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Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 215, 10 September 1908, Page 2

The residents of a town in Taranaki .not very far from New Plymouth are having some amusement at the expense of a hotelkeeper in the place. This hotelkeeper came to New Zealand while very young, and is not v. rell acquainted with his relatives. A couple of weeks ago a stranger called at the hotel and inforjned mine host that he was his younger brother just out from England. The unsuspecting' rßoniface promptly took the stranger to his bosom (figuratively speaking), and gave him a right royal welcome. The stranger was very plausible. He had, h** said,^ brought several presents of valuable jewellery and curios for hU sister-in-law and niece, but some of bis baggage had gone astray. This still more endeared him to the family. He was introduced to all and sundry as "my brother , from England." With free board and lodging and the best of everything, he was enjoying himself immensely. But the local policeman recognised the stranger, and the hotelkeeper received a rude shock when he was iuformed that his "brother" was a well-known criminal, whose special line was false pretences. But the stranger had scented trouble, and had vanished.

The Timaru Post thus reports an extraordinary incident:—' 'An accident of a very serious nature is reported from Seadown, where a swagger,|who had been sleeping in a stack/ was badly burned about the head and body through his pipe having set fire to the straw about him while he slept. Early on. Friday morning the injured man went to Mrs .Hedley's homestead at Seadown to seek assistance. He was in a pitiable plight, his head having every vestige of hair burned off it, while his clothes were also nearly burned off him, and he had painful burns all over him. Mr Marshall, dentist, of Timaru, happened to be at Mrs Hedley's place at the time, and he attended to the man as well as he could. When examined the man was found to be seriously burned. A huge blister a foot long was formed oil the right side of his back, and another large one on the right chest. Bits of his hat were burned fast to the skin on the top of liis head, and his hands were greatly swollen. His trousers were also burned through. Mrs Hedley provided him with new clothes. Mr Marshall offered to take him to the Timaru Hospital in his car, but the man declined the offer, saying he would be. all right, and, in spite of all persuasion, declined to have anything more done for him."

Mr Richard Teece, general manager and actuary of the Australian Mutual Provident Society, tells the following story (the British Australasian says) of the first annuity granted by the society. The annuitant was a spinster of 54 years, who, carried into the Board-room on a stretcher in an apparently dying condition, quite touched the hearts of the directors, with the result that sh6 was granted an annuity of £45 a year for the sum of £300, which was all the money she possessed in the world. The annuity proved an./elixir of life, and for 36 years she appeared regularly every quarter-day at 10 o'clock sharp, before the office opened, to draw her cheque. Finally, she fell downstairs: and broke her thigh. From this accident, at the age of 90 years, she died, otherwise Mr Teece is confident she would be living yet.