PONEKE FOOTBALL CLUB—WELLINGTON.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XI, Issue 46, 18 November 1893, Page 423

PONEKE FOOTBALL CLUB—WELLINGTON.

Winners of Senior Championship, 1893.

THE ARCTIC OCEAN. It is destitute of timber, and is about as barren and desolate a spot as could well be imagined. On it, however, is situated an Esquimau village and a missionary school. The teacher is Harrison R. Thornton, a relative of Ex-Supreme Judge James D. Thornton, of San Francisco, from whom a copy of the last number of the Bulletin was procured. It is dated May 1, 1893. The Bulletin is a small sheet 12 x 8 inches, printed on one side only, of stiff, white paper. It is printed by the hektograpb process, which is simply a method of multiplying copies of writing. The writing is first made on paper with prepared ink, and is then impressed upon gelatine. From the gelatine impressions are taken on many other sheets. As there is practically one mail to and from Cape Prince of Wales during the year one issue of the paper during the period is quite sufficient. This curious little paper contains a variety of news arranged under different heads. In mirthful imitation of the daily papers in other localities, it triumphantly carries at the head of its columns the legend, • LARGEST CIRCULATION IN THE ARCTIC,’ and also the additional boast of ‘ Only yearly paper in the world.' The headings are * Local Items,’ • Rural Notes, Society, ‘ Fashion,’ * Marriage Notices.’ • Whisky in the Arctic’ is the heading over an editoral. Every scrap of news is like a breath from the far north. As space is scanty, condensation is a fine art with the editor. He displays quite a fund of humour, too, and there is a strain of gentle playfulness in nearly everything he writes. Under the head of ‘ Rural Notes ’ be chronicles the follow-

Mr and Mrs Thornton, of the East End. gave a dinner parly in October. Among the invited guests wore : Mr Bruce and Mr and Mrs Lopp. Superintendent Bruce of Reindeer Station, and Mr Spencer of Norton Sound, spent ten days in town last March. Mr and Mrs Lopp entertained Mr and Mrs Thornton at dinner Christmas. The fashion notes have a decidedly original sound. Evidently they refer only to the native denizens of the Cape : Took-tnoi-na has a new pair of safety-pin earrings. Ke-rook sports two of Dr. Driggs' glass bottle-stoppers for labrets. Kum-muk is out in new trousers of the finest flour-sack cloth. A-yar-hok has a new overcoat of the fashionable dried peaches brand. He got the bags from a ship. From the local items it is learned that the winter was mild, the coldest day being 31 degrees below zero. The population of Cape Prince ot Wales is stated at 527, and the average daily attendance at school was 100. One man netted forty seals in a single day last October. Tane-na has just purchased a new forty-foot canoe, and Mr and Mis Thornton sre preparing for the walrus hunt. Evidently there is some sport in that bleak land. A few lines tell of a feat that must have been both dangerous and difficult. A midwinter mail was carried from Point Hope to St. Michaels, a distance of 700 miles, on dog and deer sled. The name of the hardy mail carrier is not even mentioned. Think of travelling 700 MILES OVER THE ICE AND SNOW OK AN ARCTIC WINTER MERELY TO CARRY THE MAIL ! Those people must hunger for news. In his solitary editorial the editor makes a spiritual pro-

numbers—singular, plural and dual. Mr Thornton has discovered that the Aleut language also has three numbers. This he regards as a discovery of which philologists may well take note, as the origin of the Esquimaux has been the subject of much discussion and speculation. Mr Thornton is gathering a large quantity of material respecting the manners, customs, religions ideas, traditions and lingual peculiarities of the tribes of Alaska, which he will probably publish in look form.