LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXII, Issue 4319, 19 September 1921, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

An ’Ard-up Social in aid of the Farmers’ Union Queen is to be held in the Soldiers’ Hall next Saturday evening, and on Thursday evening a social and euchre tournament will take place in the N.etherton Hall, the proceeds to be devoted to the Farmers’ Queen.

Surprise that there should be any social distinctions among the employees at the Hospital was expressed at a meeting of the Thames Hospital Board on Wednesday. “It is a surprise ;to me,” said Mr W. Baker, when informed that the sister® had a special room -to themselves and the nurses used the general social room. Another member remarked that this and other privileges were customary between the two grades.

Mr H. J. H. Blow, chairman of the Waihou and Ohinemuri Rivers Commission, left Paeroa for Auckland on Saturday, and,Mr J. T. Watkinson, official stenographer, left for Wellington on Friday. Mr W. Shortt went to Auckland shortly after the conclusion of the sitting. Conferences ci the commissioners were held in Paeroa during last week, and a further conference will be held in Auckland ■'.his week, Commissioner Geo. Buchanan going up for that purpose. There w,as a totali of 1097 typewritten foolscap pages, comprising 950 pf evidence and 147 of counsels’ addresses. It is anticipated that the commissioners will send in their report about the end of this week.

Commissioner control of a town or borough is gaining more and more advocates in New Zealand. In connexion with the coming Municipal Conference, the Hastings Borough Council has forwarded the following remit: "That legislative authority be secured whereby it will be possible for municipalities at their option to place their affairs under the control of commissioners as is frequently done in the United States.”

Even the “miracles” of the* Maori healer are not immune from, the activities of the humorist. An exchange has the following: "Two fiiends, one of whom was blind and the other dumb, decided to go to Ratana and see if he could cure their afflictions. With some difficulty they secured an interview, and Ratana, after expressing the necessity of faith, directed the blind man to go to a certain carpenter’s shop and the dumb man to a wheelwright’s. This they accordingly did. The blind "‘man walked in, picked up a hammer and saw, and the dumb man grasped a wheel and spoke.”

They do not mince matters when criticising public men in Sydney. Here is a sub-ieader from the Sydney “Sun,” dealing with the Lord Mayor : There are these possible explanations of the strange conduct of the Lord Mayor (Aiderman Lambert) on two occasions yesterday.. The first is that he was suffering from drunkenness, but the dangerpus drunkenness which arises from an illimitable lust for power. The second explanation is that he was mad—not suffering from madness .according to medical definition, but from the madness which comes from an overweening megalomania. The third, and possibly the correct, solution, is that he was just liis own natural self, the exemplar of ,the greatness which includes the two lesser propositions enunciated previously.

Serious illnesses dp npt shorten Life, declared Sir James Cantlie, the wellknown London doctor, to a meeting of nurses at the Nurses’ Exhibition. He cited himself as .an example, and added that he had had more serious illnesses than any other man of his age. (Sii- James is 70.) A few pf his illnesses were: - Typhoid fever, bloodpoisoning (in bed 18 months), operation to the left kidney, septic wrist, appendicitis, malaria, enlarged spleen fractured skull and lower jaw, neuralgia for eight years, broken 12th rib, lost one eye.

A man who plays golf with a parson is placed at ,a disadvantage, for there are occasions when a player must use "language” or burst. Npt very long ago a very human Auckland vicar was having a round with a friend. At a critical moment in the game the lat.ter missed his drive*. He looked unutterably at the ball; then he looked reproachfully at the vicar. Again he looked at the ball and again at the vicar. But not a word was spoken. The man was just about to take a fit when the parson came' to the rescue. "Mr C ,” he said. “I have never heard such a blasphemous silence in all my lifie.”

Not Their Fault. —Uncle Josh was comfortably lighting his pipe in the living-room when Aunt Maria glanced up from bei' knitting. “Josh,” softly remarked th.e good woman, “do you know that next Sunday will be the twenty-fifth .anniversary of on;’ wedding ?” “Ye don’t say so, Maria!” responded Uncle Josh, pulling vigorously on his corn-ccb pipe. “What about it ?” “Nothing,” answered Aunt Maria, “only I thought maybe ,we ought to kill them two Rhode Island red chickens.” “Say, Maria,” impressively demanded Uncle Josh', “how can you blame them two Rhode Island red chickens for what happened twenty-five years ago ?”

"No hat bands about this, but 11 bands competing at Thames on October sth, 6th, 7th, and Bth. Come along.

In the course of an interview at Hastings, Mr H. M. Campbell, M.P., said he thought .it wo'ulcl be a good tiling if the farmers of New Zealand combined to prevent shipping being held up by strike®. “There is another thing that must be got rid of,” said Mr Campbell, “and that is the rotten system of allowing big boats to go running around the coast, cabling at ten ports for their cargo and picking up a tenth of their freights at each place, instead of each visiting and taking a full load at one port. On arrival in the Dominion they should discharge their at some convenient port, and when necessary shipments could be distributed by coastal shipping. Alli this would mean that these liners could make three trips Home and back to the <wo made at present. “Half the people who lead an unhappy, life owe their unhappiness to indiscipline of their nervous system," said Sir Maurice Craig, physician for mental diseases .at Guy’s Hospital, in a lecture on the psychology of adolescence at London recently. It is not when a child gives way to. violent emotion that it should be rebuked. But between the fits the child should be taught to control itself. "I have seen the most irritable and bad-tem-pered people become quite sweet under proper discipline,” he said.

Drawing .the moral, the “New York Journal” points to the need of men who have l lived active lives taking up a hobby. Any hobby will do if it keeps them active mentally and as active physically as their bodies require. The man who cannot find i hobby is doomed. “Nature,” says the writer wisely, "does not do all the dictating in man’s intercourse with her. Man can name to Nature, to a great extent, the period of his existence. When he drops his old work and sits down co that most killing of tasks—doing nothing—it is a signal to Nature that the end may approach. In spite of' this there are thousands of business men who retire without thought of what they are going to do to occupy their mind and the body. They take .the brain and the muscle that have served them well and store them in the damp of idleness to be consumed by rust.”

If the tariff on the dining-car of the Canadian-Pacific Railway may be taken as representative of the general cost of foodstuffs in Canada, New Zealand is very fpr.tunate in comparison. This fact was impressed upon Mi* H. W. Frost, of the New Zealand bowling team, who recently passed through' Canada on the return journey from England. In the first place he found that the exchange value of the pound was 3 dollars 99 cents, and when he had the menu placed before him on the train he found it. was impossible to make a good meal without expending the equivalent of about Bs. For a plate* of porridge the official charge was 25 cents, or Is 3d: fried eggs were listed on the bill of fare at 35 cents, and plus a couplte of slices of bacon cost the diner 75 cents or about 3s 6d. Bread or toast and butter involved the expenditure of another shilling, and a pot of tei, sufficient for one cunful Is 3d more. Hope for the bald is held out by a machine 1 invented by Dr. James Thompson, a. New York physician, which, it is claimed, can sew hairs on human heads. A very fine needle worked by elec'dcity can “ affix ” 100 hairs an hour. The machine was exhibited at the annual dinner of the New York Bald Head Club, and, after dinner, the inventor sewed one hair each to the heads of eight members.