NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3880, 6 December 1928, Page 4

NEWS AND NOTES.

There were 21 deaths in Palmerston last month. Bert Brown, a New Zealand boxer,- is making quite a name for himself in Vancouver, where he is . trained by Ben Tracey. The tobacco growers round Riwaka and Motueka are busy getting their plant out, and everything now .points to an excellent growing season. There are 117 clubs affiliated to tire New Zealand Amateur Athletic Association. There were 26, building permits, valued at £25,756 issued by the Wanganui City Council last month. Over £1,500,000 was involved in building schemes undertaken in Auckland during the past 11 months. There are 166 Smiths on the Napier roll, 22 Bishops, 23 Deans, nine Abbots, four Parsons, two Popes, two Christians and one Vicar (says an exchange), while card players will be interested to learn that there are 31 Kings, six Jacks, one Diamond and one Hart. “There are 27,000 motorists, who have not renewed their licenses for the present year,” said Traffic Inspector Macintosh in the Magistrate’s Court at Christchurch.

A golfer’s ball at Tredegar Park in South Wales, was carried away by birds three times in one game. Remains of a Roman.fort have been found in the garden of Ribchester vicarage near Blackburn. Mr. W. C. Fuller, who died at Wlickhambrook, Suffolk, aged 87, lived all his long life in the same house. Londoners are changing in the matter of cheese. The well-ripened varieties are not now so popular as they were. Church workers of Aspley, in Bedfordshire, lately gathered 251 b. of blackberries for London children’s homes. A new swimming endurance record has been set up by Mrs. Myrtle Huddleston, who remained in the water at Ravenhall Pool, Coney Island, for sixty hours. The most expensive animal to keep in captivity is the walrus. The food bill for a full-grown walrus is £4OO a year, or as much as will feed three elephants.

The bridge crossing the Seine at St. Pierre du Vaucray is built of concrete. Prom end to end the span is 432 ft. —the longest bridge .of the kind in the world. Five bottles of beer, two bottles of water, and one of spirits, with flve razors, were found in the

pockets of a man charged at Croydon, London, with begging. There are two constables, one brass finisher, four stone-cutters, three lighthouse officials and one chimney-sweep among the women of the Irish Free State.

Say 3 the Wanganui Herald: There have been five or six derailments of goods trains in New Zealand within a few months, fortunately not attended by loss of human life or injury. Sixteen deaths occurred at Masterton last month, as against five in November of last year. The streets of Blackball, down the West Coast were lit by electricity for the first time last Thursday. There were 13 petitions in bankruptcy filed in the district under the Christchurch jurisdiction last month® How Christchurch gets its water: Ate the result of three bores having been sunk by the City Council in May’s road there is an approximate flow of 2,750,000 gallons daily. The largest of the bores is 16 inches.

Although mushrooms do not appear in any quantities in Sot/hland until January, a large and well-, formed specimen was found this week, measuring about nine inches in diameter, and perfectly formed. Excellent business during the past eight weeks is reported in Auckland by one of the large retail soft goods houses where the scope and nature of the trade bear witness to the spending power of a considerable section of the community. A bust of Thomas Bracken, the New Zealand poet, has been found in Christchurch and brought to Dunedin (states the Star). It was on view in one of the Bristol’s windows. The work is by an Italian artist. There is a probability that it will be acquired for Dunedin, the city to which Bracken belonged. A large slip of about four acres of ground comprising bush and fern suddenly came down into the Waikaretaheke river on the Wlaikaremoana road. The river was completely banked up for a considerable distance and eventually breaking out caused a flood of water. A large number of trout have perished. Cutting- out the railways! A circus that landed at the Bluff the other day from Australia is transporting its entire outfit, including the menagerie, by means of a fleet of motor lorries. It is amazing to see two large elephants standing patiently on the floor of a big motor vehicle while being rapidly whirled along the country roads. It is reported that £43 changed hands ini a very few minutes on. the ' night of the election day (says the Taranaki News) as the result of an argument between two keen supporters of opposite) sides in the Egmont electorate. Each of two residents of a country centre, while awaiting the returns, were both confident the district would give better support to his candidate, so a wager was made of £1 for each vote of the majority. A couple of minutes later the return was hois- , ted, and as that centre showed a minority for Reform of 43 votes, the supporter had to hand over a cheque for £43. Although the Inglewood Eel Club has been in operation only four weeks the tally already made by the clerk of scales is a tribute alike to the energy of its members and the productivity of his streams. The total of eels caught has already reached the huge number of 1011, which, at a low estimate, is calculated to weight one ton five hundredweight. Practically every stream in the district is represented. One eel of 161 b. was found to have swallowed a trout 19in. long, whilst another of the same weight contained a full-grown blackbird. A third and comparatively small eel weighing 81b. contained a trout measuring ll£in.

Right through the heart of the Urewera country the Public Works Department is engaged constructing a road which in the near future will be of considerable importance between Ruatahuua and Hopu'ruahine, at the head of the Whanganu i inlet, Lake Waikaremoana. When this work is completed tourists will be able to proceed direct to the Lake from Rotorua —a distance of about 120 miles —instead of going by either of the long routes via Taupo and Napier or by Motu and Gisborne. It will also serve as an alternative route between Hastings-Napier and Auckland, and, as it will include the beautiful Lake Waikaremoana, it will become a most popularly highway for motorists.