LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 13 June 1907, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS

A dance in oonr.cction with the Waimea Football Club will be held in the Oddfellows' Hall to-morrow evening. The Nelson Baptist Endaavourars hays collected and presented the sum of £5 towards the Chinese Famine Relief Fund. In connection with the course of lectures on Theosophy being delivered by Miss Browning, M.A., organiser of the New Zealand section, the second of the series will be given in the Oddfellows' Hall to-morrow evening, the subject being "xveincarnation. " On Sunday evening ,the subject will be "The Ilule of Justice. " The Nelson Citizens' Band has deI cided to give a Band conceit in the 1 Botanical Reserve on Sunday aftecnoon for the benefit of Mr W. J. Bray, who was a serious loser by the recent fire in Waimea-road. An excellent programme will be presented, and doubtless a large number of the public will show their sympathy with the object of the Band to provide timely assistance. Mr F. N. Jones, junr., will give magnophone selections between the Band items. The first practice of the opera "Les Cloches de Corneville" by members of the Nelson Operatic Society will be held at the Dresden Hall this evening, at 7.30 sharp. At the annual meeting of the Nelson Bowling Club last evening, Me Littlejohn stated that in taking the levels of the green he had found only two^slight defects, and gave it as his opinion that there was not another green in the colony equal to the Nelson one. Mr R. B. Jackson, who recently toured Australia with the New Zealand team of bowlers, said the Nelson green, though rather small, was better than | any he had played on in Australia. Complimentary references were made t> the maniKL' in which the caretaker (Mr Tomblin) kept the green, and it was decided that his salary be raised by £5 a year. A telegram in last night's issue stat- j ed that an engine-driver named Douglas Young had been killed in the Christchurch railway yard. It is learnt that the deceased was a son of Mr Thos. Young, himself an ex-en-gine driver, but now retired, and a res- j pected resident of Belgrove. The late Mr Douglas Young was an old Nelson boy, and was 29 years of age. General sympathy will be felt with the parents o!' the deceased in their sad bereavement. It may be recalled that Mr and Mrs Young lost their son Daniel ut the time of the -Mt. Pelee eruption, about fivo years ago, he being at that time an engineer on a cable-repairing steamer in the vicinity of the eruption. The steamer was never heard of after the eruption. The social held at the Wood Sunday School last evening was attended with signal success, in spite of the weather. There was an interesting *id ytj.-ied programme of songs, duets, whistling solos, violin solos, and pianoforte pieces, assisted by Misses Gieejifield. Sloan, Wastney, Giblin, Nivett," Par- i menter, Mrs Greenfield, Rev. J. P. Kempthccne, and Mr Davis, Misses Kempthorne and Greenfield accompanying. There wore also some dialogues and recitations by some of the children, and they were much appreciated. Aftei ' the programme was finished the child- ' ren spent some time in amusing themselves, and after refreshments the meeting closed with the singing of the National Anthem. The promoters tbank all those who worked hard in arranging such a pleasant evening, and it is hoped that the next social will be even a greater success. At the Magistrate's Court this morning, Fanny L. Starr, a prohibited person, again appeared charged with drunkenness, on the 12th inst., and pleaded guilty. It will be remembered that the same accused was before the Court on Tuesday, when, in consideration of a promise then given that she would join the Good Templars, Mr Kenny, S.M., remanded the case for a week. The Good Templars Lodge, however, does not meet until Friday evening, and yesterday the accused was | arrested for Being drunk. There were two previous convictions against her within the past six months. The Magistrate said he could not deal with the previous case, as it had been adjourned until the 18th inst., He said the best thing to do would be to imprison the accused,- to give her a chance of breaking off the di.'ink habit, and then, at the expiration of the sentence she might be induced to jjin the Good Templars. Mr Kenny advised the accused, if ;'ie had drink hidden, to have it destroyed. He then formally sentenced the acer-ed to 14 days' hard labour, and request <?