LOCAL AND GENERAL

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 112, 29 January 1918, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

The Thirty-third Reinforcements have reached aport of call in excellent health and spirits, according to a cablegram received yesterday by the Minister of Defence. Private advice was received in Wellington last night that the latest ascent of Mount Cook, this time from the Hooker side, has just been niado by Miss Lorimer, lady principal of the Girls' College, Nelson, and ]\tr. H. A. Hall, of Auckland, with i Chief Guide Graham and Guido Young. A water main burst in Aro Street about four o'clock yesterday morning, and in the early part of the day the residents in the vicinity were without " water. The full pressure was in iho pipes at that time in tho morning,' and the rush of water camo with considerable force. The waterspout broke the window of a house nearby, and tho lower story of the house was flooded. Tho water was shut off complete!? about five o'clock, and the main had been repaired by midday. A young man named Sidney Martin Kane, twenty-six years of age, was drowned in a dam on Brancepelh Station, Masterton, on Sunday afternoon. With a number of other station hands ho had gono bathing. Apparently he could not swim, for as soon as he entered the water ho got into difficulties. A chauffeur named Teasdale made two fruitless attempts to rescuo him. In the last attempt the drowning man clutchod him round the wa,ist, raid it was with difficulty he extricated himself. The body of Kane wa3 recovered three hours later. Deceased was a son of Mr. Peter Kane, of Merton, Otago. He was in camp last year, but was discharged on leave without pay. The weather in Masterton has been very hot during the las't three days. On Saturday afternoon the thermometer reached 89 degrees in tho shade. A writ claiming £1085 damages has (says our Masterton been issued by Mr. M'Calmont, contractor, of Masterton, against the Greytown Borough Council, in connection with a sewage contract. The case is to be heard at the March sitting of the Supreme Court in Masterton. ' A Press Association telegram from Christchureh says that W. tJru, a wellknown Canterbury Maori, at present residing in Auckland,' will contest tho Southern Maori seat. Eight cadets have been selected from New Zealand to begin their training at the Royal Military College, Dnntroon, this year. They will leave for Australia this month. The cadcts, who have qualified by examination, aio as follow:—D'A. H. Moir (Dunedin), F. E. G. Batley (Christchureh), H. H. Goss (New Plymouth), N. Williams (Timaru), S. R. Crump.(Dunedin), L. B. Galbraith (Ashburton), F. G. Clark (Wellington), 1. R. Withell (Ashburton). At the meeting of the newspaper proprietors of the provincial district of Auckland, at which it was decided to increase the price of papers to 2d. pet copy, it was pointed out that present landed cost was now 300 per cent, above pre-war rates, and that papers j had ronched such a position that the greater the circulation the greater the loss. The Finance Committee of the City Council met yesterday to consider tho proposals for the _ amalgamation of Onslow with the city. After consideration the committee deemed it advisable to hold the matter over until the City Engineer had made a report dealiufc- with ihe municipal services that will 'be shared by an area coming into the city. Tho committee will meet again, when this report is available, .and will invito representatives of the Onslow Borough Council and of tho Johnsonvillo Town Board to bo present. Thero is a big demand at present for labourers for sewerago works, especially at Napier and Petone. Labourers are also specially wanted for Mnrtinborough, where tho Government has a large work 111 band. Farm labourers are, of course, in groat denu nd, and there are at present numerous vacancies for married couples. The flaxmilling industry calls for more hands. ARE YOU INVENTIVE? If so, there arc many opportunities whereby you can make a fortune. Send for splendid free Book, "Advice to Inventors." It tells < oil tho articles or improvements that are most needed. Write to Henry Hughes, Ltd., Featherston Street, Wouinffton,—Advt,

Tho following motion wns moved at llio Nurserymen's Conference in Cliristohiiroh by Mr. G. A. Green:— "Tlint, in view of the classification of the nursmymoir's industry as essential, mid tho nailing up of the Second Division il. lie :m instruction to the executive to tako such steps as it deems best to secure the retention of enough ollieiout tradesmen to maintain tho industry during the war." Mr. Green suid that a census should be taken of the remaining eligible men in the industry, for the purpose of organisation and of determining who should go and who should stay. Mr. Jones, in seconding the motion pro forma, maintained that there was no man in any industry who was indispensable. Other , men who had been considered indispensable had been superseded, and their work in soino instances had been done better. The conference had passed a motion tho day before declaring that it was in favour of doing everything possible to win the war, and he asked tho conference not to go back on that motion, and ask for exemptions, hut to allow every man who was accepted as fit to go and fight. Mr. F. Pope, Secretary for Agriculture, 011 being invited to speakj said be could only say what he had done himself as a Departmental officer in charge of some seven hundred men. There were some men of long years' experience, who, humanly speaking, were indispensable, and iie had appealed with success for several of liis meii.' After a brief .adjournment Mr. Green withdrew his motion, and seconded a motion by Mr. Jones, to the effect that the execution of the remit be left to the executive. Tho motion was carried. Tho Borough Engineer reported to the Lower Hutt Borough Couucil last evening that owing to the difficulty of finding suitable labour the Commissioner of Crown Lands had decided to defer for tho present tho laying out of tho Hall-Jones Settlement Estate. The farmers of Scotland are expected to huvo a surplus of 400,000 tons of straw this year, owing to the extension of the area under crop, and the British Board of Trade has been interesting itself in the profitable use _ of this material. The farmers aro being advised not to waste any of the straw. The paper manufacturers are willing to tako a certain quantity, provided that it is guaranteed free from impurities, such as thistle stalks, and the Board of Trade is supplying information as to tho best methods of using straw for fodder and manure. A New Zealander, whose name appeared in tho latest list of gazetted defaulting reservists, is a prisoner of war in Germany. He was a marine engineer on the Otaki, and since that time has been a prisoner. Ho has been in fairly regular communication with his relatives in Auckland. The chairman of a journalists' dinner the other day told the following story (says an English paper)"l met a newspaper man to-day who came to Fleet Street twenty years ago with exactly 255. in his pocket. He is now worth £40,000. He owes that entirely to his own ability and energy, combined with good health and a high code of ethics, and to the fact that a relative recently died and left him £39,998." The conference of the New Zealand Boot Manufacturers' Federation, which was held in Auckland, has concluded. At the final sitting the following resolution was adopted: "That this conference of Dominion boot and shoe manufacturers hero assembled _ pledge themselves that so far as lies in their power thay will, by encouraging thrift, efficiency, and recruiting in the industry, give their loyal support to the Government in their effort to free the world of Prussian militarism and the pernicious German industrialism that obtained before the war." Amongst the, conscripts called by ballot aro convicts and others under sentence. The Military Service Boards have had some rather ironical communications on the subject from such persons. 111 sending in an appeal to the Auckland Board the other day ono prisoner said he was at present serving a sentence, and. he gave details of dates. He added: "I had been in gaol many times,' and I have a very bad record indeed." Another prisoner was even more matter-of-fact, for, to provo his contention that 110 was living at "His Maiesty's" expense, he sent along the "Police Gazette" containing lus photograph. When a motor lorry laden with drainpipes, etc., was travelling down Taranaki Street yesterday morning a boy on a bicycle dashed out of a side street, and, seeing the lorry, he got confused and started figure eight tactics. Tho lorry driver noticed the cyclist's plight, hut he could not go too far on the right roadside, as a van -was standing there. However, with great presence of mind he averted an accident by turning the lorry on to the footpath, hemming his vohicle in between a telegraph pole and {lie fence. 1 The only damage sustained was a few broken drain-pipes in the lorry.