SOUTHERN ITEMS

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11770, 27 September 1901, Page 2 (Supplement)

SOUTHERN ITEMS

Eight dredging companies on the West Coast, with a nominal capital of £72,000, are at present in liquidation.

It is reported that a Cisborne resident intends going Home shortly to establish a claim to a share in an amount in Chancery which runs into six figures.

The capital value of ratable property in the City of Wellington was stated by the Valuer-General to be £7,372,342, and the unimproved value £4,438,660.

Two guns from South Africa have been placed on the lawn at Parliament Buildings, Wellington, and command the main entrance to the grounds, flanking the Ballance statue.

The East Window for the Wanganui Collegiate School Chapel, in memory of the old boys who hare fallen in the war, has been ordered from Home. It is to take the form of a red cross with the legend, " In hoc signo vinces." There are or have been over 60 old boys in South Africa up to the present. A Christchurch syndicate has hired the Dunedin trawler Express to make a thorough test of the fishing < ouuds from Motunau Island to Akaroa Heads. Operations extending over a day or two have been made on several occasions lately, but the projected work of the Express will continue for about two months. If the trawling is successful a company will be floated to purchase a steamer in England. Operations will then be extended, if necessary, to the Chatham Islands.

Some years ago (says the Dunedin Star) an inspiration seized the City Council that it would be a good plan to obtain a tramway hearse, which could be run along the line that passes within a few yards of the public cemetery. Accordingly a hearse was procured. It was an elegant vehicle, and cost £250. But somehow the public could never be persuaded to use it, and after reposing in the Council's yard for something like 18 years, during which period it fulfilled the useful function of a fowlhouse, it has just been sold for £3. It is estimated that, together with the expense of laying a branch line to the cemetery and interest on the money expended, the hearse cost the city £717. and it never had so much as a corpse inside it.

A very valuable curio has recently been added to the Christchurch Museum collection in the shape of the carved front of a Maori pataka. or food house. The work is very ancient and especially interesting from the fact of its having been executed while the natives were still quite untouched byEuropean ideas. The design represents a woman being tempted by manaias or devils, and illustrative of one of the Maori mythical tales. The work was of course done with stone implements, and is quite unique in its way. A noticeable feature is that the eyes of the figures have not been represented by pieces of pawa shell, as is usual in Maori carvings. The centre appears to be rather newer than the sides, but is still very old. The museum has also obtained the front of another pataka, of more recent make, but a very excellent specimen of the ordinary work of the Maoris in the early days.

The Chief Justice and a- jury of four were occupied at Wellington on the 17th of September with a claim for damages in connection with a shipment of kerosene from New York to Wellington. Joseph Nathan and Go. sought to recover £277 damages from the master and owners of the steamship Bcclvuana for damage to a cargo of kerosene on the voyage from New York. Plaintiffs alleged that out of 7600 cases of oil 46 cases were never delivered, and 772 cases were damaged and almost worthless; that the damage was caused by negligence and faulty, bad and defective stowage; that the Bechuana was not, on leaving New York, in a seaworthy condition for the purposes of the contract, in that she was without proper sluices, and had not pumps sufficient to pump away any accumulation of water from the hold in which the kerosene was stowed, and from the bilges in the neighbourhood of the hold. The statement of defence set forth that, according to the bill of lading, the defendants were not responsible for loss arising from perils, dangers, and accidents of the sea, or for loss or damago occasioned by la.tent defects in the hull and equipment of the ship: that if any loss arose on the goods it was caused by an exceptional hurricane that occurred shortly after the vessel left Now York, and which at times caused loss of control of the vessel and interference with pumping, loss and shifting of cargo, straining of ship and leakage, and the forcing of the bilge water from the bilges. Judgment went for the plaintiff for the full amount pi the claim, with costs.