LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20889, 3 June 1931, Page 8

LOCAL AND GENERAL NEWS.

The prompt action of a passor-by who ran into a department store and procured a fire-extinguisher saved a large new motor-car from being extensively damaged by fire yesterday afternoon. The car, which wfs parked in Wellesley Street West, backfired when tho driver, a woman, attempted to start it, and in a few moments flames were bursting from under the bonnet. An extinguisher carlied on the car failed to make any effect on tho fire, and no 0110 present seemed to know the whereabouts of an alarm box. • Fortunately an extinguisher was quickly procured from the shop and the flames were extinguished before serious damage was done.

The price for first grade hen eggs in the city markets yesterday was advanced to 3s 2d a dozen. This is the highest price since Juno of last year, when the market touched 3s 4d a dozen for a short period. Tho highest price in the winter of 1929 was 3s Id a dozen.

A large number of complaints has been received by the city police from women who have lost their handbags by leaving them in city stores. In most cases, a bag has been lost through its owner leaving it on a counter while she turned her attention to other purchases. During one day recently the police received 12 complaints from one city store. As to-day is a public holiday there will be no cargo work on the waterfront at Auckland, but conditions will bo busy after the holiday, when a number of overseas vessels will be in port. The Shaw, Savill and Albion liner lonic arrived from London last night and today's arrivals will be the Bank Line steamer Symeric from Java, and the Kaitoke from Newcastle. To-morrow the Norwegian steamer Penybryn will arrive from Ocean Island, the Federal Line steamer Huntingdon from Liverpool, the Marama from Wellington, the Japanese motor-ship Melbourne Maru from Wellington, and the Waimarino from southern ports. Friday's arrivals will be the Commonwealth and Dominion Line motorship Port Huon from New York, and the Wingatui from Portland. Gunnery and torpedo exercises are to bo carried out in the Hauraki Gulf by H.M.S. Diomedo during the week commencing June 15. On Wednesday, Juno 17, the practices will be with sub-calibre six-inch guns, four-inch sub-calibro antiaircraft guns and torpedoes. On the following day the guns will be fired fullcalibre. No reports concerning the prospects for the whitebait season, which will start about next month or August, have been received in Auckland from the Waikato district. Last year supplies of whitebait were scarce, and brought high prices throughout the season. Limited stocks of local whitebait secured mainly around Riverhead are being offered in the city shops at about 7d a glass. Some 80 matrimonial petitions, of which 12 are for the restitution of conjugal rights and the remainder for divorce, will be heard by Mr. Justice Herdman and Mr. Justice Smith in the Supreme Court to-morrow, which is the quarterly day set apart for undefended cases of this kind. Separation is most common ground on which the divorce petitions are based, but allegations of misconduct, of failure to comply with an order for return, and of desertion are also frequent. The onus of taking action is equally divided between the sexes, the husband being the petitioner in half of the cases. The careless replacement of motor registration plates bearing only the numerals 6, 8, 9 and 0. is likely to provide magistrates with some confounding evidence if ever the bearers of such numbers ate caught violating traffic regulations. There is a light truck running about the city streets with the number 9.668 showing ahead, but after it has passed the number displayed is 899.6—a curious result brought about by the attachment of the rear plate upside down.

A suggestion that the cost of election of members t-o power boards should be a charge on the revenues of the boards concerned and not, as at present on the local bodies for the districts returning the individual members, was made at a meeting of the Northcote Borough Council last evening. '-The present position seems to be an anomalous one," said the Mayor, Mr. R. Martin. It was decided to embody the suggestion in a remit to be forwarded to the Municipal Association of New Zealand.

The bat used by C. C. Dacre in scoring 107 against the Marylehone Cricket Club at Lord's for the New Zealand eleven of 1927 has been mounted in silver and will shortly be available for display at the Devonport School. Mr. J. Hislop, who has secured the mounting, presented the bat to the school, which Dacre attended. The bat bears the names of the players engaged in the match.

"Once the crossing-keeper steps on to the crossing he should not allow any vehicle to pass over the line," said Mr., Wyvern Wilson, S.M., in the Hamilton Magistrate's Court yesterday, when a motorist was charged with passing over the Victoria Street crossing when tho lino was engaged. Defendant said that when ho approached tho crossing the crossing-keeper had his '-'stop" sign turned away. Defendant regarded that as an indication that he could cross, and when he realised his mistake it was wiser to proceed. The magistrate said the action of the crossing-keeper led to confusion. He accepted defendant's statement and ordered him to pay the costs.

There is more wild bird life in the vicinity of the city than would be supl>osed. * Until recently it was not an unusual sight to seo rabbits in King's Drive, near the sito of Luna Park, while a cock pheasant has been scon in tho open country near the railway tunnel at Parnoil. Yesterday California]} quail wore observed in tho One Tree Hill reserve. There wore about 15 birds, none of which seemed in the least disturbed by passing motor-cars.

At the Teachers' Appeal Court at Wanganui the secretary of the Wanganui Education Board said that tho school committees had power to grant three school holidays in the year for local functions such as shows or school picnics. An appellant said that one school committee had granted the school a holiday for her birthday. The witness remarked that it had not been done with the knowledge of the board. The appellant then asked if she were not important enough for the school to have a holiday to celebrate her birthday. There was no answer to the question.