LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 4, 30 December 1912, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

There will he no publication of the “Stratford Evening Post” on Wednesday (New Year’s Day). Advertisers and subscribers are kindly requested to note the break.

The lighthouse to be erected or Karori Rock, at the approach to Wei lington Harbour, will make the fortieth lighthouse around the Nev Zealand coast. Scottish Americans in Boston have started a new crusade with the object of arousing New Englanders with English and Scotch names to the dreadful fact that newcomers from Hungary and Poland—colloquially known as Hunks and Polacks—are poaching their names. The movement had its origin in an application to the court by a Pole that he should hereafter be known as Patrick Grant. He intended to carry on the retail liquor trade. A caveat was successfully lodged against the scheme. Rev. F. 8., Meyer has been declaring at Leeds that he does not seriously object to a “little courting” in chapel. One recalls (says a London paper) an incident in a Midland chapel some years ago. The peacher was annoyed by the sound of whispering coming from the semi-dark-ness under one of the galleries. A'last he paused in his sermon ant declared: “If the young couple mak ing love under the gallery do nol come to me in the vestry before eer vice next Sunday morning I will name them to the church.” It was i chance shot, but next Sunday he fount 20 couples awaiting him in the vestry A Southland gentleman, qualified to speak with some degree of authority on the matter, states that there are abundant evidences of a great wheat shortage in New Zealand this year. He was forcibly struck with the small quantities being handled on the railways, and gave it as his opinion that millers were. stocking very heavily against the poor prospects of next season’s supply. The Canterbury crops were a very thin and weather-battered lot, and their productions would fall a long wav behind the usual. There was every indication that flour would go up to a very advanced price before many months had passed. When a fire broo out in Mr George Robinson’s paddock at Rawsonville (states the ‘Sydney Daily Telegraph) Mr. W. Robinson was at the other side of the field with four horses harnessed to a harvester. The flames were approaching him almost at express train speed, and, leaping 20ft. in the air. He could easily save himself, but what of his team and his harvester? He had no time to outspan. There was no gate to emerge from the paddock except the one beyond the line of leaping flame. Mr. Robinson gathered up the reins, and set his horses at a gallop through the wall of fire. The intense heat can he imagined when it is stated that the harness and the belting of the machine cracked like biscuits just as the danger zone was passed. The horses were singed, and Mr. Robinson’s face and hands were blistered. But he heard his neighbours calling “Bravo, Bill Robinson!”

I A novel sight was witnessed in j Timani on Tuesday morning when a whale on a lorry drawn by five horses passed through the town on its way south to be boiled down. A barrel has reached Madrid (stated a London cablegram of Dec. 1) with a waybill reading:—“One barrel, weight Jjcwt., contents two Italians.” The men liave made a wager to travel round the world without leaving the barrel. When the steamer Moeraki was on her last passage from Wellington Sydney a Chinese passenger on route : to China died suddenly of heart failure. The body was buried at sea. After the ceremony a Chinese friend of deceased, standing bareheaded on dock, suddenly incanted in Chinese, and threw into the sea a sovereign, a, half-crown, and a penny. This is an old Chinese custom, the idea being that the money will help the departed Celestial to pay his way in the “far country.”

Fancy, corsets proving the death of a man, yet such was the cause of the passing at St. Louis, Mo., on November sth, of Joseph H. Pannella, a well nown American actor. He died in the general hospital of that city three hours after Jiis admission, he having collapsed on the vaudeville stage of a St. Louis theatre. Pannella had been a female impersonator for many years, and of late had grown very stout. The autopsy disclosed the fact that, in his efforts to preserve a good feminine figure, the deceased had laced eo tightly as to cause fatal injury to his kidneys. On and after January Ist, 1913, return receipts for inland parcels may be obtained by senders from the addressees on payment of one penny. When posting a parcel for which a return receipt is desired, the sender will fill in a card, to be obtained at any post office. The card will, be forwarded with the parcel and the addressee requested to sign the receipt, which will then be returned to the sender through the post.' No. claims for compensation for the loss of a parcel in the post office will be entertained unless a returned receipt is paid for by the sender when posting the parcel. Christianity was introduced into New Zealand by the Rev. Samuel Marsden in 1814. He landed at the Bay of Islands on December 22nd, and on Christmas Day preached upon the appropriate text, “Behold, I bring you glad tidings of great joy.” This was the first sermon delivered in New Zealand. The centenary of this happening is to be celebrated in December, 1914, and in the beginning of the following year. Bishop Crossley is now engaged in making arrangements in connection with the celebrations. It is probable that a special service will be held,at Christmas, 1914, on the spot where Marsden first set foot on New Zealand soil. (A) great Church Congress, to be held in Auckland during February, 1915, has also been pro- . posed. Distinguished representatives of all branches of the Anglican Communion will be invited, and, besides representatives of the Church qf England, other famous churchmen will also, it is hoped, he presept.-' i r The Bay of Plenty possesses a Methodist Home Missionary of unusual energy and universal acceptance. He has been instrumental in getting four churches built in three years'. It was a church opening occasion (says, the Auckland Star) when Mr Ready, driven by Mr Gatman, a zealous Home Missionary, encountered a bullock, team drawing a load of timber. ,A.Xhii o sight of thb oxen and the stack ; of timber, the horse shied, turned round, and backed into the bullocks, i The bullocks gently but firmly lifted the sulky into mid-ait, the occupants tumbling themselves out of it in record time. It was a creeping sensation which Mr Ready experienced, as from the air-poised sulky he looked down upon the mob of excited animals. Tilings were eventually sorted out, and the travelling preachers pursued their way with a bent axle and a wheel revolving at an angle of forty-five degrees. Other untoward happenings, both by land and sea, came to Mr Ready thick and fast, until he reached Queen street wharf a thankful man.

