ANGLO-NEW ZEALAND NOTES

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13723, 13 April 1908, Page 8

ANGLO-NEW ZEALAND NOTES

[FROM our own CORRESPONDENT.]

London, March 5.

BULBOUS PLANTS OF NEW LAND

Last Tuesday. »i the Horticultural Hall, before the fellows of the Royal Horticultural Society, a paper on " The Bulbous (Plants of New Zealand," by .Mr. Edward White, Tvingsland, Auckland, New Zealand, was read. It dealt exclusively with the Auckland province, and particularly with the Waikato district. The author said lie looked upon that district as the idea! one for the successful cultivation of almost nil kinds of lilies, and Auckland might be s*id to be the paradise of horticulturists. Lilies had come into favour of recent years, and there ■were now over 50 varieties in cultivation. Ho had carefully searched T ie district for indigenous bulbous plants, but there wa-3 only one. A hearty vote of thanks was passed to Mr. White for his paper. ARMY RESERVISTS. An official return of the number of army reservists residing abroad shows that 120 are resident in Australia and 86 in New Zealand. NEW ZEALAND FRUIT. It has been arranged that New Zealand shall be represented at a show of colonialgrown fruit, to be held under the auspices of the Royal Horticultural Society, in June. The exhibit will be merely to prove what New Zealand can produce, for there does not appear to bo any prospect of sending any regular supplies of fruit from the Dominion for the English market. PASSENGERS FROM ENGLAND. Of the saloon passengers who have sailed to-day by 'tfie s.s. lonic for New Zealand, on her loth voyage, 31 have booked to Auckland, 19 to Wellington, and 16 to Lyttelton. Of the 300 odd passengers in the third-class, 80 have booked to Wellington, 66 to Auckland 29 to Lyttelton, 21 to the Bluff, and 35 to Port Chalmers, the remainder _ being bound for other ports, including Napier, Wanganui, Nelson, Westport, borne, etc. COLON fAL DEFENCE. On the motion that the House of Commons should go into Committee of Supply on theArmy Estimates, Mr. Haldane (Secretary for War) made a lengthy statement, laying before the House the Government's programme and a record of progress made. In the course of his speech lie referred to the Colonial Conference /and to the work clone in the conference. " The general staff," said Mr. Haldane, " was in evidence at the Colonial Conference, and a general agreement was arrived at, the feeling being very harmonious, about the organisation of the whole of the forces of the Empire on a general pattern. We agreed that each self-go-verning colony should provide, as far as possible, for its local security; and that there should be the duty recognised of arranging for mutual assistance on definite lines incase of need: and we agreed that as far as possible the pattern of organisation should be made the same throughout the Empire, and that there should be co-operation. The way in which we thought we could bring that about, without interference with the liberty of self-governing countries, was to make the general staff imperial, so organising it that we could send officers out to the colonies and could .take officers from the colonies upon our general staff for training at home. That is being done. We have got two staff officers now, two from Canada and one from New Zealand, at the Staff College; and the authorities are taking every step they can to make the forces of the Empire feel themselves a single force so far as possible. The principle is that in addition to the expeditionary force to act at a distance in case of necessity, there should be a far-flung line of local defence, extending all over the rest of the world, maintained by each country within the Empire, organised as far as possible on one pattern, and by one school of thought in the shape of a general staff. We are endeavouring not only to make the general staff, for instance, in Canada and at home work together and exchanging officers, but we aro throwing open general staff appointments here to colonial officers. Of course, these things," continued Mr. Haldane, "can only be done on a very small scale at first, for the colonics, are only beginning to organise on the ideas that we have agreed upon, but we have made a beginning, and I am glad to say that the Selection. Board have lately offered the command of an infantry brigade at Aldershot to Colonel Otter, a distinguished Canadian officer. In this way throughout the Empire we are aiming at regarding' the forces of the Crown and the officers of the Crown as more or less interchangeable. No army is so difficult to organise as the British army, because it is raised on a- voluntary basis, and is scattered all over the world." FIRE ON BOARD THE MONGOLIA. Cable messages have reached London to-day fiom Marseilles announcing the arrival at that port last nij'ht of the P. and O. steamer Mongolia, with fire on board. There are 400 passengers on board the steamer, which sailed from London last Friday, among the number being the members of the professional New Zealand football team, who are now on their way back to the Dominion. The cause of the outbreak is not known, but considerable damage has been clone. The fire occurred in the after-hold, where the passengers' luggage was stored; it had been smouldering for two days. Warning had been sent from the Spanish coast, so thatwhen the Mongolia arrived at Marseilles the firemen had everything in readiness to fight the flames. On the opening of the hatches, volumes of water were poured into the hold. The smoke was so dense that throe, of the firemen were asphyxiated. Finally, as the flames threatened to spread through the whole of the ship, it was decided to flood the hold. Latest information is to the effect that the outbreak has now been extinguished, but that the damage, both by fire and water, is very serious.