HERE AND THERE.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1256, 14 May 1914, Page 42

HERE AND THERE.

Mr. D. Morrison, manager for the Union Company at Rarotonga, returned to the Islands by the Talune on May sth, after a visit to Auckland.

Mr. and Mrs. J. E. Close, of Ngaheia, Kawakawa, Bay of Islands, have booked to leave by the Corinthic this month for London.

Mr. A. J. Dunmore, of the Caledonia Hotel. Auckland, leaves by the Willochra this month on a trip to Vancouver.

Mr. Leonard Challis, formerly of Auckland, who has been in the Trans-, vaal for several years, is at present on a holiday visit to the Dominion.

Mr. R. A. Nicholls, of Eideford, who is going on a trip to Great Britain, left Wellington by the Remuera for London. '

Mr. W. F. Stewart, secretary of the Auckland Gas Company, accompanied by his wife and child, left by. the Union Company’s boat on a visit to Sydney.

Mr. T. E. Foy, manager of the Bank of New Zealand. Te Kuiti, has received word that he has been appointed manager for Fiji, and will be stationed at Suva.

Mr. S. Wing, secretary to Messrs. Hellaby, Ltd., Auckland, accompanied bv Mrs. Wing, left last week by the Union Company’s liner upon a visit to Sydney.

Mr. Robert E. Leman, of 22, Westbourne Terrace, Hyde Park, London, accompanied by his daughter, together with Mr. and Mrs. W. C. Hale, of 60, Gloucester Terrace, Hyde Park, have just completed a tour of New Zealand, and left by the Marama last week on their return home.

By the Union Company’s steamer which sailed on the sth of May, Mr. Percy Brown, of the Cook Islands Trading Company, returned to Rarotonga.

Mr. and Miss Kellie, Scotish tourists, w'ho have been on a short visit to Auckland, left last week for Rotorua and Wellington by way of the Wanganui River.

Mr. Duncan Moore, a visitor from Chicago, arrived in Auckland by the Makura last week. After a short stay in the city he proceeded to Rotorua to view the wonders of the Thermal District.

Amongst the passengers who left Auckland last week by the Union liner for Sydney were Mrs. Richard Stewart, wife of the well-known theatrical manager, accompanied by her son and daughter.

Mr. George Tutbury, of Riwaka, Nelson, left Wellington for Raratonga by the Moana on April 24th. He intends to remain among the Islands for about three months for the benefit of his health.

Mr. John Myers, of Messrs. John Myers and Co., Wellington, has arrived in London with his family via the Continent. He expects to remain in England for about three or four months. He spent a week in Leipzig.

The Rev. C. E. Dent, who has been engaged in mission work in the Kaffir Compounds, Johannesburg, and who has been in Auckland on furlough, leaves by the White Star liner Ceramic on his return to Africa in July.

Captain Williams, an official of the Auckland Harbour Board, who has been appointed to a position in connection with the Canadian-Pacific Railway, left last week by the Marama to take up his new duties in the great Dominion.

Mr. M. M. Louisson, of the wellknown firm of Messrs. Fairburn, Wright and Company, Auckland, accompanied by Mrs. Louisson and child, left Auckland last week to join the Orient Company’s steamer for London.

Mr. H. Otto Frind, a well-known Canadian mountaineer, who has been climbing in the New Zealand Alps, and recently has been also exploring the North Island volcanic peaks, joined the Manuka for Sydney upon her last trip. He returns from the latter city by the same steamer to Auckland, and then proceeds to Vancouver.

The trout streams of New Zealand are famous in clubland all the world over where fisherman most do congregate; and year by year sportsmen return to their lure. Amongst the annual visitors is Colonel Blennerhassett, who returned to England last week via Sydney, after a fishing excursion spent upon the banks of New Zealand waters.

The Resident Commisioner at Rarotonga, Mr. H. W. Northcroft, returned to the Islands by the Union Company’s steamer Talune on May sth. Mr. Northcroft, who had been on a short pleasure to trip to New Zealand, will accompany His Excellency, Lord Liverpool, upon his contemplated tour of Rarotonga towards the end of the present month.

Misses A. M. and Grace Wood, English visitors, who have spent some months touring New Zealand, left by the Marama last week for Fiji, where they will catch the Navua for a tour round the islands. The tourists are contemplating spending a month in the more primitive parts of Fiji before they return to Auckland by the next trip of the Marama and proceed via Sydney and Java to England.

