AROUND THE DOMINION

Stratford Evening Post, Volume III, Issue 198, 10 November 1934, Page 8

AROUND THE DOMINION

Monarch of the Bush The largest tree in the bush worked by Messrs Ward and Osborne at Onetea, 10 miles from Dargaville, for the Dargaville sawmill, was felled this week. With an estimated girth of 2Gft and an estimated' length of 40ft to the first bough, this fine tree will have to be cut into three big logs. The total superficial 1 content of the, tree is estimated at 20,280 ft.

Not to be Taken as Read An amusing story is going the rounds concerning a sign which appeared outside, one of the Napier banks a few days, ago, stating "Speight's ale on tap here" (reports the Herald). The explanation- is that a local signwriter, having a sign to paint for a certain hotel, took it with- him when he went to make a deposit in one of (he banks. When he entered the bank he stood the sign up against the side of the bank, where i£ soon attracted a lot of attention. When the signwriter made his appearance in the street he was greeted' with a chorus of, "Are you giving it away, George, or do- you have .to pay for it?"

■ h ~~ ' New Cornsack Fabric The first rojls of■ cornsack fabric made from New Zealand hemp arrived in the Dominion about three weeks ago. and last Week were inspected by a journalist, who war, informed that the fabric, had- been put through'- numerous tests and had been passed and. approved as suitable for general use ./The fabric is proportionately lighter in weight than th e present imported fabric, but its tensile strength has been shown to be very much greater. In appearance if is very clean and free from surface fabrics. This- is interesting in view, of the fadt that a large textile mill to manufacture cornsacks and cement sacks from New Zealand 1 hemp is to be established at Ma.taura.

"Professional Natives" The opinion that tourists from oversea do not see the Maori as he really is and, therefore, do not get a correct idea of his character, was ex pressed .by Mr Oriwa Tahupotiki Haddon, a painter of Maori life, and a carver and designer, in : an interview. Mr Haddon said .that certain resorts popularly su'pposed to/be 4 " the centre of Maori native life were visited by large numbers of tourists, but the Maoris there were becoming professional natives —they were adopting a pose. There were only two or .three districts, in which any semblance of native life could be found, and one of these was the' heart of Taranaki. Such districts were generally unknown to-, or at least, wera not visited by, the tourists.

The- Maoris and Mexico 'A suggested.connexion between the ancient Maoris and Mexico, probably centuries before the Maoris came to New Zealand, was mentioned by Professor R. Speight in his lecture on gems- and precious stones at the Canterbury Museum this week. Amongst other countries in which jade was looked upon as a precious stone,' Professor Speight said, was Mexico, and when Cortex invaded that country the Spaniards were attracted by the many beautiful objects made of jade. It was a mystery where the Mexicans obtained' jade; it Wa,s possible that mines existed and that the original inhabitants had disappeared and the secret of the mines had been lost. Jade was considered by the Mexicans of the time of Cortez as really more valuable than gold. In New Zealand greenstone (nephrite) was used for similar purposes as ■ those for which the Mexicans used jade and was looked upon; as. a precious stone. The tikis of the Maoris had their exact analogy in similar little figures made in Mexico of jade. It made one wonder whether there had been any real connexion between Mexico and the Maoris,

Unwanted Hoardings A proposal that local authorities should try as far as possible not to do business with .those firms whose goods were advertised on hoardings in the countryside- was made by the Mayor of Mt. Eden (Mr T. McNab) at a meeting of the borough council. In moving that a remit embodying the suggestion should be forwarded .to the conference of delegates'of lo cal authorities, the Mayor said every, beauty spot was being disfigured by hoardings, and the matter was a serious one. "It does not matter in the cities, perhaps, but it does in the countryside," he said. "The newspa pers are the advertising medium," he added. After discussion the Mayor withdrew his motion in favour of an amendment stating that the council viewed with alarm the number of hoardings disfiguring the highways, and suggested- that local authorities should frame by-law:-, to stop the practice.

"Light in the Bottle" Electric Ught is so universally used nowadays and ovoryone has. become so accustomed to i t that to hear of n person who has never seen it before, nor yet able to .recognise it when seen, is hard to believe. But a person with the 'qua.lihoa.tion' recently spent the night in a hotel on the outskirts of Wangnnui, states the Chronicle. It appeals that he has spent the majority of his life with the Maoris, and rarely comes to town. Recently he appeared at the hotel, was given a room, and went off to bed. Some time later he was observed by the landlord to be wandering around in the passage. Asked whether he required anything, he replied: "Yes, for goodness sake come and put out that light, in the bottle in my room. I have been trying for the past quarter of an hour to blow it out." For the remainder of bis stay the guest was regarded with much curiosity, and although there were some in the building who politely disbelieved the incident at. first, they were soon convinced by the proprietor. i „_..,_. ..^