CURRENT TOPICS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4933, 24 April 1894, Page 3

CURRENT TOPICS.

Dr Amy Castilla haß . been appointed resident medical officer at St Vincent's Hospital, Melbourne. Dr Castilla is the first Australian woman to become a house doctor in a general hospital, though such appointments are not uncommon in America. She is one of the three ladies' who obtained the M.B. degree at Melbourne University last year. Her medical course was begun in 1889, and she has been successful in passing all her examinations without break or failure. A new receptacle for Btolen property has beea invented by a Paris thief. He was suspected of having stolen a watch from a 1 jeweller named Schmidt, carrying on business in the Rue de Vauves. At the police station he was searched, and nothing being found on him, he was about to be released, when M. Bureau, the Commissary, noticed that the soles or his boots were abnormally thfck. On inspection, these soles were found to be specially made for the reception of stolen property, and in one of them was M. Schmidt's watch. Some time before the boom in Melbourne, a man bought a piece of land in a city street for £8000. He presently sold it for .£45,000, but the purchaser failed after paying £8000, and forfeited. Consequently the original holder had recovered his outlay, and still held the property. Next he lot it at £1000 a year rental, and the tenant put up a block of buildings, which cost £15,000. But the buildings wouldn't lot, and the ground rent went in arrear, and the lease and the £15,000 i buildings were both forfeited. And now ! the ground landlord has got the money | and the ground and the building, but the revenue from the rent doesn't cover taxes and repairs, and the £15,000 building is a dead loss, and it is an open question if ho isn't really poorer than he was at first. The Auditor-General has decided that it is illegal for a member of a local body to supply goods to a local body, even though the amount does not exceed £10 in one year. In a letter to the Mayor of Cambridge, Mr Fitzgerald Eays:— "l think that the supply of anything by a councillor to a Council is a breach of 'The Local Bodies' Contractors Act, 1885/ I shall take no steps as to past transactions, as they have been taken under wrong advice, but there is nothing to prevent any ratepayer or other person taking proceedings if he likes; bub you may warn the Council that if a case is brought before me again in a future account I may feel it my duty to prosecute for the penalty. For j the f uturo I shall be unable bo pass any ■ expenditure for goods supplied to the Council by a councillor."