Delivery of Mails

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23692, 27 December 1938, Page 8

Delivery of Mails

There will be no delivery of mails at private residences to-day. To-mor-row there will be one delivery only. Overseas Mail The Awatea left Sydney on Friday for Wellington with 80 bags of Australian mail and three Empire air despatches. The mails should reach the local office this evening. The Empire despatches from Dunedin of December 5 and 6 reached London on Monday and Thursday of last week respectively. Oversight with £SO Note Apparently as a result of an oversight on the part of a customer, an unexplained £SO note was discovered among the day's takings of an Auckland Arm. It is thought that the note may have been tendered in mistake for a 10s note, to which it bears a marked resemblance, and steps are being taken to locate its owner.

Retailers' Good Christmas A Press Association telegram states that Napier and Hastings retailers are unanimous that the Christmas trade this year constituted a record. On Friday night and Saturday morning there were the largest crowds of shoppers in the streets since the preslump days, and money was spent freely. Frost in Christchurch

A frost of 4.2 degrees was recorded in Christchurch on Saturday morning. This is the heaviest frost which has been recorded in the month of December since 1919, when there was a frost of 5 degrees. The hardest frost yet experienced in December was in 1913, when there were 5.6 degrees. Week-end Fire Calls

The City Fire Brigade turned out at 11.32 on Saturday morning to an outbreak of Are in a sedan motor car wh'ich was parked near the railway station. The wiring of the car was damaged before the blaze was extinguished. At 4.56 in the afternoon the brigade answered an automatic false alarm from the call-box at the Stock Exchange. An automatic false alarm from the Hillside Railway Workshops occupied the attention of the brigade at 0.29 a.m. on Sunday, and at 3.49 on the same morning a call was received to a two-roomed wooden dwelling in Leith street, which was badly gutted before the outbreak could be extinguished. The house, which is owned by Mr P. W. Stabb, was occupied by Mr S. McNalley. Estates for Probate

During the present year a total of 1063 estates has been filed for probate at the Auckland Supreme Court, this being the second highest recorded. The largest number was reached in 1936/ when 1101 were filed. Last year, on account of a separate registry being established at Whangarei, where many such applications are now received, the Auckland total fell to exactly 1000. The only previous occasion on which 1000 has been reached was in 1919, when" the figures were greatly swollen' on account of the heavy mortality caused by the epidemic of 1918.

Dunedin Railway Station During the holiday season last summer a broadcasting system was temporarily installed at the Dunedin Railway Station platform to supply the public with information concerning the arrival and departure of trains, and also to give particulars of various station and service facilities. It has now been decided to equip the Dunedin station with permanent announcing apparatus similar to that which is being so successfully'operated at the Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch stations, where the system has proved a real convenience and time-saver to thousands of daily travellers by train, as as to people seeing friends off or meeting trains. New Zealand's Desert There are New Zealanders unaware that a desert exists in the centre of the North Island (writes the Taihape correspondent of the Auckland Star). Many varied experiences have befallen travellers who have used the Desert road, between Tokaanu and Waiouru, but the following incident will probably bring back some memories:—A party travelling from Tokaanu recently had dallied too long there, making their travelling time too short to make Taihape that night to keep an appointment. So they decided to take the shorter route, instead of the National Park road. Their troubles began when halfway through the desert. Bowling along with, everything seeming to be in their favour, they ran into a sand drift, and their car remained fast stuck, so a weary party tramped into a public works camp not far distant, where they were put up for the night. They made an early start next morning with tools and equipment to free their car. Imagine their surprise, however, when they found the roadway clear and the car standing ready to be driven off. The only explanation was that an air cmv rent caused by the position of the car had sifted the sand away as easily as it had been deposited there.

Heavy Loss of Young Trou* The Whangarei Acclimatisation Society suffered a severe loss when about 80,000 rainbow trout fingerlings died at the society's hatchery at Onerahi last week. This hatchery, which is the only one north of Rotorua, is situated in a valley through which runs a spring-fed stream. The curator, Mr P. J. Mcllride, fed the fingerlings at 6 o'clock on Wednesday evening, but when he went next morning to the ponds practically all were dead. The fish had been raised at thfe hatchery from the ova stage, and in the fry stage had been put into two holding ponds of about 800 gallons each. These ponds are fed by the running stream. The fish were all in excellent condition, and were nearly ready for liberating. Now only about 80 in one pond and 300 in the other are left. The loss to the society amounts to £320, besides delaying the progressive stocking of North Auckland streams.

