Local and General

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XXXXVII, Issue 12720, 17 November 1903, Page 4

Local and General

The Wanganui portion of the 'Frisco mail, 'which arrived at Auckland by the It.M.S. Sierra yesterday morning, will reach here to-day at mid-day.

Mr. District Judgot Kettile leaves by express to-da^ to preside at the sittings of the District Court at New Plymouth and Stratford.

We learn from the "Daily Mail" that the vicar of Ilford, the Rev. W. E. Molony, has written the following Letter in reference to Mr. Andrew Carnegie's offer to present the town with £10,000 ,fora public library:—"Let Ifford have the proud distinction of being a town without a public library. People read too much and think too little. We need publio ibonfiros to destroy most of the -books which are published, rather than public libraries in which to flsrcbeire them." -

In the list of St. Joseph's School passes, published yesterday, we inadvertently omitted the name of Irene O'Connor, who passed Standard VII.

The Rev. H. J. Lewis, who has been supplying the pulpit at Sti. Paul's Church, left by the south express yesterday.

Chicago is now celebrating the c«ntenarv of its foundations. In 1800 the city's population numbered 26; this year it has reached 2,231,000.

In a very small shop in a very small town in Glamorgan the whole stock consists of a few packets of tea, two or three tins of salmon, a pot of pickles, and some bottles of sweets. A poster ifi the window proudly announce*: "We lead, others 'follow."

Mr. J. G. Poynfcer of the Wanganui Telegraph Office, staff, who has! been appointed postmaster at Otaki. leaves' for that place to-day. He will carry with him the best wishes of the; hosts of friends he has made during his long residence in this town.

A peculiar case was heard before the Christchurch magistrate1 last week. A woman who had been divorced from her husband remarried him. but left him again subsequently. She claimed £87 7s. 6d. for goods of! her® alleged to have been retained by her husband, and stated that he had taken her rings: off her fingers and attempted to remove her false teeth.

An inventor has taken out a patent for a real view hat mirror. His purpose is to provide a small mirrow and frame and means for attaching the frame to a hat or cap and for adjusting the mirror in its frame, the .attachment to be made to the under facet of the brim of a hat or to the visor of a cap, whereby the wearer -without turning his. head may soe the Teflection of any objects in the road, room, or space ibefaimd him.

At Tisra Sze Miklos in Hungary, recently Rudlof Tyrritz. at man of Herculean proportions, was .building a stable for a farmer. He was nearly finished, avhen Tyrritz quarrelled with his employer, and in the heat of the argument ran up to one of the pillars of the istaible and shook with such force as- to cause the whole .building to collapse. Tyrritz inmself was buried among the ruins, and later was dragged out dead.

The West Coast "Times" publishers the 'following:—lt has been said that it is almost impossible to miss finding gold anywhere on the West Coast no matter where tried for, in connection with which statement the following is of interest: The mem employed pile driving on the Waimea Creek railway bridge had to pull up :ai piile driven fourteen feet in consequence of being too short. The pile when brought up was found to have been driven through a layer of black sand, and numarous colours of gold were adhering to it.

The discovery of a new metal called selium is attributed to M. Edward Mollard, a Frenchman. The discoverer asserts that «:4ium costs only one-twelfth as much a.s aluminium, and is lighter and stronger. It doesi not mist, and is therefore suitable for shipbuilding, for the manufacture of pipes, etc. It is asserted also that it is capable of taking a fine -polish resembling nickel. Its hardmfts is not quite equal to that of iron, but is greater than that of lead of zinc. Its strength is' said to be greater thaw that of iron, but less thaii that of steel.

Some commotion still exists over the alleged revival of crinolines. A leading couturiidr of the Rue de la Paix .says practically that there had beon no attempt to revive the crinoline, but that as ladies now wear ampler and thicker stuffs than formerly some dressmakers have introduced into thei N .bottoms of tikirts steel circlets to prevent napping. "Voi-Ia tout!" remarked thti couturier, as he gave hfei information. At the same time, he hinted that there was no accounting for tastes or. the , actions of some ladies. By degrees women of fashion might waint to have still ampler dresses than those now in wear, and that would necessitate larger steel circlets.

A Wiltshire firm of bacon curers paid no less thaai £10,000 for the.Brandenburg method of curing hams; while a certain special chutney, or rather tllie method of mixing it originally bought for a few rupees from a poor Hindoo trador, changed hands a few months •back for £750j. The famous Worcester sauce is made atocording to a recipe hundreds of years old, which was bought "for a song" from the butler of a county family by the then head of the firm of Lea and Perrins, of Worcester. Today the little faded scrap, of yellow, paper, with its almost indecipheraible. V^voglyphics is vaJlued by its owners' ac maiiy thousands of pounds sterling. '■,

"Come one, come ail; this rock shall fly from its firm ibase as soon as I." Thus say the citizens of Wahganui dis-" triict with regard to the-question of,the Raetihi-Parapara-Wanganui road. They are evidently determined to push on, and use every means in their power to ■obtain what has .been co long withheld from them, viz.. a good road into the interior. To-morrow night a monster meeting of citizens will be held in the» Opera House, when .the matter will be again discussed, and a number of beautiful vieiws taken along the route of the proposed road,will be exhibited by the aid of a powerful, lantern. Every citizen should be interested, and all who are interested should be present at the meeting.

The Corsican bandit Pierre Poli has been killed in an encounter with gendarmes near San Gavino. The gendarmes learnt that Poli was about to leave San Gavorio by way of Mela, and laid an ambush for him. During the night of the second day three men came along the Mela road. The gendarmes appeared from their ambush and de^manded their surrender. The men replied with a volley from their guns, wounding two of the officers, and then turned to flee. The gendarmes returned the fire, and one of the three nien-fell. He waa found to be the redoubtable Poli himself, and had been killed by a bullet, which passed through his bead. He had committed many murders and acts of brigandage, and had long, been hunted b- the gendarmes.