LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 7, 24 August 1911, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A lecture will he delivered in the Municipal Chambers to-morrow evening by Mr. (). M. Ha-wson, ciuutried accountant, the subject being “Business Methods for 'Business Men.” Business men are invited to be present.

“The plaintiff had to travel secondclass because she had to lie down all the t hue, and she could not do that in the iirst-cl ass carriage; and, rnoroo’. er, as a rule, second-class passengers are more considerate of then fel-low-travellers than the first-class people are.”—Remark by counsel in the Auckland Supreme Cornt. Additional land has been taken under _ the Public Works Act lor a Ministerial residence in Moles worth Street (says the Wellington “Post”). Ihe land adjoins what is popularly known as the late Mr. Sod do ids house and it was the property of the Diocesan Trustees. It had long been occupied in connection with the Molesworth Street house. The land consists of_ ]“.7 perches, and has boon taken with the assent of the Diocesan Trustees.

Mrs. Zangwill, wife of the wellknown author, speaking at a meeting of the Actresses’ Franchise League at the Criterion Restaurant, in London, said that one of the main anti-sit/Frag-isfc arguments was the mime,ideal preponderance of women, whieii, they said, would mean petticoat government. She could not sco why it should he worse for men to he under a petticoat government than it was now for women tar ho under a trousers gororupieut. (Laughter.) What they needed was a divided-skirt government. (Laughter.) It lias boon ascertained that provision for invalided seamen is not made hy existing legislation in the case of New Zealand vessels “trading foreign” : that is to say, if a vessel owned and registered in Now Zealand trades off the coast, no provision need he made in regard to payment cf seamen landed ill, as is'done in the case of vessels on the coast or the Homo traders. in .the case of the former, throe months’ wages and other provisions have to he made, and in the case of the deep-water vessels (owned and registered outside of New Zealand) a deposit not exceeding; £SO has to he made and wages paid if men arc land-

ed sick. A vessel trading between Now Zealand and Chatham Ishv’ds, or between New Zealand and San Crancisco and Vancouver, although owned and registered in New Zealand, is exempt, it seems, from this liability. Tim matter has been mentioned to the Minister ol Alai urn by Mr. T. W. Young, secretary of the Seamen’s. I'uion, with a view to tir. being rectified during the present session.

An emu, which was an attraction at Cook Park, in Orange (N.S.W.), died the other week, and was subjected to a post-mortem examination, as to the cause of the demise. In his interior were discovered four pennies, six halfpennies, nine 2Ain. nails, fivp marbles, one pump connection, one umbrella ferrule, one hey, one modal, one- watch wheel ‘Ain. in diameter, two collar studs, one safety-pin, two staples, three washers, three coat buttons, twenty-four pieces of assorted crockery, glassware, etc., and one large pin 2in long, which was embedded in the liver, and was the probable cause of death.

A farmer in one of the upper districts has successfully tided a flock of several thousand sheep over the past two months by artificial feeding. He had a huge quantity of oat straw cut up, which lie sprinkled with diluted molasses, and fed out to the sheep in feeders. He also carted out an occasional load of turnips, and ho states his flock is in good condition, and the cost has not boon so great as one would imagine. Another farmer has had good results by feeding his breeding ewes with mangolds. The sheep did not take to the roots at first, but ultimately they devoured the mangolds voraciously—Ashburton “Mail.” Those drivers of vehicles who are in the havit of using the reins in place of runny, ay stopping gear, when leaving their horses standing, should take note of an accident which occurred in Guyton Street, Wanganui, the other afternoon, fortunately unattended by serious consequences. The reins were tied to one of the wheels, and the horse backing so tightened .the pressure on his month that his uoad was forced round, and in his struggles to free himself one of the shafts of the trap was broken. It took some time to get the horse out ol the trap, and it Was fortunate that help was at hand or worse damage might have ensued.

A letter received at a meeting of the \ ictorian Scottish Union, recently referred to a_ report that it was intended to depriye the Scottish regiments cf their distinctive uniform. The Act-ing-Min:stor of Defence (Senator McGregor) said that it had never been the intention of the Defence Department to abolish the identity of the existing militia regiments. Lord Kitchener had recommended that this should lie preserved as far as possible. The only uniform to be provided by the Commonwealth would be the adopted pattern; but if regiments liked to procure special uniforms for themselves he did not expect there would ho any objection to their use. At a time when the population problem is of a grave character, special interest will attach to a claim put up on behalf of the picturesque little town of O’Connell, a few miles out from Bathurst—namely, that it is the champion baby town of the Commonwealth. The Bathurst correspondent of the “Sydney Morning Herald” tele-, graphs that almost every house in O’Connell possesses at least one baby, and lie adds that infants were never so numerous in the township before. Furthermore, he says that O’Connell has set an example to the whole of Australia. " A .

