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Southland Times, Issue 18964, 11 June 1923, Page 4

No change in the Postal delivery servise will be made as the result of the change in the half-holiday. Mails will be delivered on the Wednesday afternoon as previously and the postmen will observe the Saturday half-holiday.

A Press Association telegram from Dunedin states that the condition of the girl concerned in the Hayne case is very much improved. It is understood the original charge against Hayne will be withdrawn and another substituted charging him and Elizabeth Inglis jointly with the offence.

Messrs D. W. McKay, Ltd., offered for sale last Friday, in the Exchange Mart the following Municipal leases: —Section 4, block 1, North Invercargill, annual rental £3 10/-; section 16, block 3, Town of North Invercargill, annual rental £2 15/-; section 15, block 4, Town of North Invercargill, annual rental £3; Lot 1 of section 43, block 23, Invercargill Hundred, 100 acres, 2/9 per acre.

The danger of tea-drinking for children was pointed out by Dr. R. J. R. Mecredy, Government school medical officer, in the course of a lecture at Auckland. A mother would sometimes complain that her little son was nervous in temperament, and imagine that his teacher was overworking him, declared the speaker. On investigation it would most likely be found that the child was allowed to have three or four cups of tea a day. Such a stimulant was too great a strain for the child’s system.

Speaking at a special service at the Y.M.C.A. at Palmerston North (states an exchange), taking for his subject “The Declining Influence of Home and Family Life,” the Rev. Rugby Pratt said, inter alia: “What proof have we of this decay of home life? We have it in the spectacle of the number of young people who parade the streets of our more populated centres at night. Again, we have it in the desire for pleasure outside the family circle; fireside evenings are no more; after their work people seem disposed to dress and rush away as family companionships seem not to suffice. The home is forsaken for pleasures more exciting and in some cases the father neglects his home for office, club, or the theatre. Then there is the tendency of some mothers to transfer the care of their children to a nurse and some endeavour to evade the responsibilities of home life by living in flats, although on this point it must be remembered that in our more populated centres many are compelled to live in flats through circumstances over which they have no control. All these influences are menacing family life, and if that passes the grandeur and glory of our nation will fade.”

The increase in the work of Cabinet Ministers was referred to a few days ago by Mr A. Harris, M.P., who made the suggestion that the time had arrived when Parliamentary Under-Secretaries should be appointed (states the New Zealand Herald). “Every year the work of Cabinet is increasing,” said Mr Harris. “Frequent absences of the Prime Minister from the Dominion are becoming mere and more necessary. This fact, together with occasional illnesses of Ministers, places an impossible burden upon the other members of the Cabinet. It is at present physically impossible for any one man —no matter how capable he may be—to properly control the number of important portfolios some Ministers are endeavouring to carry. The suggestion I am making would relieve them of many of the lesser important duties which now occupy so much of their time. There is plenty of efficient material among the senior members of the Government party for this to be done, and the result, I am sure, would lead in a direction particularly desirable, namely, that of more “Ministerial” rather than “departmental” control of the country’s affairs. Much of the detail work, which now occupies the time of Ministers, could be just as effectively carried out by undar-secretarito.”

A Westport message states that, before Mr Meldrum, S.M., on Tuesday, several Karainea electors petitioned the Court to declarp void the election of Walter Cressey for the Karamea riding of the Buller County Council, on several grounds, the principal one being that the chief booth in Karamea was closed ten minutes before 6 o’clock, the hour fixed by Statute for closing of the poll. Mr Cressey defeated Mr W. R. Simpson by one vote. Lengthy evidence was given, three electors alleging that they were precluded from voting owing to the early closing of the booth. The Magistrate held that one claimant was not entitled to vote, and that even if the booth was closed before the time, as alleged, the other two electors arrived some four or five minutes after 6 p.m., the actual time. Therefore, the result of the election was not affected by the early closing. The petition was dismissed, with costs.

