WELLINGTON NEWS NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2412, 24 May 1900, Page 19

WELLINGTON NEWS NOTES.

WELLINGTON, May 15. j The proceedings in connection with the wharf labourers' demands now before the Conciliation Board occasionally border on the farcical. An instance of this occurred to-day. It had been agreed to take the evidence of four men at one time regarding a certain point, one man speaking for the others, in order to save time. The procedure was somewhat unusual ; indeed, it is probably the first time in history thatfour witnesses have been placed in the box ! and examined a? the same time. However, ' the four men stood up, and were duly sworn. After a time a member of the board ] raised a peal of laughter by putting the : following somewhat incoherent question : — " Supposing you six men were 'divided up into the four quarters of the globe, would you have the same feelings as you have now? " The question was a staggerer to the men, but one of them mildly remarked that there were only four of them standing there. ; It is stated on good authority that there is a serious rift in the Wharf Labourers' Union, and that there are likely to be some peculiar developments in connection with the case. Mr John Duthie, formerly M.H.R. for Wellington, intends paying a visit to Europe, and leaves New Zealand by the San Francisco mail boat next month. The experiment of employing boys to assist in keeping the streets of the city clean has nof bsen attended with satisfactory results, only two out of the six boys who started operations some weeks ago have stuck to the work, for which each received 10s a week. Labour is very scarce here. May 16. The Hon. J. G. Ward recently cabled to the Secretary of State for the Colonies asking if the new duties at the Cape would affect colonial produce, and has "now received a reply to the effect that the Government have no information that extra duties will be put on our products shipped there. The railway revenue continues to increase. The returns for April shenv an increase of £7356 over the previous April returns. The statement that the Westinghouse brake is to be applied to all trains in the ■North Island and only to express trains in the South Island is not correct. The express trains between Dunedin and Invercargill and Dunedin and Christchurch will be first Btted. The fitting on on the other rolling stock in the south will follow "in due course. The Wellington hockey players now charter a drag and drive to their ground on Sunday for , practice matches. Mr Justice Martin leaves .for Christchurch this evening for the purpose of ■clearing up some Supreme Court work there. He will go on to Auckland next week to take up the business of the Arbitration Court. The Agricultural department has shipped 70 horses by the s.s. Rotomahana, which leaves for the south to-day, and will tranship the animals at Port Chalmers to the remount steamer Ormazan for South Africa. ■The Ormazan will take hi all 300 remounts for the New Zealand contingents at the front. ' I