LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2632, 13 September 1923, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

During yesterday morning’s ear-th-quake fears were entertained for the safety of the water tower. The vibration, however, did no perceptible damage to this huge concrete structure.

“I confidently expect to see one thousand more cows milked in this district during the coming season than during the season just closed,” commented the chairman of a Gisborne dairy company, recently. The total war indebtedness of European nations said Mr Atmore, M.P., was four thousand millions. Great Britain owed the United States 832 millions, France owed her 550 millions, Italy 345 millions, Russia 30 millions, Belgium 89 millions, and Serbia 28 millions.

Such was the force of a gale in Wellington one day last week that a motor lorry, standing in an exposed position, was caught by a tierce gust and overturned. At a meeting held at Levin on Tuesday it was decided to form a branch of the Jersey Breeders’ Association, to be known as the Horowhenua Jersey Breeders’ Club. Alexander Logue, aged 33, who was struck by a fall of earth at Tawanui Railway cutting, Dunedin, on August 30th, died yesterday. He arrived from England four months ago. Bandsmen are reminded that a sectional practice will be held this evening at 7 o’clock and a general practice at 7.30 in order to assist at the Flower Show to-morrow evening. After being in hospital for nearly five years, a boy named John Andrew Thomson, died in the Auckland hospital yesterday from injuries received in December, 1918, when riding a trolley, which collided with a horse and cart.

The arrivals in Auckland last month included 19 Chinese and 13 Hindus, compared with 24 Chinese and one Hindu in August 1922. The departures included 13 Chinese and one Hindu, compared with 10 Chinese and one Hindu in the previous August.

At the present time there are 1700 creameries in Denmark, of which number 1,350 are run on co-opera-tive lines. Before the observance of co-operative methods Denmark only exported 5,000 tons of butter a year. The annual quantity now aggregates 120,000 tons. The ratepayers’ list of the Manawatu, Oroua, Makerua, and Sluggish River Drainage Boards were presented at the Palmerston North Magistrate’s Court yesterday, before Mr T. R. Ilodder, J.P., for the hearing of objections. An objection was made to the Sluggish River Board’s roll, which was held over. The others were confirmed.

At the Te Aroha Police Court, an elderly man named Peter Jensen was charged with being found at Waihou on Monday, helplessly drunk, as a result of drinking methylated spirits. Accused pleaded guilty. The arresting constable stated in evidence that when picked up Jensen’s condition was such as to necessitate his admission to the Waikato Hospital.

A tragic note was sounded at the Rotary Club on Monday (says the “Herald”) when the secretary read a letter of greetings from the Rotary Club at Tokio, Japan. The tetter contained the information that the club would be celebrating its third anniversary next month. “I wonder how many of its members will be living now” queried Mr Hutchinson. It was unanimously resolved to despatch a cablegram expressing condolence. A number of valuable dogs belonging to persons who reside at St. Hilda, Dunedin, have been poisoned, also a number of cats, and one man who owns a well-bred retriever, is so anxious to preserve its life that he takes it to town with him every day. As there have been visitations of rats to some houses since the floods, if was at first thought that the poison was laid for them, and that the dogs had got at if, but the circumstances now known are againsl such a theory, and point to a deliberate design on the dogs.— Dunedin “-Star.”

At the last sitting of the Magistrate’s Court at Tailmpe, the plaintiff in a civil action produced a number of his firm’s books in proof of debt. Defendant’s counsel and the Magistrate (Mr R. M. Watson) examined several of the entries in the books and when one of the books was asked for, the- plaintiff could not lay his hands on it. After a brief search he pointed hopefully to a book lying in front of the magistrate, which caused the latter to exclaim: “That’s not it. That’s the criminal record book you are pointing at.”

A well-known farmer was driving in his motor car from Stratford to Elthani. On the road he passed two men who asked for a “lift.” “Certainly,” said the farmer, “jump in.” He drove them along some distance and then stopped, saying, “I have to call in at this house for a few minutes, but you need not get out. Just stay in the car and I will take you the rest of the distance.” He threw his overcoat off, went in to the house, and was soon out again. But when he came.out the men had decamped, taking the farmer’s ov-er-coat with them. This may he looked upon as a champion specimen of mean theft says the Eltham Argus.

Only requiring a mass of she'll holes and the bursting of “five point nines” and “whizz-bangs,” with the occasional roar of an “egg,” dropped from overhead to make it realistic, a novel minature battle field has, states the “Post,” been constructed at Trentham to give Territorials some idea of what he will be required to do if he is lucky or unlucky enough to sign on in the next war, “for the duration.” The piece of “No Man’s Land” across which the eye peers from the fire trench in the foreground reveals a church on a hill, cottages scattered about and occasional bits of bush. Various classes of targets are employed to represent aeroplanes and the movements of the “enemy” first of all marching in column of fours, and then rapidly changing his formation, as the machine gun and rifle fire makes gaps in the ranks. The targets are cleverly constructed, and, typifying the varied phases of modern warfare, are worked from a control board with mechanism made at the camp.

Mrs F. Procter solicits contributions to the tea-rooms for to-mor-row’s show. Will donors please send goods lo Ihe half A severe earthquake was experienced locally shortly before 10 o’clock yesterday morning, which caused buildings to rock violently and many people rushed from their houses. No serious damage is reported. We regret to record the death of Mr Noel Wilson, which occurred on Tuesday at his residence, “Greenvale,” Awapuni, after an illness lasting over six weeks. The late Mr Wilson, who was the third son of Sir James and Lady Wilson, of Bulls, was well-known and highly esteemed in the Manawatu and Rangitikei districts.

