LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 450, 20 February 1909, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A list of entries for the next Himatangi stock sale, are advertised elsewhere in this issue. We are informed that a shark measuring 18ft was caught in a fisherman’s net at the mouth of the river yesterday. The average attendance at the local state school since the Christmas holidays has been as follows : —257, 247 and 250. Roll number 305-

Great bargains in drapery, millinery, and sunshades are announced for this week at the Bon March?, Palmerston. It will pay buyers to see these parting prices. *

Mr Walter Seifert has installed his patent flaxdressing machine at the Green Flaxdressing Company’s “Poplar’’ Mill, and is erecting another of these machines at the “ Matai ” Mill.

Thomas Cooper, aged 19 years, whose parents leside at Havelock, was drowned in the Wanganui river yesterday morning while bathing. Captain Kdwin, Government Meteorologist, is amongst the civil servants to be retired on account of having reached the age limit. He has been thirty-three years in the Government service.

The Town Clerk has succeeded in again collecting every penny of this year’s local borough rates. In fact, this is nothing unusual, as the Borough Council has not been called upon to write off any outstanding rates for years past, A man named Bock stands remanded till Monday at Hamilton in connection with a charge of having attempted the murder of his wife. Mrs Bock’s condition shows slight improvement, although she is still in a critical state.

The local police arrested an absconder from the Weraroa training farm at Mr Satherley’s homestead yesterday. The lad’s name is Martin, 16 years of age, and he has been missing since Monday last. He was returned under police escort.

Our attention has been called by a telephone subscriber to the fact that non-subscribers are in the habit of using private telephones. This is against the regulations and subscribers so offending are liable to be cut off by the officer in charge of the bureau.

The second charge of sheepstealing preferred iu the Wellington Supreme Court by John Mai tin against John O’Keefe, of Martinbotough, has been withdrawn. When O’Keefe was acquitted last week on the first charge the Judge expressed the view that the prosecution could not hope to succeed on the other.

A Nireaha farmer, who recently disposed of his property, Intended to settle in the Hastings district, and with this end in view paid a visit to that locality. He was struck with the number of people diiving in motor-cars, and asked a friend if it was the productiveness of the flat land in that district which enabled them to afford raotois. “ No,” said his friend.; “it is the flats who have paid the big prices for the laud that enables those who sell to go in for motoring !”

The school committee has hxed Friclaj’, March. 5111, as the day on which the school picnic is to be held. On the afternoon previous the prize distribution ceremony will take place in the school, and Mr Newman will be asked to distribute the awards. As the committee are without funds, it is hoped parents and townspeople will contribute as liberally towards the object as they have done in past years. Donations will be thankfully received by members of committee or may be left at this office.

During the course of Professor Wragge’s lecture in the Public Hall, on Thursday night, the lecturer staled that most of us had our idiosyucracies. He had his, and he objected to being interrupted by the crunching of nuts by members of the local peanut brigade. His soul was in his lecture and he begged of those indulging in the habit to desist until they got outside. All went well for a time, and the audience was being carried through space by Guide Wragg, watching with absorbing interest new suns being hurled off, etc., wlien suddenly a out cracked, and the Professor let us crash back through space with tremendous velocity, with the awe-inspiriug words, “Lord Almighty ! from nebulae to nut chewing!”

The services in the Methodist Church tomorrow morning will be conducted by Mr H. Baker, and in the evening by the Rev, P. J. Mairs, whose subject will be “ Incidents in the wreck of the Penguin.’' The solo “No Night There,” will lie contributed.

The blight has played havoc with potato crops throughout the Hawera district. On the run through to Mauaia several fields, which presented a gloriously promising condition a few days ago, are now blackened, and the tubers upon being dug are found with the diseased spot which marks the initial ravages of the blight upon the potato itself.

To-morrow All Saints’ Church will hold its Harvest Thanksgiving Service. There will be two celebrations of the blessed sacrament, so as to enable all to do their duty on this thanksgiving day. In the evening there will be festal evensong, the preacher being the vicar. A number of ladies are decorating the church this after--1:0011, and there is abundance of fruit and vegetables. Mr Elwood Cooper, a Californian horticultural commissioner, is reported to have discovered a method of preserving fruit in nitrogen. The fruit is first packed in papier-mache cases rendered impervious to air, but provided with a small opening. These cases are then placed in an iron receptacle, from which the air is exhausted. The iron vessel is then filled with nitrogen, and the opening in the cases closed by some mechanical means. It is claimed that cases of fruit treated in this way remained perfectly sound and fresh for several months.

The New Zealand Shipping Company’s steamer Kaikoura, which left Wellington on Thursday, for London, took 42,583 boxes of butter and 12,541 crates of cheese from various New Zealand ports. The shipment was made up as follows: —From Auckland, 13,034 boxes butter, 275 crates of cheese. From New Plymouth, 10,946 boxes butter, 2241 crates cheese. From Pa tea, 6922 boxes butter, 5493 crates cheese. From Wellington, 9034 boxes butter, 3165 crates cheese. From Lyttelton, 2647 boxes butter, 747 crates cheese. From Dunedin, 620 crates cheese.

