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Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 91, 15 March 1935, Page 6

To mark the occasion of Lord Bledjsloe’s farewell to the children at Newtown Park yesterday, a whole holiday was observed by ’Wellington primary schools to-day. “If Waitangi is to fulfil the purpose we had in mind when we caused it to be nationalised, it will be a greater knitting together of the various sections of your New Zealand population, whether Maori or European, and a greater sense of nationhood resulting from such increased co-operation and harmony.” This was the hope expressed by Lord Bledisloo at tho publie farewell accorded Their Excellencies in Wellington, last evening, after reference had been made to their generosity in giving the Waitangi estate to the nation. Postal efficiency in the discovery of an address was shown in the prompt delivery of a letter to a resident ol New Plymouth the other day. It is 17 years since Mr L. W. Oldridge lived at Timaru, and in the meantime he has been at Wanganui and Palmerston North. Yet a letter from Australia addressed simply as “Mr L. W. Oldridge, Timaru, New Zealand.” was delivered to him at New Plymouth within 48 hours of its receipt at Timaru. “I for my part, have no qualms regarding tlie future piosperitv, happiness and progress of this partner in the British Empire,” said Lord Bledisloe when replying to the demonstrative farewell accorded him in Wellington, last evening, on the eve of his departure for England. “That is provided always,” he added, “that you are blessed for the next decade —which should open up for you a new era of confident progress —with wise and farsighted statesmanship, sound public and local administration, productive efficiency, never being contented with what is second best or mediocre, generous educational enlightenment, and a growing sense of national solidarity and mutual interdependence. 1 cay say this with confidence as my own settled conviction after five years of meticulous study and observation of your country, its resources and its potentialities.”

Two property transactions, involving large main street frontages, have been completed at Hawera, the price paid being up to £125 a foot. In the House of Representatives yesterday Mr M. J. Savage asked Rt. Hon. G. W. Forbes if he would set aside a day for discussion of the unemployment position, and Mr Forbes said lie would be pleased to accede to the request. In order to prosecute investigations dealing with the elimination of undesirable flavours in certain New Zealand honeys, a research scholarship has been awarded by the Cawthron Institute to Mr R. 11. K. Thomson, M.Sc., of Canterbury College. The cup for the best dahlia exhibit at the Auckland Flower Show, held yesterday, was won by Mr A. J. Sliailer, of Palmerston North, for the fifth time. Mr Sliailer also exhibited the champion of champions bloom, a beautiful yellow “Leonora.” “You are the world's most lovable people,” said His Excellency Lord Bledisloe, when, in the course of a brilliant address last evening to the great crowd which assembled in the Wellington Town Hall to bid him farewell, he praised the amiability and tolerance of New Zealanders. “Your loyalty to the Crown, is, indeed, robust, universal and unchallengeable,” said the Governor-General. Following the publication of his decision not to seek re-election to the Wellington Hospital Board, Dr. Campbell Begg said yesterday that he had been urged from many quarters to allow himself to be nominated not only for the Hospital Board but also for other local bodies and even for the Parliamentary election. He took these requests as a great compliment, but had reluctantly declined to accede tr them. “You in New Zealand have a greater variety of beautiful scenery than any country in the world,” commented His Excellency, Lord Bledisloe, when speaking at the farewell function in his honour at Wellington, last evening. “If duly exploited and advertised,” he added, “your tourist traffic ought to be your most lucrative industry—a source of immense wealth as well as of aesthetic and spiritual inspiration.” During sittings of the Supreme Court and Magistrate's Court in Palmerston North the passing of trains along the railway lino seriously inconveniences the occupants of the Court, voices being momentarily drowned on occasion. At the present "time the inconvenience has been added to by the alteration work to the building necessitating a certain amount of hammering and the calm of the haljs of justice is being further shattered. A suggestion that the fund inaugurated by Lord Nuffield to assist crippled children should be made a national trust was put forward yesterday by Mr C. J. B. Norwood. “I see no better way,” he said, “to commemorate the forthcoming anniversary of the accession of His Majc-sty than to create a national fund which will place the crippled children of this country in, a position to enjoy the latest science has to offer in this type of work.” “Whatever may be your country’s transient and superficial maladies it is, believe me, sound at the core,’ stated His Excellency Lord Bledisloe when Their Excellencies were being honoured at a public farewell in Wellington, last evening. “Its heart-beat is quite steady,” he added, “and surely, that being the case, it will respond generously to the stimulus of the better times that are undoubtedly coming.” While trucking a boar at the Showgrounds last evening, following the pedigree pig sale, Mr M. J. lvrivan, junr., was unfortunately injured in the left leg when the animal ripped the flesh with its tusks. Mr Krivan was taken to a doctor by the Free Ambulance and then to the Hospital. His friends will be pleased to learn that the Hospital authorities reported that, after an operation last evening, his condition is quite satisfactory to day. At the annual meeting of the Kia Toa Rugby Football Club, last evening, tlie president (Mr A. M. Ongley) was congratulated on the. success of the Country cricket team, of which he was the sole selector, in their match with the Town team at Wellington. The good wishes of those present were also extended to Mr Ongley and to the members of the Manawatu team which he had selected for the match with Southland in which the local representatives are to defend the Hawke Cup. “In New Zealand you speak of the Old Land as Home. We shall in future find it very difficult to apply that that term to one part only of the British Empire,” said the GovernorGeneral, Lord Bledisloe, at the farewell tendered Their Excellencies in Wellington, last evening. “\ r ou have made us feel 60 much at home during the last five years that the parting is to us a severance of strong ties of attachment and a sudden breaking away from an anchorage which, let me confess to you, almost threatened to keep the ship of our lives tor ever in your relatively tranquil and congenial waters.”

A Johnsonville resident, when in Grey town this week, made a useful suggestion, in conversation with a Standard representative, for the benefit of trampers. He proposes that small topographical map of the Tararuas be prepared, and that the various peaks and ridges be numerically classified. Each tramper who went to the hills should be equipped with a map and a miniature fog-horn. The map should also contain foghorn signals. If a tramper were lost, lie would give a “5.0.5.” signal on his horn, and indicate numerically his approximate location. A response would be given by those trampers who heard the signal. By this means, it is contended, much valuable time and risk would be avoided in the search for a missing tramper.

In his book, “Adventures in Geyserland,” Mr Alfred Warbrick, late Government guide in the thermal district, mentions that while out in his boat exploring the northern coast of Lake Tarawera after the eruption in 1886 lie noticed through the branches of some pohutukawa trees a cave in the cliff. “Peering into it I saw a gigantic lifalike Maori staring at me out of its recesses. It' was a mummified corpse, apparently perfectly preserved. The mummy was that of a man who must have been eight feet in height. The head was of enormous size and it was covered with rusty reddish hair, urukeliu as the Maoris call it. The teeth were exposed in a weird grin. The skin, still in perfect condition, covered the whole l>od'y. How the old Maoris preserved the corpses of their honoured dead I do not know: it was a mystery of the vanished tohungas. In further recesses round the sides of the caves 1 discovered whpt appealed to be a number of bound-up bundles, which were no doubt also human bodies.” Mr Warbrick mentioned his discovery to Europeans in Rotorua and was repeatedly pressed to remove the giant mummy for exhibition in a museum. Being strongly averse to desecration of the Maori dead, and to stop the importuning and its possible results, he quietly visited the cave one day and putting a rope around the mummy, conveyed it in .his boat to the deepest part of the lake where, properly weighted, it was dropped into the depths. This ended all possibility of the mummy being removed for exhibition purposes.