WELLINGTON NEWS NOTES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XL, Issue 12239, 7 April 1903, Page 6

WELLINGTON NEWS NOTES.

[BY TELEGRAPH. —OWN CORRESPONDENT.] Wellington, Monday. YOUNG MUSICIANS. The project to send Masters Thomas and Garnet Prowell, the young Wellington musicians, to Germany to study, is going on well, and it is probable that the lads will leave the colony in June next, to enter the Leipzig Conservatorium. Musical judges from Home who have heard the boys speak highly of their ability— fact, they describe the 'cellist (Thomas) as a genius. Gerardy, Mistowski, and others have expressed this opinion concerning him, and have strongly advised that his studies should be continued in Europe. The minimum sum required for the guarantee fund, which has been formed, is £1000, and already several leading citizens have subscribed £300 in sums of £25 each. The fund will be administered by trustees, who have been appointed for that purpose. FURNITURE TRADE DISPUTE.

Mr. W. A Allen, corresponding secretary of the Wellington Furniture Trade Union, asks the Post to contradict the statement of Mr. Townsend (treasurer) that he has forwarded £150 to the Auckland Union on account of the trouble in the furniture trade in that city. The amount actually received and forwarded, he states, is hardly half £150. Possibly there is some confusion between the amounts promised and received. FLAX. Flax, to tire value of about £50,000, was graded- in. Wellington last month by the Government experts. The total number of bales which passed through their hands was 8029, weighing over 1610 tons, as compared with 6973 bales (1397 tons) in the previous month. THE NATIVE MINISTER. The Native Minister left for Wanganui this afternoon. To-morrow he will meet the Maori Land Council of the district, to arrange matters in connection with the opening of the Ohutu block of 40,000 acres. On Wednesday he will return to Wellington, and leaves a few days later for Gisbome and Auckland. LAND FOR SETTLEMENT.

The Government has, it is stated, decided to purchase under the Land for Settlement Act the whole of the Mount Vernon Estate, situated between the Waipawa and Tukituki Rivers, Hawke's Bay, instead of only 1800 acres of it.