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Manawatu Standard, Volume XLV, Issue 289, 10 November 1925, Page 6

Since the introduction of the new motor regulations the Kairanga County Council has issued 689 motor licenses, the fees therefrom being £172 ss. A consignment of sixty Californian quail is being sent to England from the Dominion. The birds are being sent at the request of the High Commissioner for acclimatisation in the Old Country. A Christchurch telegram states that in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday Alfred Collins Bateman was fined £lO and had his driver’s license suspended till March 31 for being intoxicated while in charge of a motor-car. A Mastertan telegram states that “Fairview Lodge,” a two-storied boarding house containing over 20 rooms, owned and occupied by Mr F. Bacon, was gutted by fire early this morning. Practically nothing was saved. Among the names mentioned in connection with possible Cabinet appointments (says the Wellington Post) are those of Messrs J. A. Nash (Palmerston North), W. S. Glenn (Rangitikei), J. A. Young (Hamilton), and Chairman of Committees in the late Parliament, and F. J. Eolleston (Tirnaru). It is claimed by some of the workers in connection with ,the recent election *in Waitemata that at one booth four electors recorded their votes whose combined ages total 376 years, a record which they believe would bo very hard to beat in any other booth around Auckland. In connection with the prevalence in the kauri district of a blight which is killing blackberries, numerous inquiries have been made by settlers in all parts of the Dominion, and the Department of Agriculture is having specimens collected for identification purposes, writes the Whangarei correspondent of an exchange. Included in the cargo brought from England by the Corinthic, at Auckland, is the motor launch Silver Spray, says the Herald. She was formerly a lifeboat at South Shields, and in the early stages of her career she was propelled by oars, five on each sido. Later she was decked over and fitted with an oil engine. She has been purchased by a resident of Devonporc. A Press Association message from To Aroha states that a boy named Leonard Margisou, aged 61 years, drank spirits of salts in mistake for ginger beer three and a-lialf years ago. After treatment by local doctors he was sent •by his parents to London and was treated by specialists, but he died on August 14 in hospital. For a fine mixture of sentiment and business, the honour must go to an old school friend of the Minister of Education, who resides in a backblock settlement. Out of hundreds of messages received by Sir James Parr congratulating him on his return to Parliament, the following from his old friend in a rural disttict does not appear to mince matters: “Dear Jimmy,—Congratulations on great all-round victory. Labour has gone to the pack.. Our roads and postal arrangements are rotten. Sending you a petition.—Your old friend, Jack .” One day last week the west end of the Caroline Bay sands at Tirnaru had a curious brown carpet, in parts three inches thick. At a little distance it might be supposed to be seaweed ground up by being dashed by waves against the rubble below Benvenue Cliff. On examination, however, it proved to be composed almost wholly of comminuted grasses and other land vegetation. It had probably been dead vegetation carried to sea by floods in the rivers, and by some curious action of wind and current collected togetner and brought into the bay, states an exchange. A merchant of Sydney writes as follows: “How thankful you ought to be that New Zealand has so far escaped the calamity of a Labour Government. If your better class politicians know of happenings in Australia, and appreciate the gravity of the situation, they will move heaven and earth to try to safeguard the Dominion from a similar fate. There are many of us who think that at the forthcoming election Australia will bo facing one of the most critical periods in her history, for on the result will depend whether constitutional Government is to survive.”

Cats climb into peculiar places, but how one got on to the stern post of the big steamei- Port Darwin, berthed at the Glasgow Wharf, AVellington, is a mystery. Early yesterday morning when the watersiders commenced work the cat was noticed couched up on the stern post with the water lapping about it. One of the men dived off the wharf and rescued the cat and brought it back to the wharf. The unfortunate cat turned out to be the ship’s mascot, and is very much prized by the seamen aboard. What is claimed to be the largest oak tree in the world is growing at Waima, North Island. This tree grew from an acorn planted by Rev. John Mavin, of the Hokianga Home Mission Station, in 1840. The tree at present lias a girth of 24ft, rises to a height of 80ft, and at noon casts a shade of 100 feet in diameter. Under the spread of its branches 500 people can gather. Waima Valley is a quiet, pretty nook about a dozen miles up the Hokianga River, and the oak is growing about half a mile inland. Though only some 80 years old, it is larger than oaks in England 500 years of age. The October issue of “Cowans,” published quarterly for the printing, paper, stationery and allied trades of Australia and New Zealand, contains the following paragraph : -—“Palmerston North is a rapidly-growing centre just above Wellington. As a railway junction it is bound to flourish, so that to-day it is a near-city. To meet the growth, its evening paper, ‘The Manawatu Standard,’ has just' installed a big two-roll rotary printing machine, made in England. It is run under the Witton-James electrical system, one of the few in uso in the Dominion. This enterprise certainly brings the ‘Standard’ even ahead of Palmerston’s progress.” Collinson and Son will accept a deposit on any of their numerous lines, suitable for pissents, and will veservo same until Christmas. China is the chief line; but, then there are pictures, crystal, toilet goods, perfumes, marquetry, glassware, stationery, brasswaro, pyrex, leather goods, pottern, E.P.N.S. mounted goods, cako stands, and a myriad other lines, all admirably suited for presentation purposes. ■’ Collinson and Son, Broadway and Kings, way. —Advt. No more grinding of teeth with Wado’s worm figs. Price Is 6d.—Advt.