LOCAL AND GENERAL

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3080, 10 May 1917, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

A proclamation has been issued in Sydney annulling the price of beer iixed by the Commodities Commission.— Press Assn.

The following further appointments have l>eeii made by Cabinet to Boards of Trustees for Soldiers:—Gisborne, Messrs. W. D. Lysnar, W. G. Sherratt, andl F. E. Gaddum. Ohurn: Messrs. T. de Vere Hunt, .'fames Roche and W. K. Williams. Mr. A. Meredith lias been added to the Whangamofflona Board.

In testing the ground at Miraniar for potato growing yesterday afternoon, Mr. F. Westbury found several very healthy specimens of the grass grub ; which has been so active on the bowling greens and lawns for the past two seasons. They are fat, grey caterpillars in appearance, about an inch long, and they exist on the roots of grass, or even tho roots of shrubs and fruit trees. Later on they become brown beetles, and 1 in turn these lay their eggs aboui September to simply the ensuing summer's supply of grubs. Continual cultivation of thn soil is the only means to eradicate them. With the constant turning over of the soil the birds are able to pick up. tho grubs, and so earn the gratitude' of the farmers and market gardeners. It may be remembered that the grass grub played havoc with the Sea-toun Bowling Club's green and the Basin Reserve a year ago.

James Harold Mawby, pastrycook, Wellington, filed a petition in'bankruptcy on Tuesday.

The funeral of A. Rhode, a German, who was interned on Somes Island, took place on Tuesday in Wellington. Deceased had suffered from heart disease for a considerable time, and succumbed on Sunday last.

The tender of Mr. P. C. Watt has been accepted for thei erection of business premises in Courtenay Place, next to the Albion Hotel, for the Dominion Motor Vehicles, Ltd. The building will be three stories high, and will cover the whole site, which k approximately 75ft. by 50ft. The ground floors will be used for showroom and offices, and plateglass windows will extend the full length of the frontage. The upper floors aro to be used for warehouse purposes, and will bo served by an electric motor-car lift, capable of raising 2} tons at 60ft. per minute. The interior of tho building adjoining the site which is Jiow used by the company as offices will be .entirely altered and renovated. Mr. J. M. Dawson is the architect.

Thore were 754 cases of meningitis in Victoria last year, according to a return prepared by th 6 Health Department, and of these 326, or 43.2 per cent., ended in the death of the patient. Meningitis is essentially a winter disease, but so far the indications are that it will bo less deadly this year, states the "Argus." The great majority of those who were affected by meningitis last year were males. : There were 485 (of whom 141 wcro soldiers), as against 260 females. The death-rate was, however, heavier amongst tho females, 50.2 per cent. Amongst tho military cases the deathrate was only 27 per cent. The number of cases wrs lowest in February, when there were only 12 oases, and highest in June, with 148. Curiously enough, the age group betweon 11 and 20 years showed the highest number of cases (202) and the lowest percentage of deaths, 28. Tho dteath-rate is highest in extreme youth (under ono year) and in age (over 50 years).

German prisoners are now being employed in the big nurseries in ■ England. A correspondent suggests that in return for their hoard and lodging the- German prisoners on Somes Island might be employedi in raising food* stuffs, or doing something more useful than carving wooden images of the Kaiser and Hindenburg.

W. B. Smith, student, Training Collcgo, whose name appeared in the last ballot enlisted in the Artillery when iie became tho required, ago, and goes into camp on June 25.

The machine-gun sent by the late Lieut. Gordon Harper to the Canterbury Mounted Itifles has been deposited in the Canterbury Museum. At present it is being cleaned, and a ctse if? to bo mado for its reception, and (is soon as this is completed the gun vill be put on view. The gun is of German' manufacture, and was ■ captured from the Turks on Gallipoli, and was used by the New Zealanders against the Turks.

A new trial has been ordered (states a Pi-ess Association message from Sydney) in the case Meredith and Co.. of New Zealand, v. Foley Bros. [Meredith and Co., of New Zealand, secured a verdict of £241, the full amount, claimed, from. Foley Bros, for an alleged breach of contract in connection vith a sale of ohaff.]