Mr. G. Seifert left Palmerston North on April 23rd en route for London, in order to be present at the sculling race on the Thames for the championship of the world between Barry and Paddon (of Australia). Mr. Seifert is the latter’s principal backer, and he is confident the Australian will give a good account of himself.

At a recent social held at Woodville, in honour of a resident who had returned from a pleasure trip, he said that anyone going to Canada would either have to have a pocketful of money or to hurry through. New

Zealanders thought that our tourist resorts were very expensive, but there he had never had a bed for less than 12s. a night, and sometimes it was 165., while meals were always Bs. No wonder he liked New Zealand.

Mr. and Mrs. William Elliott, of Auckland, have left for a holiday journey abroad extending over about eight months. They will travel by the Marama to Honolulu, and will visit San Francisco before making a tour of the principal Canadian cities. Afterwards they will travel in the United Kingdom and Europe, and, retiming by the Suez route, will reach Auckland again probably in January.

From a copy of the Japan “Chronicle,” dated 4th March, we learn that the Hon. Oliver Samuel and Mrs. Samuel were then staying at the Oriental Hotel, Kobe. When the Hon. O. Samuel left New Zealand he was bound for Java and did not think he would again visit Japan, for he has been there twice before. However, he seems to have been unable to resist the temptation to pay still another visit to the land of cherry blossoms.

Constantinople has not yet realised the full possibilities of electricity. Smaller ancient cities of the Near East have taken more advantage of that agency for lighting, traffic, and other purposes than has the capital. One reason for this tardiness is the fact that Abdul Hamid, with an eye to the dangers of electricity and the possible perils to his personal safety, would never consent to its adoption in Constantinople. There are, however, evidences of an awakening interest in this power as a means of developing the city’s resources. A plant will soon be able to furnish a powerful electric service. It is being built at Silifdar on the Bosphorus. Cars on the underground cable road connecting Pera and G'alata are lighted with electricity. Electric cars are running in the main street of Pera. The service was inaugurated last August, and it is promised that in a short time this form of traction will supplant the primitive horse cars in sections of Galata and Stamboul, and that eventually the lines will be extended to the villages on the European shore of the. Bosporus.

The Whangarei Acclimatisation Society has decided to approach neighbouring societies in regard to the question of exchange licenses on payment of a fee of 2s. 6d.

Mr. Harold E. Hodgkinson and Mr. A. Muir have completed the inspection and culling of the Canterbury Acclimatisation Society’s herd of red deer in the Rakaia Gorge. They found no actual malforms, but saw some very fine heads, and they were particularly struck with the growth of the horns of the young stags, and with the size and quality of the hinds. Mr. Hodgkinson has now gone to report upon the Society’s herd on the Poulter river, which was established a few . years ago by hinds and stags obtained from Mr. Lucas, of Warnham Court, England.

Arnold Kruckman, chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics of the PanamaPacific International Exposition, is now making a tour of the United States in an endeavour to definitely decide upon control stations for the great Exposition circumaviation race around the globe for prizes now guaranteed at 300,000 dollars, and which may aggregate more than a half-million dollars. It is the intention of Mr. Kruckman to carefully inspect the entire course as laid out, and it is probable that with this in view he will sail for Europe in May.

Last year the proprietor of the Matata Hotel, reports the Cambridge paper, I) ad five beds booked for the opening Gf the season; this year he had forty applications for accommodation. Notwithstanding that a Cambridge sportsman booked his bed before he left Matata last year, and also secured the services of a Maori and his canoe, he feels it is necessary to be on the spot early or he might find the Maori had been bribed to break his contract. Game seems to be getting almost as scarce as it is in the Old Country, and to obtain a decent “bag” you have to travel.

The vagaries of the United States Immigration officers seem to have reached their climax a few weeks ago, when Mrs. Flora Annie Steel, the gifted authoress, was “held up” at New York as an “undesirable.” Mrs. Steel had been travelling with her nephew on the Muretania, second class, as she frequently does in her search for material to write about. On landing, an official, whom she described as a very polite, spectacled . gentleman, asked her how much money she had. She replied that she had £lOO and could get more if necessary. When she added that she was an author the inspector looked dubious and bade her wait. An hour later the inspector returned and informed her that the immigration doctor had certified that she was suffering from senile debility, and that she could not be allowed to land as there was a danger of her becoming a public charge. Mrs. Steel declares that she nearly shrieked, as her own doctor had assured her just before her departure from England that she ought to be able to work until she was a hundred. She told the officials that her account of the experiences she was having with them would be worth £3O in a London newspaper. This appears to have struck the officials as a slight proof of sanity, and after questioning her for another quarter of an hour they told her nephew to take good care of her and released her.

