MISCELLANEOUS.

Otaki Mail, 12 April 1922, Page 1

MISCELLANEOUS.

Mr L. Bilks, Chiel Electrical Engineer, .wrote to tiie ilorowhenu.i County Council on Saturday- staling that it was proposed at an early date to commence distributing part ul 'die transmission poles along the roads to b» oecupied by main lines. liie Uounty Engineer was instructed to make any arrangements necessary.

An arrest made by the Napier police may probably solve some clothes-line robberies which have recently occurred there. On being searched at the walchliouso tiie man was i'ound lo be wearing several articles of ladies' underclothing beneath his male garments.

Flowers or wreaths sent by country residents will be conveyed tree by ran to Wellington lor placing on soldiers graves alter tiie service at the cenotaph on Anzac Day. Any such consignments should he addressed: “Flowers lor soldiers’ Craves, care U.S.A., Wellington."'

Cable advice lias been received ol the death at Mukti Fuuna, india, :i Pandita liamahai, head oi me lUimahai Mission to the Ciiiid Widows oi India. The Pandita had. been engaged on this mission work for upwards ol thirty years, and during that period trained thousands oi eluiu

widows in home-work and in various occupations, bringing them up in ihe Christian iaith. New Zealand has assisted the cause in numerous ways, bazaars (at which goods made by die child widows were sold) having been held in different parts by representatives of the movement. Miss McGregor, one of llainabai's mission stall, is at present in Dunedin, having been invalided home to New;• Zealand alter twenty years’ service.

“A lowering of charges has been the almost, universal commercial remedy for bud business, and it is impossible 1o doubt- that if the railways and Post Office were in private hands there would have been a general lowering of rales before now," comments the Auckland Herald. It is chiefly by this means tiie British companies have sought to revive their fortunes, the compulsion in their case being the competition ol the road transport agencies, which are estimated to have (alien from the railways about T2 per cent of the total short-distance goods (ruffle, exclusive of coal and minerals. Though less severe in this country, the competition of the roads has been a factor adversely affecting the New Zealand railways, and the logical reply is a lowering of railway charges.

A correspondent whose veracity the .Taranaki Herald has no reason to douht writes: "While at Marion on Friday last 1 was mlormed that there ever e, some performing eels in a puna at the hack oi the Marlon Hotel. Having a lew hours to wait 1 visited me pond anti was shown what the eels were capable of doing. Mr X. L>. Nesbit, the licensee, who accompanied me stood on the edge ot the pond, which is 35 yards long and IS yards wide, and whistled lour or five times, an ordinary straight whistle. In less than one minute live eels averaging 51b to 81b in weight came swimming towards him. He put a few small pieces of meat in his hand and they all led out oi it. He then held some pieces ot meat lour to six inches up the hank; they in turn would reach I out of the water to get a piece ot j meat. He then put his hand under i them as they came round and practii caliy lilted them out of the water, j They, yvould slip into the water utl his hand and swim around lor more. ; They did not at any time appear to ' be frightened,”