SOCIAL NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19452, 7 October 1926, Page 7

SOCIAL NEWS.

Miss N. Upton has returned from a visit to Wanganui. Mrs. J. Price, of Hawke's Bay, is visiting Mrs. S. Pollen, St.* Stephen's Avenue, Parnell. Mr. and Mrs. Shirley Wright, of Christchurch, have just leturned from a visit to the Islands. Miss Kenderdine, who has been visiting her sister, Mrs. Quigley, in Wanganui, has returned to Auckland. Mr. and Mrs. G. D. Greenwood and Mrs'. Leicester Matson, of Christ church, are, in Sydney for the. races. Mrs. F. Todd, Waipawa, Mrs. A. Hook and Mrs. H. E. Powell, Sydney, are among the guests staying at Stonehurst. Mrs. W. Bayly and Miss G. Bayly, New Plymouth, are. visiting Auckland and are the guests of Mrs. Owen Bayly, Epsom. Mr. and Mrs. Nat MacTfwn fiave taken a flat in Sydney until November, when the latter leaves for Auckland with her, mother, Mrs. Alfred Nathan. An interesting experiment is being made in California to naturalise the chinchilla, that beautiful little fur-bear-ing animal which is in imminent danger of being exterminated. The chinchilla in a native of South America, and inhabits the eastern slopes of the Andes in Chile, Bolivia and Peru, and is rarely seen below an altitude of 9000 ft. It is regarded by naturalists, writes J. E. Macdonald, as a link between the rat, the hare, and the squirrel. The fur of the chinchilla, is much prized, being of an exquisite silky texture, and beautiful grey colour, and its rarity now makps it one of the most costly in the market. A single skin is worth about £25. Miss J. Reid, Miss Hamblin, Miss Culling and Miss Coopec are attending the gol[ tournament in Palmerston North. Miss Culling, Miss Cooper and Miss M. Payton will take part in the New Zealand Ladies' Golf Championship, which opens in Dunedin on October 15. Some interesting statements were made about the American attitude toward music at the fourteenth annual Composers' Conference held recently by tlie Society ot Women Musicians in London. One speaker told of the numerous music clubs, choral societies, etc., but added that the maintaining of an orchestra was sometimes more on the lines of magnitude as showing the town's prosperity than on those of musical perfection. She added that the true American composer had yet to appear. Of the forty-three candidates who obtained the diploma of M.R.C.V.S. in the final examination of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, two only were women —who do not, apparently, take so kindly to- the healing of the brute cfeation as they do to the healing of their fellows. Of the 177 candidates upon whom the Royal College of Physicians recently conferred licences to practise, 39 were women; a proportion (roughly) of one in five, against the one in twenty-one of the vets., says an English writer. The Loyal Manurewa Lodge of the Manchester Unity Oddfellows held its annual ball in the picture theatre, Manurewa, on September 29. Over a hundred couples were present, among whom were visitors from the surrounding districts. The decorative scheme was carried out in gold and flame streamers, balloons and paper roses, combined with nikau palms and lycopodittm. The entrance hall was lined with palms and clusters of feathery greenery .were grouped round the ballroom and stage. A grand march was led by Mr. H. M. King and Miss Betty Craig. The Hon. F. J. Rolleston, in speaking to some members of the Women's branch of the Reform League, in Wellington, made particularly interesting reference to the birth-rate. Australia and New Zealand had led the English-speak-ing world for some years in the increase of population by birth, from 1881 to 1926, he thought, speaking from memory of statistics. He gave a most comforting view of the oftentimes mentioned "Rise in the Tide of Colour," and said that although the births in the brown and yellow races were greatly in advance of those of the white people, yet their high deathrate kept pace with this, and made the balance far more even than most people imagined. The test was shown in the death-rate of infants in countries where thero was no room, or very little, for expansion. The room for expansion in this country and Australia, as well as the modern methods adopted in regard to health, meant a healthy increase in population.