The super-hotel de luxe is evolving p. regular series of uniforms for its minions almost' as varied and magnificent as those of a great European army. The staff cf the Hotel Imperial at Mentone, for instance, are garbed in uniforms which, with their slashed-away coats and buckskin waistcoats and high peaked hats, vaguely recall the dresses of the Prussian Army that rose against Napoleon. One or more Orientals in some kind of gorgeous native garb seem to be a necessity. Sometimes he is a doorkeeper; more often the Turkish coffee is under his charge. He may be a Turk in crimson and gold and a fez, or an Algerian in pale blue heavily ornamented with gold lace, or a coon from Virginia in some more conventional livery. One Nice hotel has, I believe, a genuine Abyssinian as a

lift-boy. Then there are the lounge and restaurant waiters in carefully graded variations of brass-buttoned evening dress, the hotel omnibus staff in green and gold, and “boots” with their slashed waistcoats and white aprons, the luggage men in red, and the hall porters. At Ruhl’s in Nice these last-named important functionaries wear, as their only insignia of office, a silver emblem on the collar of their impeccable frock-coats —the crossed keys of St. Peter, Janitor of Heaven, and Patron of the Porters. Against all this liveried splendour the plain black elegance of the manager and of the maitre d’hotel duly emphasises the respective importance of these two functionaries in the scheme of the super-hotel de luxe.

The remarkable steaming performance of the liner Lusitania across the Atlantic has excited wide interest, and according to news received by a recent English mail, the giant Cunarder has established a world’s record. She left New York for Liverpool on Tuesday, March 3rd, and between. Thursday noon and Friday noon steamed 618 nautical miles at an average speed of 26.70 knots. The world’s record for a day’s run east previous to this was 614 miles, accomplished in April,

1911, by the Cunard Royal mail steamer Mauretania, the Lusitania, however, being a good second with 608 knots.

To connect Galata with Stamboul a new bridge has been built. This is the.most important work the municipality has so far completed. In its construction about oner-fifth of the

loan of a million pounds which the city raised for public improvement was used. It is well paved and lighted with electricity. While it may lack some of the picturesque character of the old bridge, where “the people of all Europe and Asia passed in an unending procession,” it has more stability and is better adapted to the passage of steamers to and from the Golden Horn.

Two Masterton young ladies were travelling on the Main Trunk railway from Auckland to 'Wellington, reports a contemporary. On the journey they received much attention, from a gentleman who was also proceeding to the Empire City. They confided in him that they were tourists with great prospects, and told a story which gained for themselves cups of tea at every refreshment room, and all the respect that is due to distinguished visitors. They parted from their male escort at Wellington, with expressions of deep sorrow. Half an hour later they arrived at the house of a friend in the city, to find, to their intense surprise, that the young man who had shown them so much attention was a guest at the same

house, and had already begun to tell the story of his exploit with a couple of millionaire tourists. The explanations that followed were almost as profuse as the blushes.

A Sydney woman, who has just returned from America, says that they have a sanitary fever over there. In most of the big cities, apparently, the common drinking cup is unknown; water bubbles up in a little jet, and spurts into the drinker’s mouth without touching the jet; the common towel is also unknown, for the paper towel has taken its place. In the best hotels no waiter is allowed to bring a finger bowl already filled, in case it may have been used by someone else first. The dry finger bowl is brought and the water poured into it before the diner’s eyes. And best of all is the cleanliness in the hotel bedrooms. After each visitor, even those who have only slept one night, the room is thoroughly turned out and cleaned by a vacuum cleaner. The tariff in the first-rate American hotels is renowned; but apparently you get your money’s worth.

