MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.

Hokitika Guardian, 14 July 1920, Page 1

MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.

fAPSTUALIAN & N.z. OABUi ASSOo!aTIOn] A DENIAL. LONDON, July 12. In the Commons, Hon Bonar Law den led that the proposal for an armistice on tho Polish front implied Allied recognition of the Soviet Government. JAPANESE FEELING. (Heater’s Telegram.! TOKIO, July 13. There were disorderly scenes in the House of Representatives on the introduction of the Universal Suffrage Bill, which was defeated by 280 to 155. A thousand excited students attempted a demonstration but were dispersed by the poiice, three thousand of whom were guarding the Diet. There were numerous collisions between the police and civilians, and scores of arrests. Many were injured. NAURU ISLAND COMPANY. , LONDON, July 11. It is now admitted that a meeting of the Pacific Phosphate Company will be held on the 15th. to pass a resolution to pay the Managing Directors £65,000, the other directors, £56,000; and the other officers £31,000 for the loss of office, duo to the sale of the Nauru and Ocean Island deposits; also £BOOO bonus to other officers.

NEW ZEALAND BUTTER DEAL LONDON, July 10.

Mr McNeil, in the .House of Commons, speaking in reference to the disposal of New Zealand butter through the wholesale Cooperative Society, ask. cd Mr McCurdy (Food Minister), what evidence lie based his anticipation upon that the consumers would not suffer on a readjustment of trading arrangements, and also whether lie possessed sufficient powers to prevent this threatened cornering.

Mr McCurdy pointed out that no arrangement had yet been made to sell New Zealand produce through that Society. His Ministry would carefully consider any contemplated action. Meanwhile it was impossible to say whether action was necessary. His Ministry intended to maintain the existing restrictions on private dealings in butter. He considered the Ministry’s powers wholly adequate to safeguard the consumer.

WATT AND HUGHES. LONDON, July 12

Mr Watt (ex-Fedcral Treasurer), will not reply to Mr Hughes until lie reaches Australia. Ho sails from Liverpool in the Baltic on 18th. August joining the Niagara at Vancouver on 15th. September. Dir Watt will visit Scotland during the next fortnight.

A COLOURED CHARMER. LONDON, July 7

Further stories are leaking out concerning Francis Kildare, the colored leader "of a West End jazz hand who shot dead in a West End hotel his separated wife, .Mary, and her sister, Mrs. LudloW, seriously wounded a nurse, and killed himself. They reveal a shocking condition of vice and degeneracy among a section of faslioii in London. When he arrived a few years ago Kildare was humble and unaggressive, associating with the denizens of the underworld and souteneurs. He used his musical talent to rise in the scale of social viciousness, and became an exquisite. He always appeared in evening dress, frequenting expensive haunts in company with demi-mon-daines, whom lie was suspected of financing,' and eventually became a jazz leader.

He was known to have been a sleeping partner in gambling dens and cocaine parlors and other locations of all forms of vice. He probably blackmailed men and women patrons. He was reputed to have a singular attraction for fashionable women of high social position, who vied with one another in anviting him to their homes for 4 o’clockbreakfast, and dancing under his baton through the night. He was said to treat the invitations with disdain, chosing arrogantly, and not troubling to reply to the notes which he rejected.

Kildare was separated from his wife owing to his popularity with lady frequenters of Giro’s and other fashionable clubs.