LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 3 July 1925, Page 6

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The Minister for Railwaj's (Hon. J. G. Coates) stated in the House yesterday that he hoped to have the new railway timetables published by the middle of July. , Replying to a question in the House yesterday, the Hon. W. Nosworthy said he could uot say when the report of the agricultural commission would be available.

The Governor-General and Lady Alice Fcrgusson, and party will be the guests of the North Taranaki Hunt at a point-to-point steeplechase and drag hunt on Thursday, 16th inst., at Omata. Mr. S. ,G. Smith, M.P., (chairman of the Taranaki Education Board) has received notification from Sir James Parr (Minister for Education) to the effect that a grant for the re-modelling of the Norfolk school has been approved. Two seamen charged with having deserted their, ships were arrested at New Plymouth yesterday. One of the men is off the schooner Holmwood, which is at present in port, and the other man was a member of the crew of the Mamari, which called here some little time ago. Three hundred and sixty assisted immigrants, Consisting of 121 men, 153 women, and 86 children, arrived at Wellington from London by the lonic on Wednesday. Included in the party were 38 domestic servants. Five of the new settlers (three women and two men) were booked for New Plymouth. The new policy of through booking of passengers and goods by rail and steamer recently inaugurated by the Railway Department appears to be meeting with every success. From May 11 to June 20 tile number of passengers booked through from island to island was 1032. For the week ended on June 20 I’so tons of goods and parcels were booked through under the new scheme. The proposed night train service connecting New Plymouth and Napier with Wellington has been enthusiastically taken up throughout Taranaki, Hawke’s Bay, Wanganui and Wellington, Mr. Gordon ■.Fraser (president of the Taranaki Chambre of Commerce) reported last night. In all the principal centres the business men had supported the scheme, while it had received the approval of the newspapers, which had devoted a considerable amount of space to explaining it. To clear up a misapprehension which exists, it was pointed out that the train, if run, would be composed of sleeping cars. In the late collector of customs at New Plymouth, Mr. R. Eyre, New Plymouth has an enthusiastic publicity agent in the Waikato. Mr. Eyre is devoting his days of leisure to impressing on the people of the Waikato the possibilities of the Waikato River for traffic purposes and of main port for overseas trade. His addresses are entitled, “New Plymouth, the key of the West.” A vote of thanks to Mr. Eyre for his work was accorded by the council of the Taranaki Chamber of Commerce last night. As a result of severe injuries received through being kicked by a horse, Robert George Burrows, aged 17, of Egmont Village, was admitted to the New Plymouth public hospital on Wednesday night. He was then unconscious, and. although he has since recovered consciousness it was reported last night that there was no material change in his condition. After the accident Burrows was just' able to crawl to his home, and on his injuries being examined it was found that the brain was lacerated.

I The Fi’zroy School Memorial Fund has been further supplemented by a handsome donation of £4O from Mrs. A. B. Honeyfield, of Sydney. Mrs. Honeyfield, who was a res dent of New Plymouth for very many years,, has advised her New Zealand agent (Mr. E. P. Webster) of her latest gift. The Fitzroy Memorial Committee, through its chairman, gratefully acknowledges the. .gift which, so far, exceeds any individual donation to the fund. This is one of many gifts which Mrs. Honeyfield has generously made to the town. This is the time of the year when Taranaki farmers go on trek. It is the brief interval between the end of. one season and the beginning of another, and leases and sharemilkers’ agreements are usually arranged for convenience to terminate about this time of the year. Considerable transfers are therefore necessary. When a lease is ended the position is generally met by a clearing sale, but with sharemilkers the lease is different. “It usually means packing tip and nioving off to the nearest available sharemilking position. Each day now travellers by road in the country districts meet parties on ' trek, some looking prosperous with motor lorries convsvmg their goods and chattels, whilst others make the modest spring-dray suffice.

Smoking among the fair sex in Christchurch is becoming more and. more popular according to several city. tobacconists, but that women can scarcely ever hope to overtake the men was shown by disclosures made that day that the daily ouiice sales to cut tobacco alone to pipe smokers run into hundreds of pounds in the course of a week. “We. sell an average of 200 pounds of cut tobacco weekly,” said one leading retailer, “but of’ course we make a specialty of that line. Nevertheless, I have no’hesitation in saying that there is a greater demand for out tobacco than there is for the tinned article. I certainly do not think there are nearly so many cigarette smokers as there are pipe smokers in Christchurch, or in. any other part of New Zealand for that matter. Cigarette smoking is mostly to be found among the younger people,” Famous "Vedonis” interlock underwear for ladies is unequalled for wear . and comfort being velvety smooth, to the most sensitive of skins. This is made, in gpod long garments 7/11 , and 8/11, knickers to match at the eamq. prices. Another line highly recommended is the Rcdia “soft as silk” underwear similar to Vedonis, but has a silk stripe running through. Vests are 7/11 and 8/11. Knickers 8/6 and bloomers 9/6 and 10/6. Both- these lines are obtainable at the Melbourne Ltd.