Banquets may have been more costly in the days of Lucullus, scenes of greater splendour may have been witnessed in the palaces and mansions

of Renaissance Europe, money may have flowed more freely in the days of the Regency beaux, but surely the complete and utter luxuriousness marking the Riviera season, in the South .of France, must, as a manifestation of the contemporary outlook on life, stand almost unparalleled in

the history of the world. London, Paris, Berlin (especially Berlin), and even now St. Petersburg possess hotel palaces the lavish appointments of which still make the mid-Victorian gasp with astonishment. Yet one comes to the Riviera and finds that even the splendid caravanserais of which in all capitals of the world society now makes a second home are outdone by the latest hotel creations prepared for what is probably the wealthiest class of visitors to winter resorts in the world. The tango has popularised afternoon dances and the tango tea, therefore the super-hotel de luxe must provide accommodation. Accordingly the newest hotels on the Riviera are provided with lounge halls even more spacious and splendid than the winter gardens we already know, where hundreds of people can be comfortably seated at afternoon tea, with a no less magnificent, if not quite so large, hall adjoining where, about the hour of four, the rugs are removed, revealing the most perfect of polished dancing floors. Here, to the strains of a red-coated gipsy orchestra, two or three couples of professional dancers go through the intricate measures of the tango or the Brazilian maxixe. At one hotel there a complete dancing floor is laid down in sections every afternoon in

the centre of the lounge, and on its polished surface the tango, the onestep, with its host of concomitant “glides,” and the Boston are danced beween the hours of four and seven by enthusiasts of a dozen different nationalities.

Californian quail have increased to such an extent in the Cleveden (Auckland) district that they constitute a pest. A letter was received at the annual meeting of the local branch of the Farmers’ Union, strongly urging that steps be taken to reduce the number of the birds, as at their present rate of increase they are becoming a very serious menace to farmers. The Union is considering the best course to adopt to deal with the pest.

The introduction of the English partridge to districts controlled by the Auckland Acclimatisation Society has not proved to be a great success. The birds are apparently too fond of cultivated ground, and fall an easy prey to the man with the gun. The red-legged or French partridge does better, and is not such an easy victim. But the game bird which does best and which provides the best sport is the pheasant. These have been liberated in large numbers in various localities, and show every sign of thriving and providing excellent shooting.

The luxuriousness of life on the Riviera is very well kept up. The season is short, so prices are undeniably high, but in return the visitor finds himself surrounded with politeness and attentions that are as genuine as the Empire furniture and the buhl clocks. Life is never allowed to flag. Lights are on and servants are about seemingly at all hours of the night, and the cheerfulness with which the most surprising demands are executed suggests that the word “impossible” is not in the vocabulary of the super-hotel de luxe. What strikes a visitor as so remarkable, particularly about Monte Carlo and Nice, is that though at the end of April the season ends and nearly all these vast caravanserais are shut up for the summer, one is never allowed to have the feeling that all these glories are merely transient. And so northern pilgrims return home to cold and fog with a grateful picture of the Riviera imprinted on their memory as a place of luxuriousness, of elegance, of gaiety, and of sunlight.

On going ashore at Bombay, says a New Zealand vistor, my first business was to find out from Cook and Sons when I could get a boat from Colombo to Melbourne. And as I could not get one for some days, I decided to spend the interim in Bombay. The afternoon I employed in getting some knowledge of the extent and magnificence of the city, by taking tram to various parts of it. By paying one anna, equal to a penny, you may go to the terminus in any direction, so that for the small sum of sixpence you can get an excellent idea of the place. It is a most interesting city, where East and West appear to meet, while its buildings are simply magnificent, and its inhabitants the most interesting and varied people imaginable. “Parthians and Medes and Elamites and the dweTers in Mesopotamia” may not be there, but most other races are represented. Crowds upon crowds of Parsees, Hindus and Moslems, Paythans, Jews, and Sikhs besides Europeans and the representatives of many other Asiatic countries, each in their distinctive dress, form animated and ever-chang-ing pictures, for the people who fill the streets in thousands are most varied and interesting, while sights and scenes quite familiar from pictures are being acted out everywhere in real life. A large part of the Indian’s life is lived in the open, and one gets a fair knowledge of their customs and habits by passing through the native streets. Large numbers of students, toe, were to be seen with

their books under their arms, on their way to or from the many schools and colleges of Bombay. I finished up the day by a delightful moonlight ramble round the waterfront.

