LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2653, 1 November 1923, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A meeting of ratepayers will be held in the Town Hall supper-room to-morrow evening at 7.30 o’clock to discuss the proposed loan proposal for the eonstruelin of public swimming baths.

Official returns from Japan, give a total of 69,920 factories destroyed by the earthquake and fire. The losses are assessed at 380,900,000 yen. Seventy-one thousand three hundred and eighty-eight factory hands are stated to be affected.

The funeral of the youngest lad, Melvin Miller, who was drowned on Saturday afternoon, took place at Tauranga on Tuesday at two o’clock, and at six the body of the girl Piinella was found by a native on the beach about 100 yards from where those who were saved got ashore. The two other bodies have not yet been recovered.

Those interested in spiritual healing are referred to an article which we publish elsewhere in this issue.

A huge billboard near St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, in Wnverlev, Connecticut, bears the legend: “A hearse is a poor vehicle in which to go to church. Better go while yon are alive.”

St. Helen’s Hospital, Wellington, reported its first birth of triplets last week. The new arrivals are all girls and are the first babies in the family. The mother and babies are doing well. The birth of triplets is quite an unusual event in New Zealand.

According to the Opofiki paper, a farmer of that locality has been visiting the South Island, and this is what lig says of one of the stock sales he attended: —“The surroundings gave me the creeps. I really believe the yards were the same ones they had fifty years ago, and the cattle looked as if they had come ont of the Ark, and had been depasturing on sandhills ever since.”

In the course of a discussion at the Anglican Synod, Auckland, several speakers referred to the need of Bible reading in the State schools. At length a layman said that, while he agreed with the speakers, he must say,that two of his children who attended diocesan schools seemed to know much more about the Prayer Book than the Bible.

“Whattlers” are said to he a pretty numerous body in Australia. They are not a new religious sect, nor are they a new political party. They are, in short, excessive drinkers —the type who are not content with one drink or two drinks, or, say three, lmt who say, “Whatt’ll ycr ’ave” so often that they finish up by getting drunk.' Tlnjv are “Wliattlers.”

At the exhibition boxing bouts, held at Palmerston North on Tuesday evening, a popular encounter was that between Derrick, of Foxton, and Foster. Shortness of reach was all that prevented Derrick from making entire rings round his opponent. He slogged his man all the way, scarcely set. hack by the other’s spider reach and defensive work, and lauded some telling hits on Foster’s stamina.

Not every motorist who careers madly through our streets and peaceful conntry roads knows that the advent of their machines was foretold by the Israelitish prophet Nahum, who lived when Nineveh was in the height of its glory. The curious will find his prophecy in his se-' eond chapter, verse four: “The chariots shall range in the streets, they shall jostle one another in the roadways, they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightning.”

“As soon ns the last instalment is paid on the family perambulator everyone nowadays goes' off’ to purchase a motor car,” said Air O. T. .1. AJpers, during the hearing of a ease in the Supreme Court at. Christchurch. “I am about the only practising barrister and solicitor in Christchurch who does not own a car,” he said. “No,” added Mr W. J. Hunter, who was also appearing in (he ease, “you always ride in a taxi!”

While walking along the Opaki Road near Masterton a local resident, Mr David Orr Gilmore,’ was attacked by an unknown assailant and rather badly handled, an accomplice joining in. Mr Gilmore was beaten about the face with a heavy weapon, thrown down on the side of the road, and hound and gagged. Robbery was evidently the motive, as his pockets were ransacked and a small sum of money taken.

The second group of the Shannon reticulation scheme in connection with the Ilorowhenua . Power Board’s operations, has been closed with fifty lighting installations and -even milking plants. These are mostly within the Borough where t’. . re are. now 140 houses incorporated in the two groups, of ovei 90 per cent.,of the total number of houses in the town. Seven milking pitiat-’ have also been arranged for s.> fa-r on the Ida t and Buckley Ronds, three of these including also hot. water, systems in the sheds and electric lights.

The Foxtail friends of Mr and Mrs Mmitie will he pleased to know that they have settled down to bnsi-lie.-s life in Rnetihi where Mr Mjnifie has ..pened a drapery establishment and in a letter to a local friend, states that business is steadily increasing. lie adds: “We miss Foxtail’s good weather. Several empty shops have been occupied since our arrival here —I here is only one vacant shop now in the town and one experiences the progress of the district.”

