GENERAL NEWS.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XIX, Issue 4947, 23 September 1914, Page 6

GENERAL NEWS.

The increasing importance of the poultry industry is emphasised by the tact that the Government has recently been advised by the Trade Commissioner at San Francisco that one of the large American, firms is sending a representative to New Zealand to be present at the beginning of the egg season. Owing to the dislocation of trade through the war it is considered that an extensive trade will bo possible with London, as the imports of eggs and poultry from foreign countries into the United Kingdom during 1913 amounted to nearly £10,000,000, the bulk coming from Denmark. Germany, Russia, Franco, and Italy. It is considered that New Zealand ought to be able to help make up the shortage that must be felt in the United "Kingdom, and the Auckland Poultry Association has formed an export committee which is taking the matter in hand. One of the questionable occupations of the city, in which sharp salesmen make money out of the ordinaiy 'housewife’s keenness for “bargains,” was mentioned in the Police Court at Auckland, when a man mimed Louis Irwin was charged with being a idle and disorderly person. The police stated that the accused was what was known as a “shoddy-dropper”. The practice of such persons was to buy cheap serges and similar cloths, to doii a sailor’s cap, and thou to make a. round of the suburbs offering the cloth for sale as a “bargain,“ and stating that it was something extra special which the vendor had smuggled into the country off a ship, ana goods worth about 10s were in this way sold for 30s. His Worship gave the man a chance by convicting and ordering him to come up for sentence when called upon, 1 Several thousands of Chinese are employed in the plantations af Samoa, and they nro considered by the Expeditionary force to bo the only serious internal problem requiring the attention of the administration. An established antagonism between tho natives of Samoa and the Chinese appears to be the disturbing influence, i On several occasions small forces have been detailed to suppress rioting by Chinese, and a rille shot into the air lias so far boon found an effectual 1 mentis of dispersing the coolies. A coolie who entered the l military lines one night and refused to halt at tho sentry’s challenge was summarily shot.