A question decided at ■ the local school committee eleotion, says a Bluff paper, was this: Is it competent for a man who is a ijood citizen in all respects to eit on a public school committee and yet send his children to another school ? The Education Aot does not bear on tho subject, but the houeeholders present dealt fiTe matter in their own way by creating an election and voting out the candidate in question. . ■ ,

A statement regarding the position of dentists drawn in the ballot was made by Major J. L. Conlan at the sitting of the First Auckland Military Service Board on Monday, when the adjourned case of T. J. Cole, dentist, Mount Eden, was under consideration, says the "New Zealand HeraTcl." Major Conlan said dentists drawn in the ballot were not entitled to go into camp as dentists. The Dental Corps was- full at present. The question of exempting dentists in view_ of the shortage was under consideration, but at the present time no dentists could be exempted. The appeal was dismissed.

The following officers and u.c.o.'s have heeu appointed a committee of the Soldiers' Club (TrenlhaniJ:—Major F. Waito, N.Z. Engineers; Major D. W. Talbot, Headquarters Staff; S.S.M. (W. 0.) J. Cumming, camp sergeantmajor; Q.M.S. ,T. D. Mnthewson, Q.M. Stores; Sergt. G. S. Bates, fr.Z.M.C. The open-air meeting organised by. the Chinch of England's Men's Society for 7.30 last evening bad to bo abandoned as the city authorities refused the society permission* to hold the meeting in the streets. A sitting of the Supreme Court for the sentencing of prisoners who have pleaded guilty in the Lower Court will be held at 10 o'clock this morning. The Full Court will sit at 10.30. The criminal sessions of the Wellington Supreme Court will open before His Honour Mr. Justice Edwards on Monday next. At a political meeting addressed by "Win-the-war ,, candidates at St. Kilda (Melbourne) on Monday week a returned soldier in mufti proposed' a vote of thanks to the speakers. He was subjected to much interruption by one or two men at the back, and ivns asked when hs was ''going back." "By tho next transport," he rejoined quickly. "Will you come with me?" The. man challenged undertook to enlist if £1000 were first placed to his wife's credit in the Savings Bank, and Mr. Wynne stepped forward and said that ho would guarantee to , pay his wife as much as tlio man was now earning per week for the remainder of her life. The episode caused about five minuteB 1 diversion, but nothing came out of it. The man was still protesting from the back of the hall when the meeting ended. '

The- estate of the late Earl Cromer, who was British Agent in Egypt from 1883 to 1907, has been proved at £166,670.

The national' treasurer of the Y.M.C.A., Mr. D. A. Ewen, has just received a cheque for £1802 Os. 9d. from the Balclutha Committee towards the erection and upkeep of a Balclutha Hut,

An amusing incident, the truth of which is vouched for, is related in the "Drapers' Record," London. A delegate of a certain trades union, interested in textiles and dyes, was deputed to onll upon a leading firm to inform it that the workers could not eke out a living on their present wages. When he reached the gate he saw posted l : "The employees have contributed £10,000 to the war- loan." He retraced his steps.

The name of Mr. Matthew O'Connor., stationmastor, of Courtenay Place/was inndverlontly included in tho list of balloted names yesterday morning. Mr. O'Connor is at present on his way to the front as a member of the Twentythird Reinforcements. A kinematograph presentation of the events of the Battle of the Somme has been received by the Government bf New Zealand, and this picture is shortly to bo shown to the people of the Dominion. The means to be adopted for the display of the picture to the public have yet' to be decided. It has been suggested that the Government will hand over the business side of ' the display enterprise to the Y.M.C.A under certain conditions. The Minister of Internal Affairs (the Hon. G. W. Russell) said yesterday that thorn had been negotiations with tho Y.M.C.A. on the matter, but that no settlement had yet been reached. The matter was still under consideration:

The Minister of Internal Affairs yesterday made the following statement regarding the gift of a billiard-table for tho Hanmer'Sanatorium: —''I notice in the statement made to the newspapers to-day, reference is made to the gift of a billiard-table by tho executive of the Y.M.C.A. to the Queen Mary's Hospital for Sick and Wounded Soldiers at Hanracr. This is the second' gift of that kind which has been forwarded to that institution. Tho .first billiard-table was provided by the trotting clubs of Canterbury, and tho necessity for a second one having been made apparent, the Y.M.C.A. came forward with a gift of a complete bii-liard-table, which is much appreciated."

The "Seven Keys to Baldpate" Company, which has been touring the. South Island, passed through Wellington yesterday en route to Auckland 1 . ,