A crop grown for green manuring in his- nursery by Mr J. Scobie, of Fairfield, Levin, is lupins, and is one worthy of wider application by farmers, says the “Chronicle.” A crop of lupins four feet in height ploughed in, is equal to 35 tons of stable manure, and in ordinary good soil, will grow to this height in ten weeks. Mr Scobie sows lOOlbs. of seed to the acre, the seed costing .€1 per 1001 b. The advantage of such a crop will he readily appreciated; it cun he put in after another crop has been taken out of the ground, and grows so quickly that it merely oils in the dead period generally existing between one crop and another, so that it may be used to follow either oats or turnips with equal profit. It is nitrogenous manure, supplying large quantities of this invaluable plant food in a highly soluble form and besides adds largely tot he humus context of the soil.

The rainfall for Foxton for last month totalled 3.06 inches. The maximum fall, .GO, was recorded oil the 21st. ,

The quarterly meeting of members of the local Beautifying Society will be held in the Presbyterian School at 7.30 o’clock this evening.

The pole erecting gang in connection with the reticulation work for the Mangabao Hydro-Electric power scheme are at present engaged in erecting poles in the borough.

Tn reply to a recent invitation, Air Lloyd George has cabled to the Lord Alayor promising to visit Australia but no date lias been fixed, states a Sydney message. Captain Goffin, at one time in charge of the local Salvation Army Corps, and now of Auckland, has been promoted to the offiee of Ensign and will probably he attached to headquarters staff.

A property having a frontage of ■44 feet 8 inches to Lambton Quay, Wellington, and containing three brick shops, was sold last week, realising between £14,000 and £15,000.

The vital statistics for Foxton for last month with the figures for the corresponding month of last year in parenthesis, are as follows: Births 5 (3), deaths nil (nil), marriages 1 (2). The late Alfred Porter, head of the. ironmongery firm of Edward Porter and Co., Auckland, left an estatg valued at under £400,000. He left no will, states a Press Association message, and his widow and a married daughter are the only beneficiaries.

Air AY. D. Banekliam, grocer, has taken a lease of the corner shop of the new block of buildings recently erected in Alain Street. The premises are to he occupied as soon as the necessary fittings are erected. All the shops in the block are now disposed of. “The most charming feature of your country is the way in which the people accept the stranger, without question as to whence he comes and who he is,” said an overseas visitor to a reporter at Gisborne. “I have I ravelled pretty widely but I have never before met such a frank recept ion.” After November 11 a naked flame will burn perpetually every night above the grave of France’s unknown soldier at the Arc do Triomphe. A torch w'H be lighted, at nightfall, Ibis duty being undertaken by nine-ty-six assoc':!lions of former soldiers. A similar proposal is made iYr the Cenotaph in AVhitehall.

“One reason why you have such good .lock in Southland,” said the Hon. AW Nos worthy. at Winton, “is because any animal that, survives is good one. Up north, with the better climate,. many weedy animals .survive which would be better dead. “Our herd mortality is only 2 per cent.,” said the lloi/ A. F. Hawke, “as against 5 per cent, in ATanawatn.”

It is a dangerous risk to wander about, other people’s premises after dark. This was exemplified at a local residence v last night. A person, instead of knocking at the door of a house, allegedly to interview one of the inmates, pushed a Window open and was leaning on the sill and peering inside when the owner happened suddenly on the scene. An argument followed and the intruder was fortunate in leaving the premises other than in an ambulance.

A ease of enthusiasm in the game of howls, which*is probably without parallel in the Dominion, was-men-tioned •at the Pietnn Hospital Board’s meeting last week. Tt was stated that a local gentleman, who wa- handicapped by a contracted finger, reeentlv went to his medical adviser, and asked that the offendino finger he amputated, as it interfered with his game of howls. The operation was accordingly successfully performed and the patient i„ow •'Tossing favourably. Members of the hoard.were highly amused at such a sportsmanlike action •bring undertaken, and one said “it showed what some sports would nn-, der°-o for the sake of bowls.” Another suggested that the amputation would interfere with the howler’s bias. ' , “There is a very high standard of comfort among the people of New Zealand," declares Ah' F. B. Smith, Agricultural adviser to the British Overseas Settlement Delegation. “The houses are well constructed end nicely kept. People are well dad. 1 saw fine schools and hospiij,ls, social institutions, village halls and meeting places. I saw no poverty, no sundowners. The towns are well' planned, and pleasing to the eye of a visitor. The country seems to lie very prosperous, and have a great future ahead of it.” Mr Smith said lie was mff afraid, as some people seemed to he, i|iat new settlers would not succeed in New Zealand. If carefully selected at the other end, and given a reasonable chance here, there should he no difficulty. ...