The Rev. George Ernest Day, vicar of Bovinger Church, near Ongar, Essex, dropped dead in his pulpit recently after giving: out the number of a hymn. Choir and congregation, who had begun to sing, were startled to see him drop on his knees. He died before a doctor could reach him. The vicar was fif-Iv-five years of age.

Replying to a question at the Eltham County Council recently, the clerk stated that £5,499 rates had been received under the scheme of allowing a 5 per cent, reduction up to August 31. This sum represented slightly under one-third of the total rates levied and showed a considerable improvement upon the last year, when £I,OOO had been received at this time.

The two amusements at Port Craig (Southland) says a visitor who has just returned from the large timber mill there, are a boxing school and a weekly dance. At the latter there are close on 100 men and four ladies. When not dancing the bulk of the men do their best to drown the concertina’s music, nr content themselves with a little quiet fighting outside the hall. Idiomatic English puzzles foreigners. A Japanese'student once ask - ed for an interpretation of this sentence: “If Mr , who sits for

this constituency, will consent to stand again, and run, he will in all probability have a walk over and sit in Parliament.” Proverbial expressions are equally a snare to the uninitiated, as when a Spanish lady remarked: “Once you bite me, twice I look shy.”

“Wjhen China progresses Japan is bound to become the Great'Britain of the Pacific,” Mr Alexander Hume Ford told a “Times” man recently. “And she will need every in.'in she has to run her factories. There has been a wonderful system of electric power from her waterways under course of construction and when it is finished Japan will be Ihe cheapest manufacturing country in the world.”

A Stratford party motoring from Wellington back to Taranaki nearly collided with a man while negotiating Paekakariki about 8 o’clock last evening. On rounding a corner the body of a man was seen stretched across the roadway a few feet from (he car and it was only by quick and skilful manipulation that the car was guided clear. On investigation being made it was discovered that the man was drunk and had evidently settled down for the night.

The well-known Bell Block, situated on the corner of Oxford and Queen streets, Levin, which was yesterday offered for sale for the trustees by Messrs Abraham and Williams, Ltd., was passed in, the bids not coming up to the vendors’ roerve. The corner section brought a bid of £SOO, and another with a Queen .Street frontage, and on which the fish shop is situated, £-100, both being passed in at these figures. —Chronicle. General sntisfhotion with the new pensions law was expressed at Tuesday’s meeting of the members of the Wellington Returned Soldiers’ Association. Several members expressed the opinion that the scheme was now far more liberal than it had been in the past, but one speaker considered that more should have been done for the wounded men. The only thing the R.S.A. had achieved, he said, was that it had secured greater pensions for dependants of disabled and deceased men but it had not been able to do anything for the wounded men themselves.

“Why should men make slaves of their wives?” asked a lady defender of tenement houses, during a discussion of housing by the Health Week Sanitation Committee at Wellington. The implication latent in the wording of the question made it rather a difficult one for a man to answer, but the chairman (Mr A. J. Paterson, Acting City Engineer) after a moment’s hesitation, stepped into the breach. He sympathised with the lady’s argument, but considered the tenement house to be not the only escape from domestic hardships of women. About people who were able and willing to pay high rents for an expensive type of labour-saving flat, in a very modernised tenement building, he had nothing to say. Those people did not concern him; in housing matters they could make their own choice. But. for the poorer type of family, the tenement house adaptable to that family’s income might turn out to be a very undesirable institution indeed. He had seen such institutions. The ordinary family should live in its own home. As to those better-oif persons, who were willing to finance the high-rental tenement, they could form themselves into limited liability companies, and then they could build their tenement houses —provided that the City Council’s air-space regulations were eased a little.

“Raping clubs are the best cows in Mr Massey's herd,” was a remark made at the Waipa Racing Club’s annual meeting. It was mentioned that taxation totalled £1,400 for “five hours’ fun.” The Waipa Club has only a one-day permit and lost money on last season’s operations. It is reported by the “Wairarapa Age” that Mr David Hebenton, of Masterton, has accepted the position of Dominion organiser for the Reform Party. Mr ITcbenton is well-known throughout the Wairarapa and other parts of the Dominion as a capable and efficient organiser on behalf of the Fanners’ Union. He lias resided in the Wairarapa for the past twelve years, and is at present chief of the Masterton Savage Club. Mr Heberton, while in India, had experience as a newspaper correspondent and attended the Royal Durbar at Delhi on the occasion of the visit of the King and Queen in that capacity.

A remarkable motor accident occurred in Auckland last week. A motor car chassis on which a body had not been placed, was being driven along the road at a fair pace. In some manner that is not quite clear the clothes of the driver became caught in the driving shaft immediately behind the seat. The driver was jerked backwards, and his frantic yell, as he disappeared, attracted the attention of a passer-by. The motor came to a standstill outside “Courtville,” and when the first witnesses of the occurrence arrived on the scene they found on the groifnd between the four wheels a gentleman in a perfect state of nature, bar a pair of boots and the ragged ends of his socks. Round the rapidlyrevolving shaft was tightly wound the rest of the unfortunate’s clothing. When he was pulled out, garbed in an overcoat, and examined, it was found that the extent of his in juries was confined to bruises. It was lucky that the motor was stalled by the expeditious manner in which it disrobed its driver, and the car brought to a standstill.