LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18862, 10 November 1924, Page 6

LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS.

The Western District Fire Brigade received a call about 3.30 p.m. yesterday to a fire in a detached wash-house at No. 1, Wellpark Avenue, Grey Lynn. The house is owned by Mr. E. Skeen and occupied by Mr. W. Harkins. The outbreak is said to have been due to there being no door to the copper. Damage to the extent of about £10 was done to some clothing before the fire was extinguished by the brigade. The contents of the house and wash-house are covered by insurance to the extent of £175.

Two English mails will arrive at Auckland in the next two days. ' The Royal Mail steamer Makura is due from Vancouver at 11 a.m. to-day with a large quantity of English and American mail for New Zealand, and the Manuka is due from Sydney toimorrow with 336 bags of English and Australian mail for this port. An outward English mail, to be despatched from Wellington to-morrow, via San Francisco, by the Maunganui, closes at Auckland this evening. It is doubtful if the Makura's mails will be delivered in time for replies to be despatched by the Maunganui.

Exceptionally fine weather prevailed at Auckland during the week-end. The ideal summer condition was responsible for the excursion steamers and launches being well patronised yesterday, and many hundreds of people made outdoor trips by other means. The temperature at times was somewhat tropical and bathing was freely indulged in at the different beaches. The warm weather has tempted fish to frequent the shallower waters of the Gulf and harbour, and amateur fishermen have been quite pleased with their catches during the past two days. The barometer, which had been practically steady at 29.90 in. all ihe week, has been rising • since Friday, and last night the reading was 30.32 in.

Nearly 800 people left for the South last evening by two Main Trunk express trains. Included in the number were 380 assisted immigrants, who arrived on Saturday by the Tainui. The embarkation arrangements were carried out under the supervision of the railway, immigration and Salvation Army officials. Several of the English public schoolboys, who have come out to join farms, also went by the train. Others will leave by the Eotorua and North Auckland trains this morning.

After undergoing overhaul and then replenishing her bunkers at Auckland, H.M.S. Veronica sailed for Wellington on Saturday, in order that her crew may undergo their musketry course at Trenthaim. Tho vessel will be absent until nearly Christmas. It is expected sho will return about December 18 with H.M.S. Dunedin, which proceeds to Wellington from Australia before she returns to Auckland. H.M.S. Laburnum will not leave Auckland before the New Year.

The new Sunday-school and parish hall in connection with St. Mary's Church, New Plymouth, was formally opened by Bishop Averill last Friday. In conjunction with the opening of the building a bazaar was held, and the proceeds of this amounted to £300, which sum is sufficient to clear the hall of debt.

Applications for employment at the Auckland office of the Labour Department last week totalled 150, a decrease of 11 on the previous week's figures and 28 on those of the week before. Men classed as fit for heavy work numbered 117. The list was headed by labourers, who numbered 52. Next in point of numbers were shop assistants and salesmen, 14; gardeners and handymen, 14; motor-drivers, 11; and cooks and hotel workers, 11. During the week 26 men were placed in employment, including 17 labourers and two carpenters. In the number were a labourer and blacksmith engaged by the Public Works Department.

An unusual sight was seen at the Napier breakwater last Wednesday morning by a party of early-rising fisherman. They state that the water round about the wharves was literally studded with a huge school of Medusa jelly fish. These peculiar denizens of the deep, although slimy and of a repulsive appearance when high and dry, present a charming appearance, when in their native element. They are umbrella-shaped on top and have numerous tentacle-like arms beneath, which hang down in the water like crystals from a chandelier. Medusa usually frequents much warmer ocean belts than that washing tho shores of Napier.

The recent sharp frost in Southland was very severe in the Wyndham district. Grass that had been tramped was blackened, as were clover, the tips of Canadian thistles, dock leaves, rib-grass, laurel, gorse and holly. In gardens, potato haulms were' cut to the ground, and gooseberries, currants and apples were withered. Flowers such as rhododendrons perished, and many tender seedlings were withered up. All soft young shoots of plants and shrubs, and even the new leaves on trees were affected. It was the worst frost experienced for many years. Probably the worst loss is in potatoes, which have been seriously checked, if not destroyed. Last Tuesday there was quite a heavy fall of snow' on the tops of the mountains near Queenstown.

"Do you want the gun?" asked Mr. Wyvern Wilson, S.M., in the Magistrate's Court at Christchurch last Wednesday of a returned soldier, who was charged with having failed to register the Army revolver which had accompanied him through the Great War. "No, thanks, Your Worship," he replied. "I think I will leave it for tho State. It might come in handy when tho next war comes along!" "Oh, I hope it will have rusted away by then!" said tho magistrate. The weapon was forfeited.

On one farm in the Manawatu district of only a little ovor 100 acres, on which the rabbits have been eradicated, during the season after it had boon cleared, 20001b. more butter-fat from the same herd of cows was taken. This quantity of fat at Is 6d per lb. is equal to £150, or nearly 30s per acre per annum more income, and yet within no great distance from this farm there is country which is carrying at least five or six rabbits to the acre.

A malicious act has been reported to the Manawatu Gorge Board of Control. It was stated that recently some person or persons unknown broke a chain at tho top of tho Gorge, threw boxes used for protecting tho lamps into the river, and left the rail on the road with lamps out. "The most dangerous aspoct of these acts of wilfulness is the removal of the danger signals at right," said the chairman, Mr. R. Chadwick.