LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 24, 11 January 1912, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Dr. R. M. Beattie., Medical Sr.perintendent of the Auckland Mental Hospital, is on a visit to Stratford. The Wellington wool sales this week were attended by six buyers from France. This constitutes a record, In 1900 five French houses wore represented, but in the succeeding years the mimber fell away to three. The six representatives of French houses will attend all the New Zealand wool sales.

Some people arc born frugal; others achieve frugality with some •degree of self-sacrifice; while still another section is careful of their money —our Caledonian friends term it “canny”— through dire necessity. In connection with the above, the exploit of a lady passenger on a local tram car on .Saturday is worthy of mention. Happening to drop her purse, she rose excitedly, and without waiting to ring the bell, jumped after her property while the car was going at full speed, with the almost inevitable result that she landed in the road in a huddled heap. The tram was quickly stopped, and the sympathetic passengers gathered round. However, she was only shaken, and resumed her journey happy in the possession of her purse. When the cause of all the trouble was opened it was found to contain threepence!

The number of matches consumed yearly can hardly he realised. Forests have been literally cut into matchsticks, and the demand is growing much faster than the supply of trees. Hence the idea of paper as a substitute for wood is one that has commended itself to the scientific mind. Matches so made are considerably cheaper than wooden ones, and weigh less, which counts for much in exportation. The sticks of the matches consists of paper rolled together on the bias. The paper is rather strong and porous, anti, when immersed in a solution of wax, sticks well together, and burns with a bright, smokeless and odourless flame. Strips one-hair inch in width are first drawn through the combustible mass, and then turned by machinery into long thin tubes, pieces of ordinary length of wood or wax matches being cut off automatically by the machine. When the sticks are cut to size they are dipped into phosphorous, also by machinery, and j the dried head easily ignites by trie- i tiou on any surface. '

The annual fete under the auspices of the Opunake Seaside Improvement Society will he held on February 14th.

Miss Bredow, injured in the railway ■.ccidoiit at Palmerston on Saturday afternoon, is progressing very satisfactorily towards recovery. A recent visitor to Whangamomona gives it as his opinion that within two months the railway will be running right into the township. The roads in the vicinity cf Whangamomona are reported to be drying very well just now, and it is expected tmu in a few days the saddle will be ;n as good condition as it could be.

Hie death is announced by Press cable from Sydney of Mr. J. A. Kinsella, formerly Dairy Commissioner for -New Zealand. Mr. Kinsella’s death occurred after a lengthy illness.

The scores of Gilbert and Sullivan’s opera “Pinafore” have been received by the Stratford Operatic Society, and it is ( expected that the work will bo put in rehearsal at an early date.

Alan Maxwell, well known in boxing circles, is at present in the district on sick leave. He has recently decided to become a professional, and is at present endeavouring to arrange a match with Tim Tracey at Wanganui. At a committee meeting of the Taranaki Agricultural Society, it was decided to recommend to the general meeting that after next year the Society dispense wjth the spring show ind substitute an autumn show, and make it a three days’ fixture.

A Dalefield (Wairarapa) resident ,iad a remarkable experience recently. About 11 o’clock ho heard wind rising, and also some unaccountable 10 amis of tearing and breaking wood, etc wont to investigate, and discovered his barn in the grip of a whirlwind, which had wrenched off half the died, and had broken it up. Within the past few days an officer if the Stock Department has been purchasing in Hawera and other Taranaki districts horses for the Defence Department. Useful active sorts, of :lie milk-cart type, have been most nought after, as the horses are required for the artillery branch of the service.

A local resident was, in turn, the ifliciating Justice cf the Peace and tire defendant in respective by-law cases in the Police Court yesterday, iays Tuesday’s Palmerston “Standird.” In his more dignified capacity le fined a cyclist who had trespassed )ii the footpath, and as an offender limself, in respect of driving without .iglits, he submitted later to a penally imposed by the Magistrate. The funeral of the late Mr. H. W. Hnggett took place yesterday afternoon, and was largely attended. As che deceased gentleman had been for corty years a member of Court Waireka A.0.F., New Plymouth, the local Foresters provided the bearers. The Rev. B. Metson conducted the funeral service, and Bro. R. H. Kivdl, P.D.C.R.j carried out the Foresters’ funeral rites.' Those present at the graveside joined in the singing of ‘Rock of Ages.” “The year just ended is the first luring tiio last twenty years in which a boat has not gone ashore.” This was i paragraph from the report submitted by the Pilot,.Captain Tinney,■ to the Harbour Board on Monday, says the Pa tea “Press.” The Chairman, Mr. ’G.'V. Pearce, said this was highly satisfactory, and referring to. the state of the bar, stated that the;fact that:the Bar 1 had remained open durug the long spell of westerly weather ,vas direct evidence that the work carried out at the month of the river bad been of very considerable value.

