GENERAL NEWS

Waikato Times, Volume 96, Issue 15034, 4 September 1922, Page 6

GENERAL NEWS

As a result of widespread poaching trout are diminishing from streams in all parts of the Dominion, according to evidence given in the Magistrate’s Court at Greymouth (states the Greymouth representative of the Christchurch Sun), by a ranger of the Westland Acclimatisation Society, who was sent specially to Moana to detect acts of poaching. He was a witness in a case 'in which John Kemple and Thomas McGee, residents of the Lake' Brunner -district, were convicted for having trout from the lake in their possession during the spawning season, declared by the Fisheries Act to he closed.

A Gore resident who visited Wellington last week made an appointment with a Minister of the Crown. At the stipulated hour (relates the Mataura Ensign), he forwarded the following note to the chamber of the mighty: “Ready, so please your grace.” The words, of course, are taken from Antonio’s remark in reply to the Duke in the court of justice scene of the “Merchant of Venice.” But the point is that the Gore resident is still wondering if the Minister knew the rest of the historic dialogue: The Duke: “I am sorry for thee; thou art come to answer a stony adversary, an inhuman wretch, incapable of pity, void and empty from any dram of mercy.” The Minister, however, may have been flattered at the assumption that lie knew his Shakespeare well.