Mr. Winston Churchill, speaking at the Royal Aero Club, said: —“Some people think it is a melancholy thing that this new art of flying should be appropriated so markedly, should be almost monopolised by war and war requirements. Many of the people who are prepared to admire the scientific aspect of aviation are sorry when they realise that at the present time, the great moving power is derived from its military aspect and utility. But, after all, the two great services —the Navy and the Army—working together in flying as they have never worked together on any great common operation, with a greater cordiality and greater comradeship than they have ever worked together before —must be the main propulsive force to aviation, at any rate in this country. We recognise absolutely the brilliant work and solid achievements of the civilian flyers in every sphere and in every branch of aviation. But I think it is true to say that in the present circumstances nothing but the supreme stimulus of war consideration and nothing but the large and generous floods of money which the taxpayer can provile will carry British aviation forward as it has to be carried forward to the foremost place among he nations of the world. The risk of flying is very greatly exaggerated by the newspapers. Since I have been at the Admiralty many more lives have been lost in the submarine service than in the air service. There is an element of risk in flying, but it is not undue or excessive, or one which should prevent the active development of the service.

Visitors to Balclutha speak in high terms of the management of the Railway Hotel by Mr. J. G. Paterson, who has conducted this favourite hostel for the past few years, and also runs a livery and bait stables in conjunction with the business. Saddle horses, gigs, etc., can be obtained there at reasonable charges.

The subject of the Taupo tourist traffic was brought before the Prime Minister by a deputation from the New Zealand Automobile Association. The deputation pointed out that £3OOO would cover the cost of the necessary bridges, and the thermal district would be more easily accessible. Dr. Newman, M.P., described Taupo as the best playground in New Zealand, and said he knew of a firm prepared to initiate a motor ’bus service for Taupo traffic from Waimarino if the road were completed. The Prime Minister, in reply, said the Government recognised the importance of the road. He looked forward to improving the Tongariro National Park, and hoped the road would soon be formed. This work would be carried out by good-conduct prisoners, while the bridges would be built by contract. The Hon. A. L. Herdman said that the plans of the bridges were prepared, and he saw no reason why they should not be completed within six months. A start would be made shortly with the road formation by prison labour.

The reports from the deer country about the wild ranges of Lake Hawea are of more than usual interest. Two sportsmen, Mr. R. McKenzie, of Invercargill, and Mr. J. Forbes, of Christchurch, who possesses the best collection of heads in the Dominion, have just returned from the back country. The stalking of this high mountainous country is both difficult and dangerous. The stalking ground is reached via Queenstown and Wanaka, where hunters generally pass a night before breaking into the rough country beyond, and even when they are established at Hawea long and tedious marches await them before they can penetrate the deer country, but, once there, their pains are amply repaid, for the reports have it that there are thousands of deer in prime condition. The experience of Mr. McKenzie with the heads he has brought back with him goes to indicate how plentiful are the deer and how freely they move about. One fine ’ 1 -pointer was shot within a very sho?t d : stance of the party’s camp, and o"e was brought down by the marksman as he stood within a few feet of t’ e hut

doorway. The beasts were in splendid condition, and carried unusual quantities of fat. Mr. Forbes, who had not returned when Mr. McKenzie left, had up to that time taken two heads, one cf 12 points and the other of 14. There are herds upon herds in the long, tough grass which grows deep on the mountain sides. The herds are doing magnificently, but according to Mr. McKenzie something will have to be done within the next year to cull them if the stature of the animals is to be maintained. In one basin the members of the party saw herds of fully 200 deer, and when it is remembered that such basins are an ever-recurring physical feature of the country some idea of the dimen-j sions of the herds may be had. Along the Hunter River —which flows through a flat about half a mile wide, and upon either side of which the mountains rise steeply —the country is alive with deer, but careful stalking has to be done in order to get within range of desirable heads. In fact, the very numbers of the deer seem to add to the complexities of stalking, for the disturbance of even one mit in the herd will set the entire number on the move. It is sometimes necessary to penetrate to the snow levels to get the best heads, Mr. McKenzie stated that although the herd was thriving, the number of big stags was rather disappointing, and this is possibly why the number of big heads brought out of the district has been comparatively few.l and the Otago Acclimatisation Society, which controlled the territory, should do something to ensure the maintenance of a desirable standard of stature.’ The herd should be culled this year. In another quarter a reporter was informed that the practice with the most famous herds in Southland was to arrange for an interchange of stags. This, it was held, could very easily be done in New Zealand by interchanging stags captured while young in the North and the South Islands. Mr. McKenzie pointed out that it would be most difficult to thin cut the herds because of the very rough nature of the country, but he was firmly of opinion that, unless some such measure was adopted within the next year of two, the herd would degenerate rapidly.