Previously the opinion was generally held that potatoes could not be frown in Whangamomona, but this uis been falsified by Mr. W. Abbott, •vho recently took up farming in the listrict. HV put two or three hunIredweight of bonedust on an acre patch on bis flat, arid sowed oats oh A. The oats were eaten off and the .and ploughed, potatoes being sown is the plough went over. The tubers ire now being dug, and it ,is estimat'd that the total yield will be twenty :ons or so. This record should prove die fertility of the soil around Whanfamomona, and may probably suggest ;o farmers in the district a means of linking the land produce potatoes.

The ways of the suffragettes do not K mmend themselves to New Zealanders who are visiting England, as will )8 realised from the following extract tom a private letter received by a Dunedin resident:—“l saw the suffragette demonstration in Parliament Square last night. It was the most disgraceful exhibition I have ever men, and if I had ever had any sympathy for them last night’s affair vould have alienated every bit of it. Tver 200 of them were arrested for breaking windows and doing things of that sort, and, really, the police gave no the impression of being wonderfully tactful and forbearing with them.”

Is the motor-care craze destroying home life in England? Mr. Albert Halstead, United States Consul at Birmingham, gives an answer in the affirmative in a report on the growing use of the automobile in England. “I am informed,” he says, “that people are spending less time it home, caring less for the attractiveness of home, and devoting their surplus money, and even more than their surplus, to the purchase of automobiles and their upkeep. Real estate agents state that there is a decided tendency for people who do not own their own houses, arid even for some of those who do own their own houses, or the leaseholds, to take smaller houses, and to spend the saving on rent and taxes in the purchase and maintenance of their automobiles. The theatres make the same complaint, as do those—Though in a smaller* degree—who sell musical instruments, u Idle booksellers, and even men’s and women’s clothiers and costume makers find the motor-car somewhat of an in-terference-and injury to their business.”

Another of those sordid dramas ending in vitriol throwing, which have become too common in France during recent years, occurred (says the correspondent of a London paper) at St. Maurice, in the suburbs of . Paris. It stems that a young accountant named Albert Gros, employed in a factory there, had formed a liaison with a woman nearly ten years his senior. Ho himself lived with his sisters, but kept a small flat, where his friend resided. Owing to the woman’s jealous disposition, Gros, a couple of months ago, severed his connection with her and ceased to visit the flat. The woman I threatened vengeance for the deserj tion, and as Gros was going to his work at 7 o’clock she met him at the corner of Avenue St. Maude, and threw the contents of a bottle of vit- [ riol in his face. The unfortunate man was fearfully burned about the face and arms, and both of them had to he conveyed to the hospital. Gros will probably be blinded for life by the horrible outrage. His assailant, whose name is Marchandine, although severely burned, was able to leave the hospital after her injuries bad been dressed. She was at once arrested by the police.

Mr J amicsou, one of the first residents of Mint Road, Stratford, arrived in Stratford last night on a short visit. Mr. Geo. W. Mills, local agent for the Royal Exchange Assurance Co., frrvards a handv wall calendar for 1912.

Mr. F. N. Fussell, who has "been spending his Christmas holidays in the South Island, will return to Stratford 'to-morrow evening. Tho many friends of Mr R. McK. Morrison will he pleased to learn that his little daughter has made a splendid recovery and is now practically out of danger. Master Kenneth Wilson, who recently underwent an operation for appendicitis, is, wo are pleased to learn, progressing very satisfactorily. The Rev. B. Metson, of Stratford, left by the mail train this morning for Christchurch to attend the Primitive Methodist Conference which is to be held in that city. At the Magistrate’s Court to-mor-row, before Mr W. G. K. Kenrick, S.M., twenty-nine civil cases, one dofonde’d, and" three breaches of the Borough by-laws are set down for hearing. At the Masterton baths a few days ago a revolver bullet came whizzing Kt a woman and several children and sed in a piece of woodwork within a few inches of the caretaker. Police investigations revealed that an old man in the vicinity had fired at a bird and the bullet went through tho iron fenco surrounding tho baths. In connection with our paragraph regarding the death of the late lur. H. W. Huggett, a wrong impression was created in reference to medical attendance, it being stated that Dr. Steven had been called in in the first place, Dr. Carbcry taking the case later. Tho fact cf the matter is that Dr. Carbery was called in in tho first place, handed the case to Dr. Stevens, when he left town and resumed attendance on his return. 6 Mr A. W. Burrell, of Mountain Road, kindly supplies' the following astronomical note, which should be^ of interest to many of our readers: — l lho two telescopic comets were seen here this morning at 3 o’clock. The position of Quenisset’s comot was light ascension lohrs 4Smin, south declination 35deg. 33min. This is a little west of the sth mag. star Theta Lupus. This comet is 172 millions of miles from the earth, and is just visible in an 1-jin. telescope. Brooks’ comet, at the same hour, was right asceution 14hrs olmiiK, south declination 46dcg. lOmiu. This is a little east of the 2-J mag. star Alpha Lupus. This comet is about 174 millions from tho earth, and is the brighter comet of the two. There was no apparent nucleus in either.