<2 the 'gaolei 1 to keep a close watch m her, and, if the occasion demanded, to send for a surgeon at once. The accused was also ordered to pay 2s cab hire. When the Magistrate's Court cose yesterday evening the taking of evidence in the action McDonough v. MeDonough (a wife's application for separation and maintenance orefcrs) was not concluded, and will be continued to-morrow. Mr C. J. Harley (Adams and Harley) appears for the applicant, and Mr Maginnity for the respondent. The parties are resident in Washington Valley, and the application is based on allegations of fear by the "respondent's I wife and family, general disagreement, , and failure to maintain. The defence is a general denial and justification. The Southland Education Board has decided to appoint an agricultural instructor for Southland, at a salary of £250 a y e ar and travelling expenses. Concrete telegraph poles are being installed by an American company. A skeleton framework of four corrugated iron rods is covered with ordinary concrete, the material being "slushed about 'he framework while encased in a boxlike mould. The pole is octagonal in shape, 50 feet long, and provided with mortices for cross arms, which are fastened in place by means of iron bolts, and also mortices to be used by linesmen in climbing. The concrete poles, it is declared, will be lasting, as soil conditions do not aifect them, and the cost is said to be less than pine poles. Westport was excited recently over a walking match, man versus horse. The competitors were Mr A. Sharpe and Messrs Lennie and Robinson's thoroughbred trotting horse Yellow Peril. The distance was five and a half miles, v pthe Buller road, finishing at the Ferry. The horse (says the Westport "Times") walked the distance in one hour and five minutes, and won the novel event, beating Mr Sharpe with a Vib to spare. Bush lands are being taken up in considerable areas in the Ohakune dis- ■ trict by sawmillers. A correspondent writing in the Taihape "Post" states < that some speculators from Lower Hutt : were up last week looking at a block • of 3000 acres. They have secured this ' from the Natives for milling purposes, I and. they state that they never saw such 1 fine bush before. This is the best forest, the correspondent believes, in New Zealand, and easy to get through, as there are no supplejacks or lawyers in 1 the undergrowth- ] I Farming, said the Minister of Labour ! at the opening ceremony of the Dune- • din Winter Show, cannot now be carried ' on successful} yin a haphazard way. ' Land is costing anything from 30 per ! cent more than it did, say, six years 1 ago. Our expenses are heavier in * every way and farming is altogether a J much more artificial business than it was in the earlier stages of the colony's } history, and if prices for produce were ' to drop from their present satisfactory s level farmers would require all the as- a siftance that science and properly ap- a plied practice cculd give them, and this 4 they are entitled at least to some extent ° to look for from Government. ' The public are informed that there is ? plenty of Victory butter obtainable at J Is Id per lb. Ask your grocer for this J ;hoice brand. Encourage local industry, und take no other.* s For Children's Hacking Cotieh at J ight Woods' Great Pepperminf Cure, Is 6d and 2s 6d» On Saturday, 15th inst., Messrs Bis- s ley Bros, will sell the native lease of r six acres, with all buildings thereon, 1 <■ it Swan-road, Motueka. t <■ w g

A special meeting of the executive committee of tho Nelson Defence.. Rifle ] Club was held last- evening to consider ] a matter which had led to the president sending in his resignation, as stat- < ed in our columns last Tuesday. The | incident (which, though of no great mag- i nitudo in itself, involved a principle) was gone into exhaustively and eventually disposed of satisfactorily both to the president and the members specially concerned. At the unanimous desire of the committee, the president (Mr F. N. Jones, senr.,) withdrew his resignation, and will continue in command of the club. One of the features of Constantinople is the great number of dogs that roam its streets. They are the common property of the city, and are valuable as scavengers. Gems of thought from the Canterbury Farmers' Union Conference :— "A pair of small birds in five years will produce 550,000 descendants."— Mr Witte. "i have brought down as many as 80 or 90 small birds ia ono shot, through a hole in the barn door." — Mr Ryan. "If you start and pay the Leader of the Opposition a salary as such, the Government will want to appoint him." —Mr Wilfred Hall. ''We often complain of the taxes we have to pay, but the loss to farmers from small birds is greater than the cost of all our taxes put together." — Mr D. Jones. "If farmers failed to poison rabbits between the ' Selwyn and the Rakaia for ten years, there would not be a single sheep left in that area."