“Municipal Sunday” is the latest civic enterprise in Christchurch. At a meeting of the City Council on Monday night the Mayor (Mr Holland) proposed that a “Municipal Sunday” in each year should be established, on which all members of the Council, together with such of their relations and friends as could find it convenient to do so, should officially attend divine service at some particular church. The idea, he said, was not a new one, but was carried into effect by many municipal bodies in the Old Country. An official visit, as it were, to a church once a year by the Council would do no one any harm. There would be no compulsion in the matter, and no one with consdentious objections would be asked to go. They could take each church in turn, attending the Anglican Cathedral the first year, and the other principal churches in turns in other years. At Bury,, in England, 1800 people had attended one such churchgoing. He would move that the fourth Sunday in February should be set apart as “Municipal Sunday.” A councillor remarked that the same thing had been in vogue in the local Fire Brigade for some years, and had worked well. Other councillors supported the motion, which was carried unanimously.

'(After three months’ fighting free lunches the hotelkeepers of Sydney and suburbs have capitulated (as a brief cable message mentioned recently), and the succulent sausage, stewed rabbit and peas, oyster patties, tongue, ham and beef, again satisfy the •hungry-thirsty of Sydney’s free-lunch-ers (says the Sun). The lunch lockout was called off at a meeting of the trade a few days since, it being agreed that the side tables were to be stacked again in a few days. But some of the leading licensees were impatient, and hurried it o n the next day, so as to beat their neighbours. Striking figures were supplied by the manager of a leading metropolitan hotel. In his own case, his counter lunches cost, roughly (labour included), £SO a week. For the first week of the “lock-out” the takings fell £33—a profit of £l7—but week after week the deficit grew until towards the end there was a shortage as compared with the same period of seven days last year of £162 odd. This informant calculated that the twenty hotels in the vicinity of the block from Hunter street to the Town Hall dropped something like £20,000 by doing away with the free lunch. Most of the houses are now competing with each other in the sumptuousness of these repasts, putting on even a pair of ducks in addition to stewed rabbit, curried chops, Irish stew, pressed tongue, whole hams, pigs’ cheeks, salmon, herrings, sardines on toast, sausages, patties, black, whit© and German sausage, sliced cucumber and beetroot, as well as bread biscuits, cheese, lettuce and rock cakes, while one house added “devils on horseback” and. “angels in motor cars.”

The new reel so long required by the Stratford Fire Brigade has duly arrived.

There has been an enormous tiemhnil for brotuse coins in England of liite, and the Mint's output since July * .has ■ been double that of the whole of last year.

