HERE AND THERE.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1463, 9 May 1918, Page 36

HERE AND THERE.

The Hon. T. M. Wilford, Minister for Justice and Marine, paid a short visit to Auckland last week on Departmental business.

The Rev. H. B. Goertz, who has been vicar of Holy Trinity Church, Port Chalmers, for the last six years, has resigned the pastorate in order to join the colours as a private.

Mr. and Mrs. E. Caerlyon-Bennett, of Napier, have left for Australia, where they intend spending some months.

Mr. and Mrs. K. S. Williams, of Tokomaru Bay, are on a visit to Auckland.

The Japanese Consul-General in Australasia, the Hon. Seizaburo Shimizu, has arrived in New Zealand on his first official visit.

Four thousand million cigarettes were supplied to the Army last year.

Mr. E. A. Craig has been appointed to act as Consul of Chile at Auckland.

Sir William Cullen, Chief Justice of New South Wales, Lady Cullen and Miss Cullen, who have been visiting some of the North Island resorts, have left for the south.

Reports from country districts indicate that sportsmen are meeting with success. A party of five Rotorua sportsmen, who visited the Rangitaiki Swamp, Bay of Plenty, returned with 100 brace of ducks and three brace of pheasants.

Captain P. S. Petersen, junior, master of the Te Anau, has been appointed pilot for Wellington. * * * *

The oyster season in Auckland is in full swing now and the staff of the Government depot is kept busy fulfilling orders.

Deerstalkers report that the Matamata district is supplying sport in plenty this season. Already several good heads have been secured. Messrs. W. Livingstone and Heels secured a somewhat rare specimen, a pure white stag.

Sir Auckland Geddes says he cannot find adequate basis for the allegation of the improper retention of young fit men in Government offices.

Mr. Harold Beauchamp (chairman of the Bank of New Zealand) is on a visit to Sydney. He will attend the annual meeting of the Australian Mutual Provident Society, of which he is a director in New Zealand.

A Press cablegram from London states that ' Peter Gillon, wireless operator on the steamer Otaki, sunk by the raider Moewe on March 24, 1917, has reached Switzerland from Germany.

It is stated that 14,500 men have been withdrawn from the service of the Post Office in London to serve in the Army and Navy.

Mr. A. E. Whyte, secretary of the Wellington Racing Club, who has recently returned from a trip to Australia, says: During the four days of the A.J.C. meeting 174,000 persons were carried to Randwick by tram, and train. The manner in which the traffic was handled was a revelation to New Zealanders. There was no confusion and no crowding.

The Australian casualties to date total 293,093, including 44,650 dead, 120,447 wounded and 70,328 sick.

During 1917 there were 1358 deaths from coal mine accidents in the British Isles.

“The waste of paper in documents sent to local authorities is scandalous ; the Government ought to be first to set an example,” said a member of Warminster (Wilts) Council.

Selling his motor car, the Mayor of Tiverton, Devon (England), has bought a donkey and cart and invested the balance in War Stock.

It is not right to say that the Dominions came to the rescue of the Motherland; when England declared war the whole Empire was at war, said Lord Morris, ex-Premier of Newfoundland.

About 4000 German prisoners, skilled ploughmen, are to be offered to the British War Agricultural Committees.

" The English Government has offered 2000 German prisoners for work on the land in Somerset. Guards will be provided, and the employers will pay the Government sd. per hour per man.

Twenty pei’ cent, of blind children in England owe their blindness to ophthalmia (inflammation of the eye) in their earliest days, when there were no nurses capable of coping with the disease, says Mr. Hayes Fisher.

Over 500 German prisoners are employed on the land in Herts, England.

Over 100 officers of. the original Canadian force recently commemorated at a dinner in France the arrival of the force there three years ago.

Sir George Kenrick has given the athletic institute and playing fields of 16 acres at Birmingham to the Birmingham Corporation.

A system of allotments is being arranged at Eton College by which every house may supervise a particular plot of land.

Political neglect of agriculture has cost millions and prolonged the war by at least a year, said Sir Charles Bathurst, M.P., at Gloucester.

To improve shipping facilities merchants began to erect an electric crane at Limerick, but the labour interest objected to the scheme and a number of men pushed the crane into the river.

Speaking at the Royal Society of Arts, Mr. Edgar Crammond, secretary of the Liverpool Stock Exchange, said that at least £lOO should be given to men who had served three years in the Army and Navy during the war. * * * * A Croydon (London) butcher who had one pig was inundated with orders. In order to solve the problem it was decided to draw lots, and names were taken from a hat until the carcase had been disposed of. « * * * A 3611 b. salmon has been caught in the Shannon at Castleconnel, County Limerick. Trout fishing has opened on the river and on the Wye, Dee, Usk and Bala Lake. * * * * The Maharaja Scindia of Gwalior has given to the King and Queen £6OOO for naval officers and men whose families require help and to the Queen of the Belgians £12,000 in aid of Belgian charities. $ * $ * Before the Brighton Tribunal an applicant, aged 35, unsuccessfully urged that the making of “swagger canes” is work of national importance.

