NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1765, 15 December 1917, Page 4

NEWS AND NOTES.

As sugar is 'sold to retailers in New Zealand just now,at £22 per ton, some idea of the immense profits made by sugar refining companies is indicated by the fact that growers of sugar-cane in Queensland sell the cane at an average price of 28s per ton. Diplomats are not the only people who employ a cypher in their communications (says a London paper). At a meeting of a certain New Zealand County Council, at which tenders for a particular work were under consideration, the clerk mentioned that one tender had been received by telegram in code. In order to convey his price the wouldbe contractor asked a person connected with the council, who knew the age of his daughter, to multiply her age by ten and then add seven, A cable message from London to the Australian papers tells how Vincent Roberts, a New Zealand soldiex’, aged 19 years, was charged at Lambeth with'bigamy. The prosecution stated that he married Brenda Apployard in 191(i, at Auckland, and then went through a marriage ceremony with Frances Bennett, aged 17 years, in June, at Brixton, after a two-days’ acquaintance; He picked up her handbag in the street, and then they went to a cinema show. The accused was remanded. There is real humour in the tale of the Sikh who, bursting into a room, found a dozen Germans inside, and set to work and promptly killed eight. The other four he marched out of the house to his commanding officer. “Why did you Pot kill all of them?” said the officer, jokingly. “I began to feel tired,” the Sikh replied. “ But,” stretching out his sword arm, “I am rested now. I wilUfinish.” The Germans bolted off hard down the road with their hands up, and did not stop running till they could throw themselves on the ground before the first British soldier they came across. A message from Melbourne stales that Engine Mehegan, the wellknown . ex-champion lightweight boxer of Australia, died in hospital in France. It was remarkable in Mehegan’s career in the ring that every time he won a light he built a house with the proceeds. So that in time he became something of a landlord. Mehegan visited England five or six years ago and fought Matt Wells for the English light-weight championship, without success, and was again vanquished by this Jewish boxer in Australia. Although a native of Melbourne, Mehegan was not popular with the boxing public there, and most of his battles were fought in .Sydney, where he was idolised by followers of the game. An interesting point is dealt with in the following paragraph from the Christchurch Press; —Jl has been generally understood (hat, when members of the New Zealand-Expe-ditionary Force married in England, and were subsequently killed in action, their widows were entitled to participate in the New Zealand pension scheme. It now transpires that this is not so; that the War Pensions Acts do not include these women, who will not receive one penny of money from the New Zealand Government, and, further, are not entitled to any pension from the British authorities. A- somewhat painful case gave rise to this discovery, A member of the New Zealand Main Body, well known in Christchurch, where he was employed in a leading office, was wounded at Gallipoli, and invalided to England. There he met an English girl,'and shortly after married her. Later he went to France and was killed in action. The dead soldier’s parents made arrangements to bring the widow, badly shaken in health, to New Zealand, and she is now on her way out. Enquiries were made concerning a pension, and it was then discovered that the young woman is not entitled to one. It is understood that the Cnnferhury Patriotic Fund will grant assistance.