Christchurch Press) It will be recalled that the parents were circularised by the school committee and were asked to indicate whether they approved of, or objected to, the proposal. The response was practically a unanimous approval, only three objections being received in respect of a total roll of 170. The religious exercises take place after school and last for ten or fifteen minutes, the head teacher, Mr N. W. Pavitt, taking one class, and the assistant, Mrs JSTewnham, taking another. Both teachers are in sympathy with the scheme, and it is claimed that the fact that the teachers take the religious part of the school work makes it more effective than if outsiders came in and took it. The religious exercises consist of repeating the Lord's Prayer, the singing of a hymn, and the reading of a portion of the Bible. The pupils are encouraged to bring their own copies of the Holy Scriptures, but to those who do not do so a copy of the Queensland fecnpture Lesson Book is lent. This publication consists of selected portions of Scripture and is used by the teachers.

"Had accused any liquor on him' when arrested?" asked Mr. J. W. Poynton, S.M., Auckland, at the Police Court. "No, your Worship," was the quick reply of Senior-Sergeant Rawle, "he had it inside him. 1' Mr. P. A, de la Perrelle, M.P., when dealing with afforestation in ;an address the other night at Bluff, saad that if all the waste lands in the Dominion were planted with ttrees, in 50 years' time the revenue received would be ±o liqudate our national debt. Two huntsmen in York County came upon two big buck deer with antlers interlocked, one of the animals being. ■■ dead. An inspection revealed that the! dead one had sustained a broken neck during an encounter with the successful combatant. Unable .to *scap& from the antlers of his dead opponent, however, the winner of the duel fell" a prey to the huntsmen. From all appearances the two animals had been locked together a good while. Here is a characteristic piece -of Leverhulmian. wisdom (says the Dominion) : —"Bolshevism is only an old thing under a near name. In other days we had highwaymen and pirates. To-day we have Bolsheviki. But it is all the same thing. Their principles are the same. We will always have with us the man who wants to overturn society and get on top himself without working for his reward." Several private dairy firms in Aucklanu intend to adopt Wellington's system of delivering iniik in bottles, and a special agreement has been made between these firms and the Dairymen's Union to provide for a ' variation in wages where 50 per cent or more of the vmiik is delivered in bottles. In that case the delivery men will be paid £4 10s per week for 48 hours' work, but where the quantity bottled is less than 50 per cent the present award rates will hold. The Union Company's large passenger steamer Maheno is. to be put into commission this week after being laid up for- a year and nine months. The vessel's prolonged idleness was the outcome of trouble with the firemen which started at Auckland in the beginning of March, 1922, ov«r the discharge of a fireman. She lay at anchor in Sydney harbour for eighteen months. Early in September of 1923 it was decided to -recommission her and she was dispatched to Wellington for overhaul. This has been completed and she will resume- running in the inter-colonial service on Friday, when she will leave Wellington for Sydney in place of the Manuka, which is to be laid up for overhaul. Somebody made a very bad start for the year 1924. At the Kai Iwi bathing sheds on New Year's Day a collection box had been placed conveniently, inviting contributions towards the cost of construction. In the evening (states the Wanganui Chronicle), wnen thebox was sent for the contents could not be fount), for some person had broken into it and taken all the money placed therein. On Sunday last the box had also been put into position inviting donations, but despite the fact that hundreds of bathers use the sheds, the box held only 2s 8d when opened— one half-crown and two pennies. "I would like to shake hands with the man who donated the Salt-crown,'; was the earnest comment of a member of the gala committee..

A visitor to Stratford, who was a member of a fishing party that left town on Thursady morning, finds in an incident that befel him subject matter for a homily on the honesty of Stratfordians. relates the Post. At the corner of the street he placed his bag, containing fishing tackle and lunch, on the footapth against a telegraph pole, in order to light his cigarette and then absent-mindedly stepped into the motor, leaving his bag behind. The tackle was valuable, and during the day he worried over the loss, and was not reassured even by the emphatic as. sertions of the local, residents among the party—"lt'll be there when you get back!" So it was, right up against the hotel; no one had touched it! The visitor swears he will be a walking advertisement in Auckland for Stratford and its people for life.