Acting - Lieutenant Prince Albert, R.N., the King’s second son, has been promoted lieutenant.

Sir Auckland Geddes, at Aidershot, said that though he had had to deal with a lot of noisy opposition from revolutionaries, pacifists and proGermans, their arguments rarely influenced anyone to resist the call to military service.

Indian soldiers in France last year had 14,278 bottles of hair oil from the Indian Soldiers’ Fund. ❖ * * *

Arrangements have already been made by the British Ministry of National Service to meet the demand for labour on the land during the summer. City youths will help from June onwards, 2000 a month being available, and many Boy Scouts will be supplied for the harvest season. The War Office, it is understood, will abandon the O.T.C. camp this year, thus releasing boys for the harvest during August and September. It is hoped that 10,000 public school boys will be available.

An American mission representing the Loyal Order of Moose, one of the principal fraternal organisations of America, has landed in England to organise welfare plans for American soldiers.

No male alien between 18 and 61 can now work in certain trades in England without permission in writing from the Director-General of National Service. This order applies to more than 100 trades.

Since the outbreak of war 12,215 bandsmen in England have enlisted; 1080 have been killed, and 1414 have been wounded. Three have won the Victoria Cross and 53 have been granted commissions.

Acknowledging a manifesto from wives of Lord Lieutenants and others urging that no man twice wounded should be compelled to return to the trenches, Mr. Lloyd George says it is a great encouragement to feel that the Government has their support in the endeavour to solve the problem of man power and at the same time to act fairly towards the men who have already returned many times to the front.

Telegram from the front: “Send 2,000,000 pair of pyjamas. The Russian Army is about to retire.”

A vigorous recruiting campaign is in progress in Cape Town. Women are visiting racecourses, theatres and other places of amusement, rounding up slackers. At a meeting at Oudt shoorn 50 women walked on to the platform and announced that they were willing to fight. Seventy men followed.

Jjord Rhondda has announced that It will be possible to allocate approximately 10,000 tons of sugar during Use coming fruit season to enable private growers in England to convert their fruit into jam without reducing the issues to jam manufacturers.

A cockerel owned by Mr. F. C. Tyson, which has been sold 6670 times and has raised £7365 for the Red Cross and kindred funds, was recently bought in for £145 at a gift sale at Maidstone (Eng.) on behalf of the Red Cross and Kent Prisoners of War Fund. This sale, with subscriptions, realised nearly £6OOO.

Owing to transport difficulties and the shortage of seeds in the principal seed-growing countries our supplies for sowing this spring will be seriously curtailed. Unless steps are taken at once to increase the production of seeds at home the position in 1919 and 1920 will be extremely grave. There is a world -shortage, according to the Food proAuction Department. The over-sea Dominions are relying more than ever on the Old Country for seeds, particularly of root crops to feed • stock for shipment as meat to us.

Many more dogs than usual are being taken for painless destruction to the various dogs’ homes in London. “The number has more than doubled,” said an official of one of these institutions. Shortage of food is partly the reason, but also owners are becoming more humane and do not turn so many unwanted dogs on the streets to starve. Cats, too, are being surrendered in large numbers, over 1500 being received every month by one society.

Sir Charles Bathurst, at the Chambers of Agriculture meeting in London, said Government Departments are competing by high wages to secure labour from Wiltshire farms. Early in the war 16 boys left the land to earn £3 a week on hutting contracts, and mothers wrote to him saying these boys were going to the devil through drink.

Sir Williams Beardmore has won this year’s Bessemer Gold Medal, which is awarded “to the inventor or introducer of any important or remarkable invention either in the mechanical or chemical processes employed in the manufacture of, iron or steel.”

Mr. Kellaway stated in the House of Commons that on the formation of certain contracts about 8000 women munition workers had received notice of dismissal during the past three weeks. Every effort was being made to place them in other forms of national service.

Dog’s hair is being utilised in England in the manufacture of wool. The 12 months’ crop of combings from Mrs. Scaramanga’s kennels of chows at Edgware, says “the Field,” provided sufficient material to make 30 jerseys, which have been given to needy soldiers. Examples of combings have been examined by experts and classed as “finest Vicuna,” the price of which to-day is not far short of 2s. 6d. an ounce.

“The Government, I am afraid, do not attribute sufficient importance to the paper making industry,” said Lord Burnham at the London School of Economics. “Newspapers are an important part of the Government machine in times like these. In future we must see that the supply of materials for paper is not dependent on enemy or neutral sources.”