— Mr G. Sheat. The inevitable result of marriage between European girls and Chinamen was bVought ' before the notice of Mc •Bishop, S.jM., at ChriUchurch last week, when Ethel Lim Cheong charged her husband, Lim Cheong, with having failed to provide her with adequate means of «iaintenance. Tho complainant's story was that she had married tho defendant in 1903 at the registoy office. She was only seventeen years of age at the }ime, but Cheong had stated to the registrar that she was twenty-one. In 1004 she obtained a summary separation from him on account of 'his cruelty, but a little later returned to him. He would not give her European food to eat, and she had had only two dresses since her marriage. Ho? husband spent a lot of money on gambling, and was connected with a pak-a-poo game. He had thrown her out of the house, saying that he did not want her, and she had instituted Ohese proceedings. «After hearing the defendant's denial that he had ill-treated his wife or had refused to purchase her whatever she wished to cat, the Magistrate said 'it was no good "sermonising" on the matter, but if girls made these foolish, undesirable and unnatural marriages, they could only expect them to turn out badly. He v. ou Id order the defendant to pay 10s weekly towards the support of his wi fo. A Dunedin telegroam in the Auckland "Herald" says with regard to the rise in wheat : — " 'He laughs best who laughs last.' At the beginning of the present wheat season some flourmillers made merry at the expense of one of the fraternity, who has his being somewhere in South Canterbury, and who made large purchases of grain at little more than 3s per bushel. At that time there were loud complaints against him io: forcing up the market some pence per bushel, but this shrewd miller can chuckle to-day, as he sits contentedly on a pile of wheat, currently reported to total something like 40,000 sacks, worth at current market quotations 4s 6d a bushel, and watches the former merrymakers sullenly closing down their mills because they have 1 no wheat and are afraid to go into the mccket and buy at the present price. It is whispered that should the market hold, and the fortunate miller succeed in quitting his holding at anything like present values, the net proceeds of the venture will total between £15,000 and £20,000." At the Zoological Gardens the authorities are returning to the principles of the 'forties with regard to keeping the ,'i;reat flesh /ating beasts in the open." From 1840 till early in 1876 the lions, tigers, and leopards were kept, exposed to the weather, in the dens under the terrace walk. In 1876 they were transferred to the new lion-house, and one might well be excused for thinking that the outside cages were not in the original plan, so complicated is the arrangement for shifting the animals from the house to the open air, says the "Daily Telegraph." At present three lions tenant the outside den at one end, and a couple of jaguars inhabit that at the other. The lions have a wooden shed as a sleeping place or a protection against cold, and the door is left open in the other cage so that the jaguars can go inside when they like. Alterations in the house are being planned, and when these are carried out the animals will have free access to the open air, as they have in most of the Continental gardens. Wolves are reported to have increased g'.eatly in numbers in the Vosges. They are unusually bold in the Mirecourt region, where battues have already had to be organised against theim. The tjescent of the wolves from their mountain fastnesses so early in the season betokens, according to the local peasants, a very hard winter. Mr H. W. Stevenson, the billiard champion, played two games at the Federal Club, Christchurch, on Saturday night, with Mr J. C. Adams and Mr .T. Williams. The matches were for £00 up, and Mr Stevenson conceded each player 250. He beat Mv Williams by S4, and Mr Adams by 216. His best breaks against Mc Wiliams were 63, 48. 57, 55, and 159 (unfinished). Against Mr Adams his best breaks were 59 and 424, which is his New Zealand record. Mr Stevenson played a top of table game, and scored most of his points with nursery cannons along the cushion. The Waikouaiti railway station was "held up" by a polled Angus bull one fl.av last week (says the "Palmerston Times"). It appears that the bull escapee 1 , while being put lon board a truck, and after scattering the bystanders the animal made direct for a train which was standing at the platform. The pesengers immediately took refuge in the carriages, while the railway officials tied in all directions, and for a couple of minutes the bull was in sole charge of the station and its environs. Eventually some cattle experts came to the rescue, the bull was removed, and the train proceeded on its journey. A humble funeral, consisting of a one-horse hearse, escorted by an undertaker in a swallow-tail coat and a tall glazed hat, appeared before one of the cates of Paris one day recently. The Customs men were about to let it pass without question when one of them was struck with tho appearance of the undertaker who seemed the worse for liquor. Suspicion was aroused, and the funeral was halted. A Customs official lifted the pall covering the "coffin," which proved to be an oblong vessel or tin full of absinthe. The "funeral" was promptly confiscated, and the undertaker was afterwards identified as a well-known smuggler of spirits. The sealing industry in the