NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3531, 31 August 1926, Page 4

NEWS AND NOTES.

At the Paris Zoological Society luncheon recently, seaweed jelly and sharks’ fins were among the dishes served.

Life-size elephants, tigers and camels with almost living movements are made from papiermache in an American toy shop. In the 14th century watches were Considered proof of the owner’s gentility, and were worn attached to a chain round the neck.

At Caerphilly, in Glamorganshire, there is a tower which leans lift, in 80ft. ' The Pisa Tower leans only 6ft. in the same height.

The use of carbon dioxide gas refrigeration instead of ice was successful recently in. shipping a consignment of fish from Halifax. It was found recently in England that a bird had built its nest in telephone wires, effectually topping all communications.

When accumulation of sand at the base of the Sphinx was recently removed, tremendous paws and an old altar were discovered.

The paper from which a Bank of England note is made is so tough that when folded it can sustain a weight of 501 b. . There will be a saving of £50,000 a year by deleting mutton from the British Army menu, it being considered expensive. Over 100,000 ft. of timber was railed from Ross last week (saj’s the Greymouth Evening Star). The output 'consisted chiefly of orders which had been left for some time and were waiting shipment.

“Banks are like a wife —you should keep to the one,” said the chairman of directors of 'the Awahuri Dairy Company at the annual meeting when one director asked why the company gave all its business to the one institution. “That is something questionable,” was the reply of a supplier (states an ex'change). With the era of high prices receding more and more into the distance, it becomes more necessary than ever to increase the production of New Zealand’s staple industry. Moreover, the balance of expoi'ts shows that the dairy farmers of the Dominion are about £3,000,000 short in their returns as compared with the previous year.—Napier Telegraph. A persistent barracker at the rep football match at Wanganui on Saturday showed signs of vocal distress during the second spell when a spectator in the vicinity remarked “Your voice is giving out old man, have a cough lolly.” The noisy one did not appreciate the ironical remark, but accepted the lolly, and directed his attention to mistakes of the referee with renewed energy. — Herald.

It is stated in the 18th annual report of the Teachers’ Superannuation Board that the number of contributors increased from 1,443 at January 31, 1924, to 7,968 at the end of January, 1925, an increase of 525. Allowances amounting to £13,403 16/- were granted during the period,, compared with £18,490 12/- in 1924-25. The total annual rate of all allowances payable at the end of January, 1926, was £152,421 14/-. Only a month from the re-opening of the next bowling season, the Wakeleld (Nelson) Bowling Club has closed its green. The ceremony, probably unique in New Zealand, considering its date, was held last Saturday in ideal weather, which enabled the members to enjoy the game. Only two. Saturdays have been idle on the club’s greens during the winter. The Nelson greens are in splendid trim, and the reopening of the season will probably take place about the middle of next month.

At the next meeting of the Wellington Education Board, the following motion will be moved, and will, it is expected, give rise to animated discussion: “That in the opinion of this hoard, it is in the interests of education that education boards of the Dominion should assert their rights, as representatives of parents and guardians of children, to a voice in determining the syllabus to ho taught in the schools.”

What is one man’s meat is another man’s poison. While the Auckland Golf Club has been objecting to the raising of the revaluation of its Middlemore links to £20,645, the Otahnhu Borough Council has been calculating the increased revenue which this assessment will mean to it. At the council’s meeting it was reported that last year the rates collected from the club amounted to about £BO, but this year the levy would be £602. However, the valuation may yet be the subject of an appeal by the club. “The various Power Boards buying power in bulk from the Department have continued to energetically carry out their various schemes of reticulation, and have very materially assisted the Department in its general aim of making an adequate power supply available to everybody within reasonable economic range of its lines,” said the Hon. K. S. Williams when delivering the Public Works Statement in Parliament. “The Department recognises that these electric supply authorities are really partners with the Government in its general scheme of making_power available generally throughput the country, and appreciates the co-operation that is being exercised and the stimulus that is being given to the load on the Government power stations by the energetic policy of load development that is,being carried out by most of the Boards.”

Not often a clergyman has a wedding, a baptism and a funeral in one day, but Mr W. T. Brabyn, Presbyterian minister for the TirauPutaruru district, had that experience on a recent Wednesday. Motoring across to his old parish, he visited some sick people at Kihikihi at 10 a.m., took part in a wedding at 11 a.m., baptised a child at 11.30 and then attended the wedding breakfast. At Putaruru on the same day a funeral service was conducted.

“British names are good enough for me,” said Mr T. Bloodworth, a Labour leader, at a meeting of the Auckland City Council, when they were discussing street names. Miss Melville had been saying that Mr George Graham, some of the Orakei Maoris, and other people interested, were busy preparing a list of ancestral and tribal names for the new garden suburb of Orakei.- She thought it was quite an appropriate idea. Mr Bloodworth, while thoroughly admiring the beauty of the Maori language, did not think the names should be vulgarised by being put up at the ends of streets, particularly as many of them were very difficult for ordinary Englishmen to pronounce, such as —and there Dir Bloodworth boggled, and frankly confessed he would not try to pronounce it. Probably lie was thinking of something like “Matamataharakeke” which used to be a bit of a tongue twister for'the mere pakeha.