At a meeting in Auckland, convened by the Mayor, Mr. J. H. Gunson, it was resolved: “That in recognition of the services rendered to the Empire in the present war by the late Lieutenant-Commander Sanders, V.C., this meeting resolves to establish a fund for the purpose of providing an appropriate memorial in honour of the memory of that gallant officer.” The Mayor read the letter received from His Majesty King George by Mr. E. H. C. Sanders, referring to the late officer’s valour and devotion to duty, and also extracts from letters sent by Admiral Jellicoe and the Lord of the Admiralty, in addition to an extract from a confidential letter from the Admiralty, which stated that the deeds of the late Lieutenant-Commander Sanders were “such as entitled his name to be inscribed imperishably on the same roll of naval history where stand the names of Blake, Nelson and Riou.” The hero is the son of Mr. Sanders, of Takapuna.

Brigadier R. Wouters, who saw active service with the Belgian Army in the early stages of the war and who was declared unfit for further military service, has arrived in New Zealand to conduct a lecturing tour throughout New Zealand on behalf of the Belgian Red Cross. The various Belgian Consuls, acting on the advice of the Belgian Consul-General for Australia, are to give their patronage to the lectures, and the money raised will be forwarded by the local committees to the consuls, to be remitted to the Queen of the Belgians, who is the head of the Belgian Red Cross movement. The tour starts at Dunedin.

A drastic reduction in the output of paper used by the London “Times” is about to be enforced. The daily sale will be limited to 120,000 copies, and to make up for the serious loss of revenue the price will be restored to threepence, at which “The Times” was sold from 1861 to 1913, when it was reduced to twopence. Those who require “The Times” will be obliged to sign a rationing form, and no copies will be supplied to anyone who does not undertake to share the journal with at least one other reader.

Mr. G. H. Roberts, Minister of Labour, at Exeter (Eng.), remarked that some people said we should share our materials with Germany after the war. “I do not subscribe to that,” he said. “Work and wages for my own people first of all, and if it be needed let the enemy people suffer a little longer for the terrible crimes committed in this ghastly war.” He hoped to give every demobilised man a reasonable chance of employment within four weeks, and he believed men would use this four weeks in such recreation as would cast no slur on their fame or sin on their soul.

The King, at Buckingham Palace, recently received Lieutenant Frederick O. Loft, of the Canadian Forestry Corps. Lieutenant Loft is Chief of the Six Nations Tribe of Indians. He has brought over a number of his “braves,” and intends to return to Canada to recruit more for forestry work in France. Because of his knowledge of Indian economics and his services to the various tribes of Indians in Canada, Lieutenant Loft (whose Indian name is Omondeyoh) was raised by his tribesmen from the ranks of the “braves” to be chief.

Some time ago the death in action was reported of Private H. G. Williams of Inglewood (Victoria), a member of the Army Medical Corps. News received by mail from Sergeant N. Porter, of the same corps, shows

that Private Williams died a hero’s death, inasmuch as he sacrified his own life to save a comrade. Sergeant Porter, in a letter to his mother, says: “I want you to tell Mrs. Williams how George died. He was away from us temporarily with artillery, and Fritz shelled them. The men were coming in wounded and gassed. The medical officer was knocked out, but George carried on and gave his own mask to a wounded man, although the gas was all around them. He went away gassed, and died at Rouen. . . . His people will have a little compensation in the Military Medal.”

The splendid resource and leadership of our officers is shown in the official notes in the “London Gazette” to awards of the Military Cross previously announced. Lieutenant Geo. M. Doughty, commanding a machine gun sub-section, held a position for three days and nights under heavy machine gun, rifle and shell fire, waist-deep in water. He kept up a constant fire on the enemy massing for counter attack. While firing his gun the pin broke at a critical moment, but he repaired the stoppage first with his tie-pin and afterwards with a split pin from a grenade.

Sir Arthur Yapp, speaking at a Y.M.C.A. meeting in London, told an interesting story of misplaced German ingenuity. “When our troops entered Peronne,” he said, “a west country detachment was told off to

a certain house for quarters. In one of the rooms was a German piano, the sight of which greatly elated a young soldier, who approached it with the intention of playing it. He was warned by his officer not to do so until it had been examined. The niano.” explained Sir Arthur, “was connected to a bomb, which the striking of a certain note would have exploded, causing the destruction of the house and all those in it.” » as * as Charged at Westminster with beg ging, Thomas Plantagenet Bohun, 65, who stated that he was formerly a clergyman in Australia, described himself as “a guide to lost soldiers,” which Mr. Chapman remarked was a new occupation. The defendant, who gave evidence, said he had no address, and slept under the vault of Heaven on a Piccadilly seat. He acted as a guide to soldiers, usually after midnight, making no specific charge, but receiving gratuities which accounted for ss. he possessed. Many got astray, and he put them in the right direction. He was remanded.