The Wellington Automobile AesoGiition has asked the Auckland Chamber of Commerce for its support in securing a Royal Commission to Inquire into the expense of county council administration and also to urge an amendment to the Main Highways Act to embrace the maintenance of county roads. A common method of defeating the Licensing Act and enabling a person to obtain liquor after hours is for the thirsty one to “book in” as a guest at the hotel. Under this cover he is then able to imbibe as frequently as he' desires, without fear of prosecution. A police officer was endeavouring to explain this practice to Mr. J. G. L. Hewitt, S.M., at the Magistrate’s Court in Wellington, but the Bench interjected with: “It’s all right. I know all about it. I was five or six years on the West Coast!”

The new city engineer at Christchurch, Mr. Galbraith, formerly of West Australia, has pointed out to the Mayor, Mr. J. K. Archer, that roadways of 66ft. wide will be too narrow for main arterial ways as the city grows. Mr. Galbraith suggested that the Christchurch Council should decide at once what roads and streets should be of 100 ft. width, in order that it might make provision for the future when approving of plans and subdivisions. It would be necessary for the Christchurch Council to obtain special power before it could set about so widening streets, the provisions of the Public Works Act not extending so far. Representations in that regard have been made by Mr. Archer to the Prime Minister. Apropos of the recent ease in Auckland in which the liquor consumed at a sportsmen’s dinner was held to have been sold during prohibited hours, the Hawke’s Bay Herald says: “A Napier fraternity, whose member* one would naturally assume to possess sufficient knowledge of the matter to take all precautions, held a dinner in a local hostelry recently and were inform ed, it is stated, that they had broken the law. Developments are awaited.” A scheme to supply Sunday School instructions by correspondence to children in the back blocks districts is to be inaugurated by the Sunday School Board of the Auckland Anglican Diocese. The chairman of the board, the Rev. W. Edward Lush, says it is realised there are many children in the country districts who cannot be reached by Sunday schools, and who are now doing their day school work by correspondence. To reach these, and perhaps a much larger number of children who go to day school, but have no Sunday school available, the board has issued a circular to the clergy interested, and has already received enough replies to justify immediate action being taken. Dr. G. J. Blackmore, of the Cashmere Hills Consumptive Sanatorium, does not attach much weight to a report cabled from London that two members of the Medical Committee of the House of Commons are convinced that the Spahlinger treatment is “the one cure designed to eradicate tuberculosis in human beings and cattle.” He said, that the members of the committee were not experts, and unless an opinion was expressed by experts after examination it was worth nothing whatever. Spahlinger had refused to submit the treatment to true expert experiment. A mere opinion without evidence was nothing, and unless he did something much better, Spahlinger could not expect the people to believe that his treatment was really good. A curiosity in the possession of Mr. J. Cook, of Coromandel, is a one-shilling credit note circulated in Auckland in 1345. In those days the inconvenience: of a shortage of metallic currency was frequently experienced during the intervals between,the arrival of sailing ships from England, and it was the custom, therefore, for certain firms to issue credit notes redeemable in gold or silver to tide over the period of shortage. The specimen im question was printed by J. Williamson and issued by the firm of Gundry and McDonald, of Lower Queen Street. Printed on a piece of frail paper, it bears the imprint: “One shilling. August T, 1845. On presentation of five of these notes we promise to pay the bearer the sum of five shillings, the value of this note being one shilling.” “The policy initiated by my predecessor, Mr. Coates, is that a post office must be run on a business basis! The' Postal Department during the past two or three years has been called up to pay —to find out of revenue—interest on the capital expended. That was never done before, and it is to the credit of Mr. Coates that he has initiated a businesslike arrangement under Which post offices must largely be conducted on that basis.” These remarks were made by the Postmaster-General, Sir James Parr, when replying in Wellington to a deputation from Pahiatua, which asked for a new post office in that town.