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Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 10140, 29 August 1904, Page 1

The success of the Berne (Switzerland) popular theatre experiment is assured. Twice a. week the doors of the principal play-houses are opened to the public at the nominal price of 10 cents to all-com-ers. Although theatres are subsidised by tlie State m some other countries, the Swiss axe the first without State aid to bring to the drama the intelligent and even educated citizens who cannot pay the cheapest rates at the regular performances. The deficit m the box-office receipts is made up from a fund of £800 raised by voluntary gifts.

Mr E. W. Colo, the well-known Melbourne bookseller, who has always strenuously opposed the White Australia policy, has returned from a visit to Japan, and after careful observation has come to the conclusion that the influence of eun and climate is solely responsible for brown and black people. He has issued a leaflet on which lie shows the zones where white, brown and black skins are produced. He is convinced, for reasons which he gives and illustrates, tliat ail I colored people would gradually become white if always shaded from staong sunlight, while white people would become brown or black if they went about unclothed m the strong sunlight where the brown and black abound.

The Acting Superintendent of Tourist Resorts, m his annual report, sa.yu lie m- j tends to place before the Minister a proposal for the purchase of a small aerated water plant, to enable the Department to bottle and place on sale m. a more palatable and attractive form some of tlie most valuable mineral waters of the colony. Dr Wohlmann, In a reference to the subject, says an aerating plant should be set urp at Rotorua and the waters bottled. By this means they would be. rendered more palatable, and would keep better. Table waters, bottled by the same plant, could supply the Government acconunodatiott houses and the Kudway dining cars, and there is ho reason why they should not be exported. The Postmaster-General (Sir* J. G. Ward) tells readers of August Life tha<> "among the nearer- possibilities is tliat of having a post and telegraph ofiice, or its equivalent, m every house m the krger cities. In America, tJie practicability of the collection and delivery boxes, into which letters are deliveired and at the same, time letters for posting are taken flway, has been fully demonstrated, and the system is very popular. I made a tentative trial of this m New Zealand, but the time was not ripe, or at any lute the public did not sec its way to .pay the email fee for the delivery and collection service. A telephone office m the house, or, rather, a- delivery and transmission of telegrams by the house-telephone, is more popular, and m time we may tad the systott adopted much more generally