Iho case cf Edward Harrell v. James Loutitt, set down for ’trial. at tno coining civil sittings of the Supremo Court at Dunedin, but reported on- Friday last to have been settled, was,of quite an unusual type. Horrell and Loutitt, states our Dunedin cor-, respondent, wore neighbouring farmcis .jit AVaipQpnanui. Loutitt, in October last, broke a window in Horrell’s house, threw some burning material into Miss Horrell’s room, and then, when the daughter called her father,_ Loutitt shot at Horrell, wounding him in four places. For the offence of attempted murder, Loutitt was sentenced to twelve years’ imprisonment, and he is now serving that sentence. Horrell subsequently claimed for £2OOO damages, but under the settlement Loutitt paid £IOOO, this sum to cover costs.

“For ways that are dark and tricks that are vain the heathen Chinee is peculiar.” Dr. Angas Johnson, of Adelaide, has received from a well-known resident of the Northern Territory an “exhibit” which makes manifest the trouble which the Chinese miner will take in order to outwit his unsuspecting European brother. The Chinese seem to be the principal workers in the mining industry, especially in surface “shows” in the Territory, and they often have to sell the results of their labour to the banks. Dr. Johnson says;—-“Thousands of pounds have been obtained from the banks by Chinese miners,engaged on cue alluvial fields in exchange for gold. It has boon ascertained, however, that in a great many instances this supposed gold was composed of much baser metals, and the loss to the banks as a consequence has amounted to a large sum. The Chinese prepare little irregular-shaped pellets of lead and zinc, which they gild over to represent the granular g )Id usually washed out of alluvial. This is so cleverly fabricated and disguised that it will deceive ‘the very elect.’ Expert miners cannot detect the fraud by either the weight, touch, or appearance of the metal. It answers the acid tests, and its component parts are discoverable only by analysis. It is worth about 8s an ounce. As gold is warth about £3 7s. 6d, it will bo soon that the astute Celestial makes a good profit out of his cunninguoss.”

Many queer tales have been told concerning the oversea Premiers during tneir stay in England (says a London correspondent). There was one concerning Mr Andrew Fisher (Commonwealth Premier), who refused to embark on a certain vessel to see the Naval Review because there were coloured seamen employed on board; another about a certain Premier who all unwittingly won the ardent admiration of " a most importunate person oi the female sex” to his own great embarrassment; of another whose fleeting references to one of liis colony’s primary industries resulted in his rooms being cumbered with a stack of raw, refined, and “omulsioncd” samples of a certain fish oil; and a hair-raising tale of how another Prime Minister was guarded, waking and sleeping, wherecver he wont, by a couple of Scotland \ aid’s most trusty minims, lest the assassin’s hand should cut short his days. Joking apart, a story is going the round of Fleet Street to the (■fleet that Scotland Yard kept special watch and ward over the Prime Minister of New Zealand from the moment ho landed in the Old Country till he embarked at Marseilles. The reason for this is said to be that a cretain ma.a, alleged to bo a disappointed New Zealand litigant, had threatened to “do Yard in” whilst Sir Joseph was at Home, and that the utterer of the threat was known to bo in England, and was actually staying at one of the hotels contiguous to the Cecil during the Coronation, but afterwards disappeared. How much of the tale as told in Fleet Street is true it is, of course, impossible to say, but the allegation that Sir Joseph 'Ward was the object of some solicitude on the part of Scotland Yard does seem to have some foundation in feet. For inllnciiva take Woods* Great - . Peppermint Cure; never fails. Is Gd and 2h* Gd *

A requisition is being signed in Elthara (says the “Argus") for the Hon. T. Mackenzie to address the electors there. Professor F. J. Cole has discovered that fleas are very fond of music, particularly that of the trombone. He has been conducting a series of experiments with many insects, in order to ascertain whether or not they possessed any musical talents, snd in a report made* to the Royal Society he makes some flattering observations regarding the pestiferous flea. Viscountess Harmcrton, the “rational dross" pioneer, who died in April, left personal estate in the United Kingdom valued at £44,259. She directed m her will, says the “Daily Mail," “that no one who professes to have any affection for me shall wear mourning or make tho smallest alteration in their clothing on account of my death.”

The mining market is deadly dull (says a Greymouth paper), arfd it is a condition that the jobbing brokers have helped to bring about. The publie is not in tho mining market, and rightly so, for the private speculators have at last realised that they cannot possibly receive justice and fair treatment when so many brokers are doing a jobbing business. The following resolution from the Taranaki Branch of the Teachers’ Institute was received yesterday without comment by the Education Board: “That this Institute views with regret the growing tendency of the Board to allow certain matters likely to embarrass teachers in the execution of their duties to be made public through tho medium of the press.”

