NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 1205, 7 February 1914, Page 4

NEWS AND NOTES.

Tribute to the honesty of the average Australian Black was paid by Mr James Caldwell, a Presbyterian missionary worker, who gave evidence before the Aborigines’ Commission in Adelaide recently. He told a story in support of his assertion that the honesty of the aborigines compared favourably with that of the whites. A little wblk- ago a sheep owner employed aborigines to capture a particularly troublesome wild dog. He offered lor the destruction of the beast, which was known to be within an area of land surrounded by netting. There were plenty of dogs just outside the fence. After several days’ hunting the aborigines came back and said they could not find the dog. They might easily have got one of the outside dogs and passed it off for the genuine animal. Mr Caldwell, who has during the past six or seven years come in contact with the natives of the country surrounding Iron Knob, states that some of them possessed horses and buggies, or camels, and may be seen with a gramaphone or sewing machine.

He considers that there are aborigines in the district capable of managing a sheeprun under supervision. At the Sandringham meet of the West Norfold hounds, Princess Mary made her first appearance in the hunting field, on a side saddle, as all her ancestresses, especially Victoria, did, and not the cross saddle, which is now so much in vogue in England. The Ladies’ Field opened its columns to correspondence on this subject. The net result is that the side-saddle —and the writers are all expert lady riders of light and leading—with all its disadvantages, is more graceful and safer thau a cross one, and fewer side-saddles get emptied in the hunting field than cross ones. The latest evening dress is termed the “invisible one.” This invisible dress descended upon Paris suddenly, and almost succeeded in shocking that unshockable city. From the distance the invisible dress looks as if it were no dress at all. This is supposed to add mystery and charm to It. It is made over a tight foundation of flesh-coloured satin, and consists of soft fold after fold of crepe and chiffon in an exact flesh-coloured shade. The folds must be draped

artistically, but must be held close to the body. Tlie sleeves are cut above the elbow, and the neck is quite low. With this dress is worn a soft-draped belt of a contrasting colour, black being mostly favoured.

A warning to the over-strenuous was uttered at a National Health Society meeting by Professor Stirling. Severe bodily exercise, he said was incompatible with full digestive activity. Mental fatigue greatly impaired bodily activity, and vice versa. Glands, like muscles, suffered from fatigue, and the result of a “quick lunch’’ was to exhaust the glands which supply the digestive fluids. The secret of health, said the lecturer, was to be found in rj thm. Between the heart-beats was a regular pause, which permitted a restitution of matter and energy. On a larger scale, sleep was such another quiescent period. Repose was the necessary complement of fatigue. The word itself meant to put things back in their places, lu the words of Plutarch, “ Rest is the sweet sauce of labour.”