AUCKLAND

Otago Witness, Issue 2804, 11 December 1907, Page 33

AUCKLAND

Interviewed on the 3rd as to the progress of the Piako Swamp drainage works, Sir Joseph Ward stated that there were 50 men now employed cutting channels and drains. Two specially-constructed Priestman dredgers have been cabled for to England to out a channel 15 miles long from the mouth of the Piako to the Waitakaruru, and tho works will be energetically pushed on under the supervision of Mr Brakill, ■who is in charge of the works. When this work is completed I hope and believe, said Sir Joseph, that the swamp will be turned into some of the best land available in the province. A stevrard on a coastal boat "who applied to the Health Department for advice as to the extermination of cockroaches, after being unsuccessful with kerosene, crude petroleum, beuzine, boric acid, and carbolic aoid, claims to have entirely 'id his ship of the peso by using a substance found in a natural state at Tauranga. Cockroaches are a 6enous nuisance on 6teamers, and the experiments which are being carried out are watched with considerable interest.

Mr Chambers, who was purser of the ill-fated Elingamite, after an investigation of the message found in a, bottle at Kaihu Creek, purporting- to have been signed by Mr Fraser (engineer), and stating that the Elingamite had been wrecked and that the eeoond mate had gone mad, says it is not genuine. The writing does not resemble Mr Fraser'e. The third mate was in charge of the boat Mr Fraser was in, not the second mate, and the bottle in which the message was found was of a brand not kept in the Elingamite's stores.

At the invitation, of Major Rackham, of the Salvation Army, the Hon. Geo. Fowlds Minister of Education and Public Health, pioceeded on the sth inst. on a visit of inspection to the new home for inebriates at Bell's Island, the s.s. Ruru being chartered for the occasion. Speeches were made by Messrs Fowlds, Kidd, Poole, M.P.'a, *nd others, eulogising the Army work in re-, claiming the fallen. shop in Grey street, Auckland, on the Bth, and a quantity of liquor was found, a quantity of liquor was found. The long-continued absence of rain is acutely felt by farmers. Tho grain crops are stunted, and growth has almost ceased. Unless the drought is relieved before long the consequences will be serious.

So far as can be ascertained, all the immigrants who arrived by the lonic last week — over 600— have obtained employment. There 16 still a good demand for farm hands.

The total contributions on hospital Saturday and Sunday amounted to £428, not counting the money in hotel boxes, which has not yet been gathered in.