WAITARA.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 144710, 19 June 1915, Page 7

WAITARA.

FF.au ODE OWN CORRESPONDENT. Juno 19.—Waitara is showing up well in the numbers that the district is sending to Trenthain, and if other parts of the Dominion do as well correspondingly there will be no need for anxiety as to whether the force can bo kept up to its strength. There have been no fewer than 20 enlistments during tho past week. Of the eight men who left with tho first expeditionary force, seven havo been reported wounded. Private Eric Laurence, son of Mr. H. C. Laurence, is among tho list of wounded at the Dardanelles; Private F. Chapman is in hospital in Egypt with enteric; while tho brother of Air. Dewhirst, of tho Bank of New Zealand, has been killed in action. I was spoken to tho other day with regard to recruiting for those living in the back-blocks, and tho point of view presented shows that those who come from such districts as Awakino, Mokau, Okau, and such places, must bo in real earnest. It should bo remembered that before they can bo accepted they havo to come to Waitara to be medically examined and. to pass the recruiting officer. In several cases it has involved tho loss of a week’s work, besides travelling and hotel expenses. it seems a pity that this loss of time and expense cannot be avoided; for, oven among bushfellers, there may be some who nuiy not have the ready money to spend in tho necessary expenses which must bo incurred. There was an important tangi hero this week, and a largo number of Natives came from long distances to be present. Among them was a woman from Nelson, who has herself become a candidate for another tangi. Tho body was taken to Nelson by the mail train on Thursday morning, accompanied by some 40 mourners, and tho railway station was tho scone of a groat show of grief and tho wailing of weeping women. That ‘hardy annual,” the Juno Tea, takes place next Thursday. There will bo, as usual, an attractive programme. Misses Lcatham and B. Hirst, of New Plymouth, will render some of Liza Lehmann’s “cautionary” songs, which are musical, amusing, and interesting; and Alias Harrison’s clover pupils are giving an adaptation of the forest sceno from “As you like it.” The programme promises to be a particularly good one, and, following tho invariable rule, there is sure to bo a crowded house.