Manawatu Herald SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 1928. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3741, 14 January 1928, Page 2

Manawatu Herald SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 1928. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Local fishermen report that, the] is an unusual number of shark outside the bar at present. j

Robbie Mason, the seven-year-o grandson of the Mayor of Otaki, i)j

J. P. Brandon, fell from a bicychi yesterday and cut his leg. He was’ admitted lo hospital, but later died. Experiments are being conducted in the borough of Gisborne with a weed erariicator which, it is claimed, will clear the footpaths of grass and other growths:. % A bequest of £2,000 has been I made to the Methodist Theological* College, Auckland, by the late Mr A. A. Wags'taff, of Te Aroha, and formerly of Pohangina. The dentists’ register, - published in yesterday’s gazette,, contains the names of 854 practitioners. The list of registered New Zealand medical practitioners contains 1340 names.

The usual Labour Social, Club eychre tournament was held in the Town Hall supper-room last evening. The prize-winners were as follows : —Miss Griffin, Mesdames Harper and Pritchard and Messrs Chaff 'ey, Andresen, and Newsom A girl, Mary O’Connor, aged 4. was drowned in a lagoon at Preston Rd., Greymouth, yesterday. How she got in the lagoon in unknown. Where the body was found the water at high tide, is no more than a foot deep.

The, spell of dry weather is having a disastrous effect upon local gardens and orchards, and pastures are drying up. Local house tanks ‘are being replenished from the town water supply. Good soaking rain is badly needed throughout the district.

Wje were shown a photograph of the thrasher shark captured recently by Mr. J. Taylor and party, while fishing from the launch Huia, off the Manawatu Heads. The fish put up a great tight before it was captured. It weighed 130 lbs. and was 9 feet 0 inches in length.

The preacher at the Methodist Church to-morrow morning will be the Rev.' Scriven, of Papua. Mr Scriven is a very talented speaker, and his message and experiences are both full of interest and rrplift. An invitation is extended to the local public to hear the wonderful story of the triumphs of the Grace of God in the islands of New Guinea.

W|hen the Palmerston N. Hospital Board was discussing a protest from the Manawatu County Council re proposed increase in levies next year, it was suggested that a circular he issued by the Board to contributing bodies showing how the money is raised and expended, the Chairman (Sir James Wilsos). said members of such bodies would not read them.

Figures relating to the losses involved by the slump in the West Coast timber industry are given in an exchange. No less than £2,000 per week in wages was lost by the limber workers last year owing to the mills closing down when the stream of orders dried up. The coast sawmillers paid out approximately £96,000 less last year, as compared with previous years.

Tim .medical sujpeijtnten dent of the Palmerston- North Hospital (Dr. Frank Ward) reported to the Board meeting on Tuesday that 201 patients had been admitted during December, while 205 had been discharged and 8 had died. On January, 1, 149 patients remained in the Institution. The daily average number of occupied beds was 147.58. Scarlet fever patients admitted numbered 8 and diphtheria cases four. Twelve scarlet fever cases and two of diphtheria still remained in isolation at the end of December. Since January 5 there had been no diphtheria cases.

Potatoes in Wellington last week sold up to £1 per cwt. It was currently reported to-day that Heeney defeated Sharkey at New York yesterday on points in the heavy-weight boxing clash.

whcnua Power Board with a view' to securing assistance in the matter of reducing the load in order to arrest the continual falling of the water level in the dams. Between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. the fuel stations can cope with the existing load, and it is between the hours of 7 a.m. and 11 p.m. that assistance is needed.

George Thompson Hall and John Gordon Hareourt, both returned soldiers, were each lined £1 at Wellington yesterday for failure to observe all the regulations in regard to firearms. They had failed to notify a change of addresses while having permission of the Defence Minister to hold unlawful weapons, i.e., war souvenirs in the form of automatic pistols. “Charitable aid has' again been very heavy during the month in Palmerston N. and things do not seem to be improving. During the month I had to issue 219 rations at a cost of £55 5s compared with 148 rations at a cost of £34 14s in December, 1926,” reportecj Mr. F. Aisher, Charitable Aid Officer to the Palmerston North Hospital Board on Thursday.

Matthew Guy, an elderly man, was fined £25 yesterday at Auckland for being found at Mt. Albert Road in possession of apparatus for distilling or rectifying spirit without having a license. He was also fined £5 for sly grog selling in 1 the Mount Roskill no-license district. Charles Peters and William Pratt were each fined £2 for being found on premises for the purpose of illegal dealing in liquor. lan Coleman, aged 19, was killed last night through the motor lorry he' was driving running off the road and capsizing on Baton Saddle in the'Nelson district. Deeearsed was the son of Edward Coleman, of Motupiko. He was engaged in carting timber from a sawmill in Baton to Tapawera. Deceased was travelling by himself. No one actually saw the accident, the first •to discover it being a man who was driving a lorry some distance behind.

Mr J. E. Barltrop, Feilding, wrote to the Palmerston North Hospital Board on Thursday, expressing thanks and appreciation for the care taken of his son while in Hospital. “I think the public are exceedingly well served,” added Mr Barltrop, “and the Hospital is to lie congratulated on having such an .honorary staff. I was also agreeably surprised to find that tlio charge of 9s per day covered every-' thing and that the doctor who performed the operation did so in dn honorary capacity, and that I had nothing to pay him.” Mr Barltrop enclosed a cheque for £5 5s as a donation to the funds, and was accorded a vote of thanks. All of the engineers of the various power boards supplied from Mangahao are co-operating to assist the Public Works officials. Several of the industries in the Horowhenua Board’s area are adjusting their loads to do less in the daytime and more in the small hours of the morning to help the position, and an appeal is made in our columns by the Power Board’s engineer for consumers to assist by doing without water heaters, as this load is the easiest to be dispensed with. If the consumers co-operate as desired, owing to the great number of water heaters, the day load will fall several hundred horse-power. ' The 1928 issue of the New Zealand Official Year-book, just to hand, although slightly reduced in bulk as compared with the 1927 number, retains all the salient features of its immediate predecessor, and contains a substantial amount of new matter. The extent of authoritative information supplied in regard to all important matters connected with the affairs of he Dominion is most useful, and reflects credit on the Census and Statistics Office, by which the book is compiled. Two new sections have been added, one dealing with the tramway systems of the Dominion, and the other containing the summarised results of the first annual collection of statistics, of building and construction activities. The section on water power has been rewritten and extended; that dealing with the revenue and expenditure of the Government has also been entirely rewritten, and that devoted to railways partially so.

The death.of a well-known Chinese identity, Bun Tuck, occurred recently at the Westland Hospital at the age of 83 years. Deceased was a native of Canton, and Had been 50 years on the West Coast, having in the early days been a sorekeeper at Maori Gulley. Later he was engaged in mining at Kumara, and subsequently he removed to Hokitika, where lie remained until his death. When the Rt. Hon. R. «J. Seddon was Premier, Bun Tuck’s name figured prominently in a debate in the House. ■ A charge (subsequently proved to be unfounded) was brought against Mr Seddon by Mr George Hutchinson, in which (says an exchange) it was asserted that the Premier and Bun Tuck were associated in some illegal mining transaction. Mr. Hutchinson, who had been elected as a supporter of the Seddon Governmeh, subsequently became its bitterest opponent, and he took every opportunity of making things interesting for -the Premier. The Buir Tuck incident was a trying ordeal for Mr. Seddon.