Mav TV W. Kirk, said in Dunedin the other day that during the last three years tnore had been /added to the' area of commercial orchards in this country a total of 5000 acres, which did not include domestic orchards,’ and tho latest return published by the Government, which was in 1908, showed' that there were then 28,000 acres of laud laid out in commercial orchards in New Zealand. The'composition of Sousa’s Band is made up as follows: piccolo, three flutes, two oboes, two E-flat clarinets, eighteen B-flat clarinets, one bass clarinet, four saxophones, one basoon, one contra bassoon, four trumpets, two cornets, four French horns, two euphoniums, four trombones, two E-flat' basses, one monster bass, one Sousaphone, two side drums, one tympani, one bass drum, one bells and effects, one-harp.

,i A farmer at Springdale, near Temora (Mr. Amos Crisp) has obtained surprisingly good results during the past couple of years in growing pota- ' toes under straw (says “Dalgoty’s Review”)- Last year tno tubers were planted an inch under ground, and covered .with straw to a depth of about ten inches. The result was a heavy crop of potatoes, some weighing as much as 41b. each. The straw firotects, the plant when young from ate frosts, and they do with far less water than when grown in open land, besides being less trouble. Tire straw keeps the ground very moist. The following report by Mr F. J. Heat-ley on the work of the Stratford technical classes during the past month was adopted at yesterday's meeting of the Education Board;— Classes in book-keeping, drawing and dressmaking were being carried on for the second term. Continuation classes had not been started this term;, There was a likelihood of dresstaaking ! classes commencing J at Midhirst or Tariki. An instructor had been secured, for a course in utility poultry keeping, which would be gone on with if sufficient names were forthcoming.” The wool classing courses were about finished. 'Tire attendances thereat- had been rather disappointing this year. He had especially to thank Messrs. Sims and Mail for the energetic assistance received.

A further important development in battleship armament was recently announced by cable as being under the consideration of the Admiralty. When the Dreadnought was designed (writes the naval correspondent of the London “Daily Telegraph”! the familiar secondary armament of. Gin. guns—hitherto mounted in every large armoured vessel—was banished. The Dreadnought was given 10 12in, guns for battle, and 24 12-pounders of a new type for resisting attacks by torpedo craft. In later ships the 12pounder gun has been replaced by a new 4in. weapon, of which the newer battleships have 20 each and the battleship cruisers 16. Owing to the longer effective range of the torpedo and the stouter build of torpedo-craft,' a further increase in the penetrative power of the anti-torpedo armament is about to be made. The Americans

are using a bin. gun for this purpose, the Japanese a 6m. gun, and the Germans a 6.7 in. gun. These two latter weapons, on account of the weight of tne projectile—loolb and 1561 b respectively—are considered by most ordnance experts to be too large, as the shells cannot be readily lifted by hand. A consensus of opinion favours for the British service a gun of about the same character ns that adopted by the United States—probably a_ 4.7 inch weapon, with a projectile of 451bs, such as was used ashore with such admirable results in South Africa. The 4iu. gun at present in use has a shell of only 251 b. with a muzzle energy of 625 foot-tons, whereas the 4.7 in. weapon is a much more powerful piece. Either this gun or a Sin. gun will, it is believed, be adopted for the new British armoured ships. The French are gradually getting a more sure command of the military situation in Morocco. The special correspondent of the Times, in a letter, from Rabat, published recently, gives a striking account of the efficiency of the French military officers, especially in the matter of transport organisation. He tells us that when he joined the camel convoy at Skeriet the officer in command told him, before he said “Good night,” that the last camel would be clear of the camp at five o’clock the following morning. Having some experience of camel transport, the correspondent was inclined to be sceptical. Yet at five o’clock the next morning the convoy of 500 camels, carrying grain and biscuit, had cleared the camp. “I am not exaggerating when I say that I have never seen a more efficiently worked camel convoy.” The camels raoyed in ten sections in column. Behind each section was the chief camel man, an Algerian mounted Spahi, and a French corporal. It was his business to keep the camel-drivers up to the mark. He communicated with the Spahi Spahi communicated with the camel owner, and the camel-owner with his men, “usually with a stick, which finally reached the camel.” By these means the convoy was always closed up, and made a good five kilometres per hour into Rabat. It would seem as if the French organisers had based their system on the old rhyme of “Stick, stick, beat the dog; dog, dog, bite cow,” and so on. After all,; this is the essential principal in all organisation, the principle that the order given at the top shall bo sure to reach the camel, or whoever stands in the place of the camel at the other end.

At .yesterday’s meeting of the Education Board Messrs. C. Watchorn and C. S. Galton were appointed commissioners of the Punewhakau school district for the ensuing year.

The conditions governing tho Ah' Bayly Memorial Scnolarsliip were before "the Education Board yesterday. They wore tho same as last year, except as regarded the athletic compotiou. Mr. Cargill stated that previously it was possible for a candidate to win the scholarship without obtaining one mark in atnletic competitions. Tlie present conditions made it compulsory that 80 marks should bo obtained in tho athletic competition. Tho maximum marks obtainable in this were 805, and it was possible for every boy to get 140 marks by equalling the standard.