A case has just been heard in the Supreme Court which is said to be the first of the kind in New Zealand, and could not be tried under the law of any other country. Certain facts were submitted to the police as a basis for a criminal prosecution. They declined to take the matter up on the ground that the evidence was too weak and no jury would possibly convict. Action was then brought in the Supreme Court on the same facts for damages, the plaintiff being a woman and the defendant an hotelkeeper. The case was heard in camera, and no evidence is therefore published. It was tried before a jury and £<\6o damages awarded.

lii the course ot his response to the toast of the dairy industry and farming interests at the Hawera banquet on Friday (says the Stratford Post), Mr J. G. Wilson, president of the New Zealand Farmers' Union, had a few words to say concerning farmers and education. Farmers, he considered, did not sufficiently appreciate the agricultural classes placed at their disposal by the Education Boards, and he hoped that in future more advantage would be taken ot the opportunities given. There were four universities in New Zealand, but not one of them had taken up agriculture, and he thought it should be the duty of members to see that a chair of agriculture was established in connection with one or other of these institutions.

Says a Hawke’s Bay paper:— “ Fruit-growing as a commercial undertaking is developing on more satisfactory lines in Hawke’s Bay than in probably any other district in the Dominion. This is in large measure due to the fact that it has been taken up by men ready to conduct it on up-to-date methods, and that growers have followed the advice of State experts as to principle on which orchards should be planted and conducted, and insect pests controlled. Speaking of the development in Hawke’s Bay, Mr Boucher, North Island pomologist, informed the writer that there are now 1330 acres in commercial orchards, 300 acres in domestic orchards, and 150 acres under small fruits—a total of 1780 acres. This does not take into account the considerable area under vines. New orchards planted last year represent an area of 200 acres, while 350 acres have come into bearing this season.

A victory for Spiritualists is reported from Glatz, in Silesia (Germany), where the Court of Appeal, on Friday, December nth, acquitted Frau Winter, who was charged with slandering Herr Samraeck, the chairman of a parish Council, says a London paper. The lady was the medium at a spiritualistic seance. Herr Sammeck’s son, who was present, was thanked for his attendance by the spirit involved, supposed to be that of his deceased sister, and was besought to bring his father, who, the spirit said, “had much accursed gold on his conscience,” and whose “hopes of eternal life had almost vanished.” Herr Sammeck brought an action against the medium, who at the first trial was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment. In the subsequent trial the “spirit’s” statements were proved correct, for Herr Sammeck, cross-examined, admitted that he had made numerous deductions for his own benefit from certain pensions he was entrusted to pay.

Argentine butter is said to be more in evidence on the London market this season, and is competing with Victorian butter, which it much resembles.

Among the list of successful teachers who passed in Class Cat the January examination, we notice the name of Mr L. J. Furrie (an erstwhile Foxton boy).

The Flaxmills Employees Union hold a meeting this evening to discuss and frame a reply to suggestions from the N.Z. Flaxmillers Association.

The services at the Presbyterian Church to-morrow will be conducted both morning and evening by the Rev Mr Aitken. The subject for the evening service will be *‘ The wreck of the Penguin and its lessons.” Appropriate hymns will be sung.

We have received from the Re-gistrar-General’s office the volume of statistics of the Dominion for 1907, with statistics of local governing bodies tor the year ended March 31, 1908. The volume, of over 700 pages, is crowded with statistical information of much interest and value.

Another supposed victim of the Penguin wreck, Felix Woodward, is now proved to be alive, ami at Taihape. The body claimed to be Woodward’s certainly resembled him, for it was that of a tall dark young man with bushy black hair. One of Woodward's old friends visited the morgue when the newspapers announced the identification, and satisfied himself that there was a mistake by opening the mouth. It contained no artificial teeth, whereas the real Felix Woodward has a number of them.

A visitor from Foxton to the Woodville races who was staying at a local hotel had a startling ex-. perience on Wednesday evening. On retiring for the night he looked under the bed and found a man . lying there clad in a shirt only. The intruder was immediately dealt with in a way he little expected. He was kicked downstairs, out into the yard, and into a coal shed where he took refuge. On being ejected from the shed he received a final kick into the street, where he accosted a pressman, enquiring from the latter if he were a policeman. , The pressman, who was quite unprepared to receive a deputation at that hour of the night, quickly disappeared in the darkness, leaving his interrogator to find lodgings the best way he could, ' Says this week’s Free Lance:Tardy beyond a doubt, but truly the limerick craze has hit Foxton all of a heap. Foxton is the small town in the Manawalu where the workers make ropes, and the pleasure-seekers “stalk” white-

bait in the river. Foxton is a pleasant little town. It is matter for surprise that the Limerick business has come so late to Foxton. But they’ve got it badly all right. The competition was brought in to help the Anglican Church funds. A strange use for the Limerick craze, which has been looked upon as a gamble or some such thing. But it is redeemed now, since the vicar won the prize. The local paper announces to an astonished and admiring world that the Limerick competition was won by the vicar (Rev G. Y. Woodward). There is one refreshing piece ot information in the foregoing. It is the fact that Foxton is accustomed to entertaining angels or saints or some such order of beings.