A Taranaki farmer related to a Wanganui friend an interesting little transaction he had with his bankers recently (relates an exchange). He desired to transfer his account, which was a substantial one, from one bank to a similar branch in a neighbouring town. He duly presented his cheque for the amount, and fairly took the breath of the banker away. The latter naturally asked a few questions, and when he learned it was only a matter of transfer, he most obligingly offered to attend to the detail. “What will it amount to?” asked the owner. “Between £9 and £lO, the usual rate of exchange,” said the banker. “But I have my motor and can reach the other town in less than half an hour, and am not afraid of being robbed,” replied the owner. The banker then had to admit that he did not have such a large sum on the premises. The owner, who had served his apprenticeship in a bank, knew a good deal about the internal workings, and asked for the bank’s own cheque, free of exchange. Reluctantly, the banker lost the commission and handed over the cheque.

The value of social life is dealt with by the ex-principal of the Wellington Training College, in his annual report, as follows:—“The school has long been divided on the supposedly rival claims of the individual as opposed to those of the community, but it is slowly learning that they are complementary aspects of human progress. Great discoveries, great undertakings, great ideas, are the result of social, as much as individual work, and consequently education cannot afford to neglect any means that make for training in citizenship, and its institutions must provide opportunities for actual living as citizens. The teaching of history or civics, or morality or patriotism alone, is futile, just because it is true that thought is useless unless it leads to action. The school is a community ‘in little/ but no school is so small that it cannot provide the best possible training ground for all the civic virtues that really count. The potential power of a training college is such that the responsibilities outlined above appear to‘ us to require continual reiteration.”

Cases are known in which fathers, by their wills, left allegedly unfilial sons a shilling or some other small sum. Interesting observations on such actions were made by Mr Justice Reed in giving written judgment in a case which came before the Supreme Court at New Plymouth recently, in which a son applied for an alteration in respect of his share of his father’s estate. His Honour, inter alia, states: “The £lO left to the plaintiff is, on the face of it, intended as a slight. If the plaintiff, by his treatment of the testator, or by his character .. . has warranted this treatment, the Court will not interfere, for, indeed, it may well be that there should still remain in the hands of the aged a means by which they can reward those of their children that are kindly and considerate, and punish the unfilial. But old people sometimes take strange fancies and unjustifiable antipathies, and may do, as many have done, a moral injustice in their wills to those who have a moral claim upon their bounty. *lt is to repair such injustices that the statute was passed.

Victorian judges have of late indulged in some strong comment when sentencing thieves and housebreakers (says the Melbourne Age), but none appears yet to have indulged in the “bitter condemnation” attributed to Lord Kenyon, in England, when sentencing a prisoner who had been convicted of stealing much wine from his employer’s cellar. “Prisoner at the bar,” said His Honour, “you have been found guilty on the most conclusive evidence of an inexpressible atrocity—of a crime that defiles the sacred springs of domestic confidence and that is calculated to strike alarm into the breast of every Englishman who invests largely in the choice vintages of Southern Europe. Like the serpent of old, you have stung the hand of your protector. Befriended by your generous employer, you might, without dishonesty, have continued with the comforts of sufficient prosperity, and even with some of the luxuries of affluence; but, dead to any claim of natural affection, and blind to your own real interest, you burst through all the restraints of religion and morality, and feathered your nest with your master’s bottles.”

An authentic disclosure of the recent trading losses of the Commonwealth Government line of steamers is expected to be made at an early date (states the Melbourne Age). The balance-sheet for the year ended June 30, 1922, will be published as soon as possible after Cabinet has considered the future policy with regard to the line, in the light of information now being prepared by the general manager (Mr Larkin) for submission to the Prime Minister. It is significant that according to a published intimation by cable the similar shipping enterprise conducted by the Canadian Government made a trading loss of £2,000,000 in the last financial year. If Commonwealth taxpayers who have provided the money and guarantees for this impulsive enterprise escape with half such a trading loss on the last financial year they might derive some consolation from the more disastrous experience of Canada. Nearly two years have passed from the date up to which balance-sheets of the line have been published, and an enormous sum of money, estimated at several millions, will have to be written down owing to depreciation of capital value. Upon this and other heads detailed information and calculations are being made by the general manager, who is not in a position publicly to discuss the affairs of the line.

