LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 26, 24 December 1917, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A counter delivery of correspondence will bo made at the post office to-night between 7 and 8 o’clock.

In response to enquiries, the committee state that the Stratford Mimiipal Band will not play carols this Xmas, as their time is occupied with practices in view of the forthcoming races and band recital.

The Kakaramea Dairy Company has decided to erect temporary buddings for this season, and to build a new, factory in brick or concrete on a more central site than that of the late lire.

Writing from Egypt, one of the New Zealand Volunteer Sisters saysi that tinned milk there is very expensive, nearly £3 for a case of 48 tins. The needs there, she says, are tinned milk, meats, fruits, jams or honey.

The poll on Saturday on the proposal to borrow £15,000 for street improvements in Stratford resulted in an affirmative vote of the ratepayers by a majority of 101—the figures being 182 to 81.

According to a witness in the Ha-> wera Magistrate’s Court on Friday (states the Star), shearers can earn good money these days. The award rate is'27s Gd a hundred, which works out at between £8 and £9 a week, provided a man is working full time.

“1 have good authority for saying,” says a Wellington correspondent, ‘‘that Mr Justice Edwards, who suffers greatly from asthma and is troubled with heart affection, has been told by his medical adviser that he cannot winter in New Zealand. The probability, therefore, is that he will ask for extended leave of absence.”

A young officer, whose parents are well known in the district, has had a unique experience (says the Mataura Ensign). He was wounded by shrapnel some time ago, and in a letdr to his parents he states that the surgeon who attended to his wound located the shrapel fragment and found almost alongside of it a pea-rifle bullet which had been embedded in his body since the occasion when as a boy he had been the victim of a minor shooting accident.

A collision between a Ford motor car and a railway engine at the Fenton Street crossing on Saturday night caused some excitement, the occupants of the car narrowly escaping serious accident. Mr F. .T. Hopkins accompanied by Mr R. H. Cameron drove into Fenton Street from Broadway at nearly nine o’clock when the night was very dark and the car collided with an engine travelling out of the station on shunting operations. The evidence as to the alarm bell ringing and the enginedriver having blown the whistle is a matter that will no doubt be disclosed at the official enquiry, but there were some bystanders who stated at the time that both the bell and the whistle were distinctly audible,

while others wore equally positive- to. the contrary. However that may be, j the engine-driver called a warning to the motorists, who were travelling] slowly, and the shock of the collision! was not more than sufficient to twist] the front wheels of the motor shiver the wind-shield to pieces. The! car was not otherwise damaged. The occupants received rather a bad shock, but were not injured. A crowd quickly gathered, and the police on arriving on the scone jotted down particulars.

Barrnclough’fj Nervine stops Toothache,

To celebrate the sinking of the Lusitania the German Government, ie will be remembered, issued a commemorative medal. A replica of this medal has been produced, and one is now in the possession of the Rev. S S. Osborne, of New Plymouth. Reuter’s Agency says that the Swedish match factories have recently been amalgamated as a trust, which will be the largest of its kind, with a capital of 80 million kroner and an annual output of five thousand million hoxesi

Parkinson’s Star Almanac tor 1918 is to hand to-day, and is well up to the standard of former issues. This is the thirty-fifth yCar of publication

of this useful calendar, diary, and book of information, valuable to farmers as .well as townsmen.

A piece of cotton waste saturated with kerosene was placed beneath the Richmond Road School building and ignited some time after 8 p.m. on Wednesday week. Next morning an. uncoiisumed portion of the material was discovered, and near it the boarding of the building was charred.

In 1903 the income tax in New, Zealand represented 0 per cent, of the total taxation co’Wled. This year it represents 401 per cent. The enormous increase in income tr x this year is partly due to the tax oil mortgages being changed from the heading of land tax to income uix, and consequently laud tax shows a heavy decline.

Additional War Regulations which have been gazetted provide for the deportation to any Allied State of persons liable to compulsory Military Service in that State. The Regulation also authorise the military or naval authorities to seize, whether aboard ship, or ashore, any document or other thing which may be evidence of an offence committed or about to be comraitetd against the War Regulations, Military Service Act, or Army Act,

I met lately (says a writer in the Pall Mall Gazette) an English ladyj who has just succeeded in reaching this country from Russia. She wat> present during the whole of the res volution, and the description she gave me of conditions in Russia throws a new light on the present situation. London, with its little sugar and grocery queues, knows nothing whatever about war, I was assured. In Petrograd the housewives wait all night long on the snow-covered pave-> ments in order to get their meat ini the morning. Passports have to be produced when one wishes to buy a loaf of bread. At the time when boots are advertised to be sold people wait outside the shops for days, and then often discover that only small sizes arc to be had.

In connection with the opening night, on Monday 31st December, (New Year’s Eve) of the new King’s Cinema Theatre, Broadway, the box plan will be opened from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Monday next. The directors of the picture company have generously agreed to give the whole of the proceeds without any deduction whatever to the wounded soldiers’ fund, and for the occasion at the request of tho Stratford Patriotic Committee the Stratford Picture and Amusements Limited have fixed the price at 2s, Is 6d, and Is, with sixpence extra for booking to all parts of the house.

In patronising the opening night> of this splendid new picture theatre, the public may rely on enjoying the special programme together with a fine orchestra and thus while getting good value for their money are at the same time materially aiding a cause which is in need of further funds.