North At- ] lantic is full of risks of the most des- , perate character, the men endangering J their lives almost every day they go ] abroad on the floes. In their pursuit , of the seals it is a common thing for ] them to wander six or eight miles from ] their ship, and if they get benighted or ( meet an accident serious consequences ■ frequently ensue. The most horrible "" tragedy in the history of the floes was that of the steamer Greenland in 1898. , The ship was struch by a blizzard while 180 men were hunting for seals over the i icy plain. They were left, helpless while j she was driven to sea. Two nights and a day elapsed before she reached them again, and when sbo did she found that 48 of them had perished from hunger and cold. _ Some had gone mad from , their sufferings, others had collapsed from exhaustion and been frozen stiff, c a few had been killed by fragments, of , ice tossed about, while others fell into the ocean and were drowned. Of the . total only 25 bedies were recovered, the c others having found a grave in the j depths of the sea. About 50 of the survivors were frost-bitten, and it was a sad-looking ship that- returned to port £ that year. j ( Rheumo has permanently cured thousands of sufferers from rheumatism, j, gout, sciatica, and' lumbago. It will <j cure you. All stores, 2s 6d and 4s 6d. ( Give it a trial. *■";■ I q ;■■*»."' : »'■ -'-' • -i "■■' -

The Pennsylvania fU.S.) railr. al proposes to substitute nil steol for wooden passenger cars on its entire system. Thia enterprise will involve a tremcii dous investment of money and the relegation of a vast quantity of rolling stock to inferior uses or to the scrap heap. It is proposed lo construct 2000 all-steel pastenger cars within the next two years, and 200 aro to be built immediately. The following method of eradicating blackberry is by Mr F. B. Guthrie, of the New South Wales Departnien. of Agriculture: Mr Guthrie suggests that the freshly-cut stems of the plant should be dressed with dry powdered arsenite of Boda. A correspondent who tried this wrote that "this was only partially successful, owing, perhaps, to the powder purchased not being tho best kind, being lumpy, and having no means at his disposal to make it fine — a large quantity fell to the ground, refusing to stick to the end of the stems— where it did cling it did its work effectually. However, the idea of applying arsenite of soda was made use of by mixing a solution of arsenic and soda, in the proportion of lib of arsenic to 21b of washing soda, and mixing them in five gallons or boiling water (the water must bi boiling when the mixing takes plao). This was applied to tbe roots after digging round them, so that the liquid would percolate to the roots. This was most effective ; the clump of briar is now quite destroyed." The cost of treating this particular patch, having an area of 12 square yards, was about 2s 6d ; it would therefore be too costly for large areas, unless a less quantity proved snfficient to kill the plant than was used in the instance j above quoted. Arsenite_ of soda is a very deadly poison, and in ordinary circumstances contact of living plants with very small • quantities is sufficient to kill. .-In the experiments carried out rt the Hawkesbury Agricultural College the cost of arsenite of soda solution worked out at 2d for five gallons. If. then, care ia taken to apply tht solution without waste by means of a Bpray pump, tbe cost should not be beyond a reasonable cinount, and would, without doubt, be cheaper than grubbing by hand. A word of caution with regard to stock running in tbe same paddock is necessary. Owing to the poisonous nature of arsenite of soda, stock should be remo7ed until the sorub has been eradicated. By this means any grass that may have been sprayed Trill nave died, and will thus be burnt, and the risk of accident from poison reduced to a minimum. In felling a tree some days ago in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, a bird's nest containing four eggs was discovered enclosed in a small hollow near the heart of the trunk, Tho sap rings showed, says " Feathered Life," that nearly a cen'.ury ha 3 elapsed since iho eggs were laid, and it was obvious t hat the hollow bad closed automaticaVy. The eggs were intact, but slightly faded. The National Zeitung in April published details of the reported early visit of the Kaiser to England. The Imperial yacht Hollenzollern, it is stated, will anchor in the Solent on July 31, and the Emperor hopes to attend the Goodwood race meeting, after which an automobile tour in the New Forest is planned. His Imperial Majesty will return to Cowes for the start of the regatta on August 6, and King Edward uill on August 7 give a banquet on board the victoria and Albert in honour of his distinguished guest, who in return wil 1 entertain the King and Queen on the following day at a banquet on board the Hohenzollern. The Emperor will leave Cowes on August 10. j . ■, =