Last Thursday the oldest church in Taranaki celebrated its seventy-eighth anniversary—the Te Henui Anglican Church, which was completed so long ago as March 1845. All that remains of the original building now is the nave of the Holy Trinity Church. There is something particularly historic about this old church; for it is intimately associated with the memory of that pioneer churchman and first Bishop of New Zealand, George Augustus Selwyn. It was he who selected the site, and it was he who used his private means to erect a church for the needs of the 70 or 80 people then living in the “small hamlet on the east bank of the river.” The Bishop arrived in Auckland in May, 1842, and immediately commenced the herculean task of visiting the various parts of his diocese. He had no trains or motor-cars, or roads to help him. He had to rely on his Maori guides to lead him through trackless forests, over mountain ranges and across numerous rivers. It was on this occasion that he selected the sites for the Henui Church and St. Mary’s. Afterwards he returned to Wellington by the Government brig Victoria. Nevertheless, he was not daunted and so on October 28, 1842, he came to New Plymouth. He had walked from Wellington, a distance of 271 miles! “I am much satisfied,” he wrote in his diary, “by the disposal of the people of this settlement and the friendship and cordial manner in which I have been received. The New Plymouth settlement pleases me much by its honest agricultural character and the absence of attempt to appear what it is not. My impression is that an active and zealous clergyman will find a most hopeful field of usefulness among the Devonshire immigrants, who seem really desirous of such a privilege.”

The favourable copditions for the manufacture of cement that exist at Portland and Warkworth were the subject of comment by Sir George Elliot, chairman of the directors of the Wilsons (N.Z.) Portland Cement Company. Through ingenious manufacturing methods, he said, cement could be produced from limestone and cement rock, from limestone and shale or clay, from limestone and blast furnace slag, or from marl and shale or clay. In every case, the principal constituents were lime, alumina, and silica. “AU are common enough,” said Sir George, “but it is rare that there is found such a combination as exists at Portland and Warkworth of cement rock, white limestone, coal and water power all in the immediate district, and where the materials are grouped in such a usable form and free from all objectionable compounds.”

In this work-a-day world, when commercialism seems to grip at the very heart of our everyday life, and when most things are valued according to their monetary value, people do not always realise the deeds of heroism which are going on unseen around them (remarks the Auckland Star). Lately a man, to save the life of a fellow-workman, allowed himself to be drained of every drop of blood which he could with safety to his own life aflow the surgeon to take, so that it might be put into the veins of another whose life was despaired of and whose sole chance of recovery depended on the infusion of blood. It meant fully six months of careful going before he could recover, and it meant a big loss in wages to the man who had saved the sick man’s life. He had to draw heavily on his Savings Bank account, and he had in consequence to put off his wedding for another few months, but he was satisfied and never uttered a word about what he had done. Some of his actions were misunderstood, and it was only through a chance word of another that the story of heroism leaked out lately, fully eight months after the event had taken place. All the Otago and Southland saw-mills are working at full pressure in the endeavour to meet the increasing demand for timber, and this increasing demand is accepted by the best-informed men as the herald of a great building boom in Dunedin and other centres ( states the Dunedin Star). The indications are that building timber grown in New Zealand will rise in price. This is a fair deduction that was brought to notice to-day by a merchant in conversation with a Star reporter. The first of the fact is that the supply of native timber is gradually diminishing, and cannot be materially reinforced until the opening of the Otira tunnel gives access to the West Coast forests. The second outstanding fact is that imported timbers are going to be scarce. Recent advices from the Pacific Coast are to the effect that the mills there are running day and night to try to meet the call for lumber from San Francisco and other places, and the Manchester Guardian is the authority for the statements that the total production of timber will fall short of the pre-war quantities for years to come, until, in fact, Russia fully recovers, and that Sweden, Norway, Finland, and the Baltic States are advancing their production almost to the limit of their capacity.

