TOWN EDITION

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11123, 24 July 1907, Page 3

TOWN EDITION

The net proceeds of a series of jperformances of "Maritana" bv St. Patrick's Operatic Society, Auckland, in aid of the Auckland Catholic Cathedral Building Fund, amounted to £250. During last year sixty-two deserters from H.M. warships whilst in New Zealand waters were reported to the police. During the same period forty-eight boys absconded from industrial schools witliin the State. In reply to a telegram from Mr R. Robb in reference to tbe wreck of the scow ■Surprise, as to whether there was any likelihood of lives being saved, Captain Pankow replied tliis afternoon from Tairua : "Have oeen to the wreck, which is (broken up to matchwood j nothing to save." Mr T. L. Joll, of Okiawa, Taranaki, will have six new* cheese factories erected "and equipper at a cost of £10,000 running during the coming season. Mr Joll informed the writer that he estimates his output from them will be over 2000 tons. Tlie cheese will be cured at each centre. The buildings have been erected alongside Mr Joll's creameries, so that suppliers cans deliver their milk to either the cheese factory or the skimming station. In Mr Joll's experience, farmers who understand how to make the best use of skim-milk in the feeding of calves and pigs calculate that the value of skim-milk over whey is equal to Id a pound of but-ter-tfat, but that the share-milker, as well as the farmer who does not regulate his work properly, recognises little difference in -the feeding value of the two by-pro-ducts. Mr Joll has decided not to erect cheese factories at two of his skimming centres. • "Mercutio," in' the N.Z. Herald, recounts the following story:— A witness, a. strong, hardy son of the sea, was asked! at the Kia Ora inquiry if the steps leading up to the bridge-deck were not i»6 steep for a man under the influence of liquor to get up without difficulty. "Oh, no," laughed the witness, "not at all, not to a sailor. Why," he continued, leminiscently, "when I was a young man I have run up to the royal tops -when I was drunk. Later, counsel for the Marine Department was cross-examining him, and referred to him as an "expert m the.in;. fluence of liquor, as he went". up to the royal tops while three-parts drunk.' 1 The witness waxed indignant. at the imputation that he waa only "thiee-parts," and he replied emphatically, "Full, not threeparts, I was full, drunk as a Lord." Bench and Bar alike had- to cease the more serious business for a little till the laughter subsided.. Among all the sea-birds that dash themselves to death at night against the thick glass of lighthouses the little dove petrel seems to head the list of victims in New Zealand. Talking with a Wellington Post reporter the other day a keeper, with a dozen years' experience in various stations, said h had known . very iew instances of the larger birds coming to grief against the glass, but the petrels perished by the hundred. When the nignts- are stormy these pretty skimmers of the sea, around Stephen's "Island, make for the cliff from which the bright light streams. There appears to be a warm refuge from the tempest, and* the birds, drive for the lamp, fast and straight, and soon the ground is strewn with battered bodies. The refugees come wit— such force sometimes against the thick glass that blood and feathers are left upon the surface. When the weatherVis fin the unintntional suicides are not -nearly so numerous, but there is some mortality practically every night, whether the elements are peaceful or bois terous.