PAEIETS

Southland Times, Issue 17851, 5 August 1918, Page 6

PAEIETS

NOTES AND NEWS. All Southland railway lines are reported clear. Rugby football games were postponed on Saturday. The barometer was rising during the hours of night. The railways were used by many motorists on Saturday. Snowstorms closed Naseby school for at least three weeks. Some trees have fallen to the wind on local reserve areas. Nearly 1000 food prosecutions a week are heard throughout England. The revival of competitions is creating marked interest in Wellington. During the month just closed one Wellington bankruptcy was recorded. Weatherbound vessels arc creating a coal shortage at present in Auckland. A Wellington resident is to be prosecuted for sending matches through the post. After being covered by snow for some time, only one of a Glenmuk flock was missed on mustering. At the revived Wellington competitions in November the classes will number up to 143. Every person in Great Britain had, not Inter than June 10, to register with a tea retailer. The use of aeroplanes in England for exhibition purposes and dropping leaflets has been prohibited. A jilted English girl gave evidence against her late lover pointing to the fact of his being a military slacker. Six tons of sugar are being released weekly for the making of ginger beer for the use of men in Welsh tinplate works. Parcels of N.Z. cake for civilians in England are only forwarded at the risk of the consignors—soldiers’ parcels rank differently. Herts (Eng.) War Agricultural Committee have three horse-drawn potato sprayers for the use of farmers and others. In the crop of a wood pigeon shot on a farm at Cranbome, Dorset, 813 barleycorns were found by an investigator. Pension claims are now received at the rate of over 1000 a day in England, states the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The cages which formerly contained wild animals at the Southend Kursaal (Eng.) are now used for housing rabbits. Power is now given to local authorities in England to erect and maintain piggeries and buy and sell pigs of all ages. Though 62 volunteers offered themselves to the major in charge at New End Hospital, Hampstead, for inoculation, to And out what trench fever is, more were required. Margaret Rooney, 32, a soldier’s wife, who was said to have used her baby as a club with which to strike a neighbour, was sentenced recently in England to eight months’ imprisonment for cruelty. Walter Bentley, the well-known player, is now secretary to the Actors' Association of Australasia, and is a resident of Sydney. He was a great favourite in Maoriland in days gone by. A cargo of benzine which reached Auckland valued at, say, £IO,OOO, was passed on to private speculators al £12,000, and the latter let the public have the spirit at about £20,000. The Australian Socialist party have engaged the sendees of Mr Tom Mann for a lecture tour throughout the Commonwealth. The English Labourite is due to arrive during August. During the course of an address on the prisons of New Zealand Sir Robert Stout said that the Mount Eden gaol of Auckland is the finest in the Dominion. The gaol is so situated that there is little opportunity for out-of-door work. The members of the Ngapuhi tribe, now in camp at Narrow Neck, Auckland, have carried a resolution favouring the appointment of Mr A. Rupene, a discharged returned Maori soldier, to represent the North Auckland Maoris in the Legislative Council. Charlie Chaplin, in denying a rumour in New York that he was shortly to be married, said; “That rumour creeps up every little while, but there is no foundation for it. I am not about to be married, and I doubt whether I shall every marry.”

A golf club in the south of London which had half a dozen Gotha bombs dropped on its course early in the year, is now adapting three of the resultant holes for use as bunkers. They are of just the right size and shape, and in exactly the proper places to punish misdirected shots. The Australian Imperial Force casualties up to the week ended July 20 included; Dead, 49,998; wounded, 139,486; sick, 73,266 ; missing, 1147. The Australian Farmer, a 64-page illustrated monthly, is to appear in Melbourne early in August. It is to be run on lines similar to the N.Z. Farmer, published in Auckland. A. R. Cole, recently a Christchurch bookseller, has been remanded to the Supremo Court for sentence, having pleaded guilty to failing to account to the Red Cross Fund for amounts totalling £l7O 19s. When the proposal to abolish racing came before the N.Z. Fanners’ Union Conferencci at Wellington, Mr W. Couser (Southland) declared there were as honourable men connected with racing as with any other industry. He saw no reason why a wholesome pastime should be interfered with. In the Raglan portion of the Auckland province some farmers are troubled with wckas which are absolutely protected. The weka, once numerous, is now a rare bird in Southland. A curious suicide has been reported to the Melbourne police. C. C. Combridge, a returned soldier, was accidentally shot in tbs groin. His mate went for assistance, and on returning found Combridge dead, with -a wound in the head. The coroner found that deceased shot himself whilst suffering agony from a gunshot wound. The N.S.W. Returned Soldiers' and Sailors’ Imperial League are asking the Federal Government to replace all men in the Defence Department fit for active service with returned soldiers, as soon as suitable men are available. The military authorities in., Victoria have taken action to place under stricter surveillance several persons of enemy descent resident in the State, including some of prominence in the community. A tailor of Gilgandra (N.S.W.) recently broke his leg for the third time this year. This is his forty-second major break, without including fingers and toes. He has only just turned 34 years of age. An 11-year-old son has had no less than nine breaks, j The N.Z. Farmers’ Union, Conference resolved on Tuesday last that it 1 should be the duty of the teachers in charge of all schools on State occasions to have the national flag hoisted and saluted. The eldest daughter of the Rev. G. T. Marshall, formerly Wesleyan minister at Otautau, died at Auckland last week. Despite the increased cost of material owing to war conditions, and, despite strike troubles, the finances of the N.S.W. Railway Department (railway and tramways) for the year ended June 30 last show a small surplus, against a deficit of £412,000 during the previous term. Speaking in regard to the proposal made at the N.Z. Farmers’ Union Conference to abolish racing, Mr J. O’Neill (Hastings) a-ked the opponents of racing if there wa a not more time lost by farmers in attending sales and sitting on the rails of the saleyards than by men attending races. Very rarely has a singer enthused a Wellington public as has Cappelli, the goldenthroated Italian tenor. When it came to his final numbers (says the Dominion) the applause, which had been generous throughout the evening, increased in volu*e until cheers rent the air. “Every German who can shoulder a rifle has been put into the army,” said a Middlesex man, one of a party of 29 returned soldiers arriving in London. “The result is that every prisoner who can crawl has to do work of some kind for the Germans. The only things plentiful in Germany are work and water.”