When a lady orders that her fur coat be dyed one colour and it .48 dyed another, is she entitled to regard the coat as ruined and claim ite : value in damages? An interesting case of this description was heard by Judge Wasley in the County Court in Melbourne (says the Age), when Nance Markham, of Victoria street, Carlton, asked for £l6 10s damages from Sarah Corfield, trading as the Canadian Fur Company, Russel street, Melbourne. Plaintiff’s case was that in November of last year she left a grey fur coat with defendant to be dyed light brown. After calling for the coat several times she was shown a black coat in pieces, which defendant said was plaintiff’s light grey, but that the dyers had made a mistake in the dyeing. Plaintiff had paid £9 9s for the coat new some years ago. The same kind of coat was now worth £lB 18s. An expert called for plaintiff stated that the coat was now a “nigger brown,” and she valued it at £lO. Defendant stated that when the coat was left it was to be dyed light brown. Judge Wasley held that there had been a breach of contract, and gave judgment for plaintiff for one shilling, on the understanding that the coat was to be put together, lined, and returned to plaintiff within a week. Defendant was ordered to pay £5 5s costs.

By request Mrs Stanley Brown, with her bevy of bright maidens, will repeat the Crimson Ramblers on Tuesday, Invercargill Parish Hall, South Invercargill—(Advt). The greatest money saving event in the history of Southland begins on Thursday. Watch the Progressive Stores. —(Advt). For the purposes of good business there is nothing like a quick turnover in a grocer’s stock. That is why Baxter gives such splendid value for prompt cash. S.P.Q.R.—(Advt). Winter Clothing at cut cash prices. Large woollen scarves 2/6 each. Woollen gloves 2/6, 3/6, 4/6 pair. Children’s gloves 9d to 2/11 pair. Woollen socks 1/6, 1/11, 2/3, 2/11 pair. Wool cardigan jackets, 12/6, 13/6, 15/6. Golf hose 2/11, 3/6, 4/6 pair. (Rural parcels post free). Pram rugs 10/6 each. McNeil and Clark, Dee Street.—(Advt). KORTLANG AT PAPEETE. Mr. Kortlang enthused Messrs. Bambridge Dexter and Co., who have taken over the Oceania Agency for Fluenzol and Q-tol. They ask for an urgent shipment.—(Advt). Visit Thomson and Beattie’s Millinery Salon for best values. Trimmed Hats from 10/6, 15/6, 19/6 to 25/6. Ready to Wears 5/11, 7/11, 10/6 to 30/-. See also the All Wool Flannel School Dresses, usually 10/6, 15/6, 17/6 to 37/6, clearing at 6/11, 7/11, 8/6 to 22/6 each.—(Advt). Schoolboy—schoolgirl—commercial man or business woman—in fact everybody will appreciate the “Onoto” people’s latest pen production “The 1923 Everybodys” pen at the popular price of 7/6. In this case you cannot measure merit in terms of price. “Everybodys” looks, acts, and feels like the guinea article. Who’s to say it isn’t ? The “write” gift. Hyndman’s sell it. l (advt.) ITS COMING. The greatest money saving event in the history of Southland. Great preparations have been made; our huge stocks of over £75,000 worth of high-grade drapery, clothing, furnishings and wearing apparel of every description, have been secured for cash from the foremost manufacturers of the world. This big drive is to welcome back the peoples’ favourite shopping day. Every one of our efficient staff of over 130 have a welcome for you, and will be pleased to show you round. The stocks are the largest and best selected it has been our privilege to show, and the values are striking examples of our progressive policy. Each section will be. aglow with piles of attractive goods, and the wonderful offerings are worth coming tn any miles to see. Every evening our windows and Aeroplane will be lighted up. Watch the papers for our gigantic sale announcements, at H. & J. SMITH, Ltd., Progressive Stores, Tay and Kelvin Streets, Invercargill, and Main Street, Gore. (Advt). The following are some of the many different diseases and ailments we have successfully treated by Professor Kirk’s methodes in our Institute: Asthma, bronchitis, Ulceration and dilation of stomach, hip disease, synovitis, sciatica, lumbago, rheumatism, eczema, bladder troubles, neuritis and nerve troubles of all kinds. Consult Mr D. Marshall. Kirk’s Institute, Leet street. Tel. 315. — (Advt.). THE BUSINESS THAT PROSPERS, Is one wherein everything is conducted with maximum efficiency and minimum expense. Our Furniture Removal Staff is composed of expert packers who work expeditiously saving your time and money. Try us and see tie difference.—THE NEW ZEALAND EXPRESS CO., LTD.— (advt.).