Buried Forests

Besides tapping a supply of pure water for the Normanby township of 1000 gallons an hour, a well bored within the Town Board district has disclosed (reports the Taranaki correspondent of the Evening Post) that the land surface in the vicinity was once 105 feet lower than it is now. Two distinct former land surfaces were discovered, the first 40 feet down and the second 105 feet. At each level there was a buried forest, and much mixed volconic rock, scoria and pumice. There was also evidence of two eruptions. The timber is remarkably well preserved, the texture being rough and stringy, without any signs of decay.

Landmark Destroyed Criticism of the action of employees of a power board in destroying a pohutukawa tree at Maketu, which, he said, was nearly 100 years old, was expressed by Mr H. Tai Mitchell when the Rotorua Borough Council was considering a letter from the Auckland Provincial Centennial Council in regard to the planting of trees along the Auckland-Rotorua highway as a centennial memorial. Mr Mitchell stated that the tree had been at. the side of the main road and had been cut down during power line extensions, when a deviation of only 10 feet would have saved it. He thought that when the Government was suggesting to local bodies that they should plant trees as centennial memorials steps should also be taken to ensure that a curb was put on the practice of power boards throughout the Dominion of chopping down trees during power line extensions. Clothing for Camping

"Most people take sufficient light clothing to camp with them, and as is well known, white and light shades are the coolest," says the summer holiday precautions' statement of the Canterbury medical officer of health, Dr T. Fletcher Telford. "The clothing should be sufficient to keep the body reasonably warm when at rest. If violent exercise has been undertaken, with the production of much perspiration, or if the wearing apparel has been soaked by rain when in use, keep moving, so as to keep warm till you can reach your camp and change into fresh, dry clothing. It is always advisable when proceeding by car to wear some warm garment next to the skin, as neglect to do so is often punished by an attack of neuritis in that part of the body most exposed to the draught. If neuritis results through neglect in this respect, it may bother you for a matter of two or three weeks, and so completely ruin your holiday."

£IOO,OOO on Illuminations In England they make the most of their seaside resorts. Mr John Robertson, of Invercargill, who has just returned home after a tour abroad, said that Blackpool was an eye-opener to him.* He was there one week-end when excursion trains brought crowds from all parts of Scotland and England, and there was no room to move on the footpaths, so pedestrians thronged the roads. "At Blackpool £IOO,OOO has been spent on seven or eight miles of illuminations, and it is a wonderful sight. It is amusing to see the number of eating houses in the town. There are stands every 10 yards or so, where cockles, pies and other things are sold, and then there are many restaurants besides. Everybody seemed to be eating," he said.

Inadequate Publicity " It amazes me that a country with so much to offer to tourists should not tell more about it," said Mr Warren H. Bean, of Seattle, upon his arrival at Auckland on Friday by the Monterey from San Francisco, when referring to the meagre publicity given the Dominion in the United States. He said it was not until he and his wife stepped on board the Monterey and read the literature supplied that they learned so much about New Zealand. "Now that Americans have to a large extent stopped going to the Continent for their holidays," said Mr Bean, " it is a good opportunity for the Dominion to tell us what you have to offer." Swing from Sheep to Dairying • There is every probability that in the coming season there will be a definite swing back from sheep farming to dairying in Taranaki. The trend during the past two or three years has been the other way. A tour of Taranaki by a representative of the Evening Post reveals the inroads that sheep have made into a district formerly regarded as essentially dairying. Labour difficulties, not so much the increased wages which farmers generally are prepared to meet, but the impossibility in many cases of securing; reliable labour' either on wages or on the share system, have caused some farmers to change from dairying to sheep farming, and nave caused others to reduce their herds to such size as the available labour could handle without difficulty, and to replace displaced cows with ewes. Experienced farmers and men who keep in close touch with the stock market position predict that next season there will be a definite change.

The Railways Department announces in this issue particulars of the tram service to Wingatui in connection with the Dunedin Jockey Club's races today. for all youi requirements 111 Fishing I'ackle. Electrical Appliances, Electrical Repairs Contracts, and Jobbing call at Barth Electric. Ltd 36 George street Dunedin Fishing Catalogues still available.—Advt ■ ■ ' ' A. E. J. Blakeley and W E, Bagley, dentists. Bank of Australasia, corner of Bond and Rattray streets TeleDhone 12-359.—Advt

For rings watches, ana jewellery, try Peter Dick, jewellers arid opticians. n 9 Princes street Dunedin. 1 -Advt