“His Worship the Mayor, Councillors, and citizens of Christchurch” are to be prosecuted. An information has, been laid against them for over-, crowding His Majesty’s Theatre dur-j ing a municipal organ recital. | V Ail enormous eagle has lately been terrifying the people at Dalqmse R&, in 'Perthshire. Many of the| cfofters there have been keeping their, children indoors, fearing that they might be carried away by the. aerial monster, and they are keeping a close watch on their flocks also. j •The first Japanese-owned mercantile ship, manned entirely by Japanese officers B>ud. crew, to visit Auc-klfl/iul, arrived yesterday., This was the Hakushika Maru, of 5000 tons, with' superphosphates and ‘sulphur for A&kiand, Lyttelton and Tiraaru. She ■ ledyes for the south on Tuesday. . A Russian Lochinvar, a widower, 1 40 ‘years of age, and father of seven children, carried off a widow of 80 > years of age during the absence of liar relatives (stated a recent London' cablegram). The pair were then married by a priest, who concluded the ceremony just as the enraged relatives arrived upon the scene. ■ The promoters of the Whau Canal, from Onehunga to Auckland, esti-j mates that this cut will shorten the; distance from Auckland to Sydney by T3iniles (a reduction from lz»i to 1208).. The run from Auckland to Wellington, via East Cape, Gisborne, and Napier, is 590 miles. Ihe Mhau Canal will cut this mileage down to 3i4, ■; , ! The: principle of co-operation among butter companies in New South Wales ih at I .present receiving some attention. At- the annual meeting of suppliers to ode factory recently, a resolution was carried that . all manufacturing cooperative companies should have one joint/ door in Sydney for the better regulation of prices and distribution of butter. . The question of the Commonwealth Capital is a burning one, on the ,other side. In 'reply to an enquiry in the HEqtise of Representatives, as to what was proposed to be done about the pilaus ■ for the Federal Capital, the Minister for Home Affairs (“King” O'Malley) said he was told that the American plan which was, awarded first . prize, by a majority of the Capita*'Sites Board would, if it was adopted. require the provision of lifts to , take people up the mountains. (Laught'er.) 1 ■ "’One of the dangers to which buyers of 1 stock in the public saleyards are 'lias been related to the Okaiawa correspondent of the Hawera Staf.' Last year a local settler purchased, a pedigree Holstein bull, bred bV-Mr E. ’Short, of Feilding. Some ’afterwards the. purchaser wrote ta' 'Mr Short- asking -him if he would kihdfy • forward the pedigree of the animal.' 1 11 ‘Mr Short’s answer was brief but to the point; “Know nothing of hull; breed nothing but Herofords.” ■ A '-well-known character about Picton attired in a white cambric suit, was- the- victim of the jokist on Boxing Day’(states the Press). “The sun Had' 'evidently proved too warm for his constitution,. and he lay himself down in a shady nook for a quiet nftp. Meanwhile the joker came along with a pot of black paint, and fighted the 1 white coat 1 With ‘the orthqd&£ ' broad arrows. The innocent yifitlih afterwards praded the streets inftvhat looked for all the world like prison garb, and wondered why he Wtjia the cynosure of all eyes ”

'Fh© ever increasing lo&s of cycles in'Christchurch has aroused the sns.plijibh, which is .becoming stronger daily, that an illicit trade is still being carried on in stolen machines. Tc enable th© police to have a reasonable chalice of tracing the lost property, .it has been suggested that cycle dealers trading in secondhand machinal should be licensed as secondhand defers. This would compel them to ke'ep a record open for inspection b> this' police of the bicycles bought, sold, or exchanged by them.

'jfho Queensland Department of Agriculture is making exhaustive tests with two cows which have been recently purchased as being immune from tick fever. , An owner claimed thtit' some of his stock had become immune, as a result of the application of a system of inoculation which he had discovered, and he urged the Goveihment to make a test. The department promised to do this when ticks became active. ’ The two cows have been taken to Brisbane for the purpose of the test.

Apparently the Adelaide Ironmbiilders’ Society regards diligence as crime, for it has expelled a member,V( one of the ironmoulders employed Vby A Simpson and Son) for the offence of earning too much money. Soide months ago the firm offered a stove moulder a bonus of 9d, in addition tp his weekly wages of £3, for all washing copper castings he should mdjtie in excess of 50. The man accepted, the offer, and as a beginning jnaile between 60 and 70 castings a week, hut the executive of the MouldUnion had previously decided that wm a fair week’s work, and in Aiigxi'st :t.he secretary (Mr Spafford) w#qte, asking the man to reduce his ohtput to 55, and, incidentally, of course, to bring down his earning to £3f3s 9d. The moulder, a loyal uiilohist, vainly endeavoured to persuade the' executive to alter its devision, and"'last week he ivas expelled ! ffbin the union.

A hew game, entitled “Trilliards,” has been by army officers in India, the country where the popular pastime of Snooker was thought put. As the title suggests, “Trilliards’' is indulged in by three players, styled A. B. C. After drawing for the order of play, the billiard balls ar< plated on spots thus: (B) on centre spot, and ’ plain white (jAi) on the centre spot of the “D.” “A” breaks the balls, and can only score by winning; hazards; B follows and must /..score from losing hazards, and then comes C (red), ;who may only score from canons. The game is 25 up and two points are taken for each score made. There are a number of pens,lies, which the non-strikers participate in to the extent of one point each :—(1) If a player makes a stroke which he is pot entitled to make, or (2) giveq a miss, or (3) forces a hall off the table, or (4) runs a coup, or (5) plays with the wrong-hall, or (6. plays frdm a wrong position, each of the other players score one point. If in the stroke the striker makes both a legitimate, and an illegitimate score, he scores- his points, but the break is at an end, and his opponents also take points for any errors made. li is ah excellent game, but whether it ■ will take the place of billiards or snooker is doubtful. One of its advantages’ is that three players raaj itaktf'part in, a short gfi-ffie.