Says the writer of "Passing Notes" m the Otago Daily Times: "Lord Leverhulme, a millionaire in a small ! way (compared with Ford), who has I made his millions out of soan, as Ford j has out of cars, writes in "a London ) paper: "The Fords of the world have the pleasure and thrill of accomplishment, the joy of winning. The money profits are matters of the least conoern to them.' When I first visited Australia in 1892 there was then living m New South Wales one of the earliest Australian squatters, named lyson, well over 90 years of age. He was a multi-millionaire in money, cattle, sheep and land, yet lived the same simple life he had lived as a shepherd m England as a young man. He was asked why he worked on when he had so much of this world's wealth, and he replied: 'It is not money I work for, but I've put cattle where tw Tr 6 n° cattle 5 rye Put sheep where there were no sheep; I've put houses where there were *no houles ESi 1 t pUt hlte men and «-omenTn land where there never were white men and women before and mad? them happy, and that is worth work ing for, and not the money 'Yet all over Australia I heard him described as an avaricious old miser And the Australian Socialist would gibbet him as that odious thing a bloated cap^Twt, the enemy of the human race ''

A correspondent of the New Zealand Petition in dairy production, says: suited for dairy farming. This is- a question that has not received any at! tention from any writers that I hay* seen Everybody knows of the wonderful dairy herds that have W evolved during the past two genera* Sven°; «,' but no«nt appears to have given a thought to the fact that the people who milk cows require, in their way, to be just as wonderful. People who can milk cows every day of the vT kYZS ar in and W out, leavSg: very little or no time for recreation, and receive by way of remuneration something less than a labourer's wa^e require to be evolved, just as much "as the dairy cow, and the people of the Argentine are very far removed from this ideal. No, sir, the man who maKes a success of dairying fs the man who milks his own cows and attends to all their wants personally. That is just what will prevent the Argentine Republic, magnificent as the country is. ever competing to a great extent in dairy produce. The people are a pleasure-loving crowd, mostly of Latin descent, and the drudgery of cow farming would be quite unthinkable to even the labouring class, and, as for the maa with sufficient capital to obtain and stock a farm, and then do the work himself, why T guess be would turn cold even to think of it."

A special meeting of the Hawora j bounty Council wilt be held on Satur- ' lay, January 12, a»t 12 noon, to fix the' iay of th« week on which the halfaoliday will be observed. | Hawera has contained an extremely tt-derly community during the Christmas and New Year holidays, the only local case brought before' the court being that of a first offending inebriate, j One or two motorists were rather concerned yesterday afternoon -when on driving along the upper end of High street they found themselves enveloped ixl a swarm of bees. No one was stung, however, and the bees continued on their way in the direction oi some old buildings. i 7 Now that the Christmas and New Year rush of shopping is over tradesmen in Hawera are exoeriencing a' iairly quiet time. As one tradesman put it, "We have done three weeks' business m one week, and the volume of trade is now evening itself out." Our^ Manaia correspondent writes that the residence of Mr R. "Walker farmer, Rama Road, Kaupokcmui,- was burnt to the ground on Christmas Lye nothing being saved. Mr Walker has suffered a great loss. The ympathy of the citizens] are extended to Mr and Mrs Walker in their misfortune. i At the Wanganui Courthouse on Wednesday an inquest was held concerning the death of Mr Clarence Humphrey and his little daughter, who were killed at Kai Iwi beach. A verdict of accidental death was returned, no blame being attachable to anyone. The jury added a rider that the Marine Department be asked to erect notice boards warning the public of the danger of standing underneath the cuffs. j Mrs. Belloc Lowndes, speaking at a recent dinner of the Readers' Pensions Committee in London, said the chief link between literature and journalism was ..literary style, the possession of which made journalism into literature, though it did not make literature into journalism. Whatever might have , been the case in the past, in the English newspaper office of to-day the editor at any rate was very well aware that "style was the man," and he eagerly cherished any new contributor whose work impressed him as having that mysterious quality which they were agreed to call style. Journalese was rarer to-day than, ever it was. The journalist of to-day, working at high pressure, produced often passages of fine, simple, vigorous prose. • There was a closer connection between the press and literature than was ever the case before, at any rate in England. American achaeologists, who are digging in the valley of the Ohio Eiver, have treasures and artistic remains that are claimed to rival those •of "the Valley of the Kings" in Egypt. The excavators declare that their discoveries prove that native American art in 1000 B.C. was superior to that of Egypt during the same period. Beautifully carved pipes, shaped from the hardeßt of stones, are amongst the objects extracted from the Indian burial mounds. A large gold nugget, which had been hammered into the shape of an eagle, was also- discovered. Tutankhamen's subjects used to. sleep on wood, but the original American natives had luxurious beds, made with fabrics woven from long, tough grasses. The only point in which the old Egyptians could be said to be superior to the Indians was in their knowledge of writing, which the latter race never Seems to Yiaye developed. These latest discoveris, and those made some time ago in Yucatan, go to prove that the ancient races of what we misname the New World were quite as civilised as those of the Old World.