MAIL NOTICES

Marlborough Express, Volume LIII, Issue 274, 21 November 1919, Page 4

MAIL NOTICES

SATURDAY, NOV. 22. ;■ Wellington, .Northern and Southern Offices: Per Pateena, at 3 p.m.

A' e-ood story was related at the Supreme Court at Palmersfcon North last week by Mr Justice Chapman during the hearing cf an appeal arising out of the- decision in a case previously heaird in Woodville in winch a dog had been run over and killed by a mc(tor-car. Counsel were wrestling verbally with the paint at issue as to whetjher tho driver had been guilty of negligence, when' his Honor intercepted. Many years ago, said his Honor, a case was heard before a magistrate in which a vehicle had «omo into contact with a cow on a narrow road on a hill abutting the .sea and had knocked the bovine into the water. The animal was drowne_d, and compensation claimed on the grounds of negligent driving. After hearing the evidence, the magistrate nonsuited f>he plaintiff, holding that the cow, having been on its wrong side of the road, wais gulty of contributory negligence. /

It is argued by a leading medical authority in England that bodily fatigue is more a matter of the brain and the spinal cord than of the it'uscles—that while one set of, cells in the brain become tired, the muscles were .not tired,, and would still work efficiently," 'provided they v. rere yoked to a new .set of cells. The' moral is that a variation in the monotony of a task may increase the whole output bf ;i factory. We submit, as a deduction from this, that overtime at routine work is a mistake, and that the weekly day <of rest cannot be. dispensed with, says the Dunedin Evening,, Star., In support of this proposition we cite a Dunedin experiment. Certain hands in a big establishment were put on the bonus system at hard manual work, the arrangement being that they received ]25.6 d per" day and extra for increased output. They speededup and.earned £1 per day of eight hours. Finding it "a good thing,' they asked to be allowed to work twelve hours per day, and the manager consented. They put their whole energy into the work," and at the end of three months were sible to earn only the £1 per day which they previously earned in the, eight hours. .