LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2254, 14 September 1914, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

As the HuiTdart-Parker steamer Wesfcralia. (from Sydney) failed to connect with the Main Trunk express from Auckland to Wellington .yesterday, the southern portion of the vessel's mails will not arrive at Wellington till 6.50 a.m. to-morrow. \ The postal authorities wish to notify the public that all correspondence for members of the main body of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force must be addressed to . the particular camp at which the men are being trained, until the force embarks. The notification as to addressing correspondence to the G.P.0., Wellington, is only intended to apply to . correspondence posted after the force has left New Zealand. fiaray Christmas, charged at the Auckland Supreme Court with wilfully setting fire to a -launch in June last, has been found not guilty, and discharged. At a meeting of the local branch of the Reform League, Mr. D. Jones, orgnniser, being present, it' was decided to select Mr H. H. Hayliurat, son of the lato Colonel Hayhurst, as the lieform candidate for the Temuka seatPress Association. Yesterday afternoon a heifer belonging to Mr. T. Twoniey, of Lower Hutt, whilst "ferretting" along the- river banks near the Hutt Bridge, in search of .young grass, overbalanced, and was precipitated into about five feet of water. A band of ready helpers, with the assistance of a rope, speedily dragged the animal out to safety and its owner. The Railway Department has_ accepted the tender of Mr. Geo. Bird, of Lower Hutt, for the lease of the bookstall at Lywer Hutt station for five years from July 1, 1914. A burglar was surprised at the very beginning of his enterprise in a house in Mount Street about 9 o'clock on Saturday night. At that hour a son of the house, a youth scarcely out of his teens, returned home, finding tho house, as he supposed, empty. He went upstairs, but hearing a noise in one of the downstairs rooms, he called to inquire whether tho other occupant of tho house was his brother. Receiving no answer, ho slipped a cartridge into a revolver ho had in his room and ran downstairs. He saw through a window a man rushing past tho side of the house, apparently having' let himself out by the back door, and the pursuer opened the front door, in time to see a man going out through tho front gate. In tho uncertain light he fired at the fast disappearing shape, but as_ the man got away, the shot probably missed. The burglar's haul amounted to only a few pounds' worth of jewellery, but had lie not been interrupted-there was much moro valuable loot ho would certainly have discovorod.

"New Zeaianders will bo wanted," remarked the Mayor of Auckland, Mr. 0. J. Parr, C.M.G., at a dinner which was tendered to some of the members of tho Expeditionary Force in Auckland on Friday. _ "Germany has a great fighting machine in her nrniy. She has received a check, but the 3 ; 000,000 German soldiers in the field will take somo crushing. Then tho fact that Germany has a large fleet must not bo discredited. God Almighty, however, never yet favoured the liar and tho murderer, iNo words of mino can adequately oxpress our loathing of those responsible for the ruthless sacking of Louvain, the murdering of helpless women and children, and the sowing of the sea with mines to tho danger of innocent men as well as belligerents. Never lias Britain waged a juster war than this. The Empire to a man is behind the King in this war. (Applause.) Our Allies, tho Japanese, . aro gentleman I compared tip the Germans. Tho Japanese liavo kept to- their bond and have respect for 'a scrap of papor.' Wo must learn, to be a littlo nicer to the Japanese and try not to bo continually holding up tli© yellow peril. Tho action of Japan has been such as to entitle her in 'future Jo our reajjeot,"