THE EXHIBITION.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXI, Issue 8770, 23 March 1907, Page 2

THE EXHIBITION.

Day by Day. By Telegraph—Special Service. Cheistchttech, March 22. The Fire Brigade Competitions were concluded on the Exhibition Sports Ground to-day, under moat auspicious circumstances. In the evening a banquet was held in the main corridor, over which Deputy-Mayor Payling presided, and at which the Acting-Premier, Hon. Hall-Joues, was one of the speakers. The whole of the lower half of the main avenue ■was occupied by the banquet, In the Concert Hall to-night Mr Purcell Webb, Kelson organist, gave the last of his series of organ recitals, before a largo attendance. The school cadet encampment at the Exhibition is fully, occupied at present, the battalions in camp comprising Taranaki and Wanganui companies, to the number of 572 with 30 officers, and 113 Nelson lads with seven officers. A large number of schools from different parts of Canterbury and Otago have visited the Exhibition during the past few weeks, being accommodated at the Exhibition “Home.” Children from no less than four schools arrived to-day, and notice has been received of the intention of several other schools to visit shortly. Two fine exhibits of perennial ryegrass/ grown in Southland have been placed in the Southland Court by an Invercargill firm. The weight of ono sample is 33lbs to the Imperial bushel, and of the other 341bs. Weights such as these are very rarely met with. At the production of “ Elijah ” in the concert hall on Tuesday and Wednesday nest Miss Amy Murphy will take soprano, Miss Le Cron contralto, J. Bari Puschell tenor, and John Trouse baritone. The oratorio will bo given by the Exhibition orchestra and a choir of 140 voices, with Henry Wells, the well-knowivchureh organist, as conductor. Purchasers of tickets for. any part of the house will be admitted free to the Exhibition.

There was a large attendance at Wonderland this evening to take partin the search for buried treasure and new physical development competitions. The display of ladies’ arms and ankles did not take place, the manager of Wonderland explaining when the curtain rose on the special platform erected, that the Acting-Premier had prohibited this feature. Clever representations of classical statuary were given instead by a lady cpecially engaged, and a number of leading physical culturists exhibited the development of their muscles in different poses, prizes being awarded to the best developed. Several hundred men and women purchased licenses to dig for the buried nugget. No nugget was really buried, possibly because if one had been, difficulty might have been experienced in discovering the finder. Instead twentyfour wooden blocks, each bearing a number, were buried in a largo enclosure, and holders c? licenses dug for theso energetically till time was called at the end of twenty minutes. It was explained beforehand that the numbers of all blocks found would be placed in a box and tx lady in the audience be invited to draw a" number, and the holder of tbo block with tho corresponding number would then receive £lO. "When twenty minutes had expired five men and boys wore tho only persons who had found blocks. The draw was made by a lady in the presence of an independent committee, and tho prize fell to a boy, for whom loud cheers wore given. A display of ono hundred typical sorts of pears and apples will be made to-

morrow in the Agricultural Department’s

court with fine exhibits of fruit in tho Hawke's Bay, North Canterbury and South Canterbury courts. These should prove of great interest to growers. The attendance to-day was 12,700,