Shannon News FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 1923.

Shannon News, 5 January 1923, Page 2

Shannon News FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 1923.

On Wednesuay Mr Cyril Jennings was removed lo the Palmerston North Hospital suffering from an attack of rheumatic lever. His many friends will hope for his speedy recovery.

A large amount of hay is down in this district, and owing to the daily showers it. is quite impossible to get it in, and should the wet weather continue much longer a large quantity will lose its feeding value.

The residents of Moutoa are still working hard to raise the necessary funds for the erection of their hall. They have secured a section near the school which has been donated them, and they now have £125 in hand. It is the intention of' the committee to make a systematic canvass of the district for funds ,and hope to 'hen make an early start with thi erc-dcn of the hall.

At the Police Court yesterday morning, Dan' O’Neil and Frederick Smith were charged with being idle and disorderly persons. The former was convicted and ordered to come up for sentence when called upon and to lea\ e the town at once, smith was convicted and sentenced to 14 days imprisonment. Messrs. Gunning and Spencer were the presiding J.P.’s. Mr T. E. Y. Seddon, ex-M.P., is to resume practice with the legal firm of Messrs. Hannan and Seddon, in Greymouth.

Tlie Horowhenua County Council’s crushing plant left for Shannon today, where it will be installed on the Council’s new metal reserve on the Shannon East Road. It is the intention to put the road surfaces in that locality in a good state of repair. A curious golfing incident has taken place on the Middleton, County Cork, links. A member of the club drove a slow shot from the third tee, and the ball entered the ear of a donkey, grazing on the' links. The donkey stood still, but when the players were within a few yards of the animal it took to Us heels, tossed its head, and the ball came spinning to the ground. An interesting family gathering took place' on Christmas Day, when Sir Joseph and Lady Ward had assembled around them all their sons, their daughter, their son-in-law and daugh-ters-in-law, and their grandchildren. The reunion took place at the seaside residence of Mr Cyril Ward at North New Brighton. ' Nineteen in all sat down to dinner, namely: Sir Joseph and Lady Ward; the eldest son, Mr Cyril Ward, his wife and four children; the daughter, Mrs B. B. Wood, her husband and three children; Mr Gladstone Ward, his wife and two children; Mr Vincent Ward, and Mr Pat Ward. Opportunity was taken of this complete family gathering to have, a photograph taken of the group. How do we stand in comparison with bee-keeping in other countries? (asks “Apis” in the Auckland Herald.) The correct answer to this query is the true criterion as to whether we have kept in the front ranks of bee culture or fallen behind. I have uo hesitation in saying that we have not only kept in the front rank, but in several respects we are ahead of all other countries. For instance, we have the most efficient Apiaries \ct for the suppression of bee diseases in existence; we have the only strict grading rules, the best density standard for honey of any country, while our appliances and methods are equal to the best to be found anywhere, and above all we have a standard hive, which neither England or America has —ihe ten-frame Langstroth. Our output; of honey in one year exceeded 1200 tons, valued at £IOO,OOO. At a meeting of the Rotorua Chamber of Commerce, mention was made of the unusual dearth of visitors at .this time of the year, and tentative reasons given to account for it. Two or three mentioned the fact that visitors complained bitterly of the high tariff in Rotorua, and compared the prices with those of Te Aroha, Helensville and other watering-places frequented by invalids and holiday-ma-kers. Another member denied the impeachment, stating that, apart from the increased cost of labour and the distance from a port, Rotorua prices would bear comparison with any. There is, however, a busy time ahead for January and February, for a great many people who had been kept in town in connection with the Parliamentary and licensing elections are now ready for a holiday, and with the big bowling tournaments ahead, and separate visits of Queensland and New South Wales bowlers, Rotorua promises to be a pretty lively centre for the next few months.

At a meeting of the Newcastle (N.S.W.) Hospital Board a balancesheet oi the Crystal Art Union, promoted on behalf of the hospital by Mr Thomas W. Collman, of Casino, was received. In an accompanying letter, Mr Collman stated that the art union was launched in December, 1921, and at first the sales were good, because of the advertising methods adopted, in April, when the sales were increasing and success seemed, assured, they were called upon to withdraw all advertisements, and in addition the propaganda against an unions sealed the doom of the Crystal Art Union. The balance-sheet showed receipts of 17,171 tickets at 6/ to be £5151 6/, and expenditure amounted to £4027 19/4. Prizes to the value of £285 had been distributed, and £Bl5 was still to be paid out, leaving a balance for the hospital of £23 6/8. The opinion that the art union was far from satisfactory was expressed during the subsequent discussion by members of the board, exception was taken to the fact that whereas the expenditure was over 80 per cent of Ihe gross receipts, the promoter had assured them it would not amount to more than 20 per cent. It was derided to send a letter to the At-torney-General, pointing out that the comm it lee was far from satisfied with the result of the art union, and asking him to give the matter the strictest investigation.

Work starts at the Mangahao liydro works on Monday next.

As a IC-suli oi the heavy rain in Shannon yesterday, the Otauru Creek overflowed its banks just over the railway' bridge, Hooding a .large area of land on Mr Curran’s property, coming close up to his house. This morning the water had gone down considerably.

The paragraph in a recefit issue relating to a fall in exchange rates between England and New Zealand was written under a misapprehension, as there has been no fall in exchange lately. The information on which the item was based was to the effect that the exchange charge reduced the price of butter by id per lb.

There was a large influx of visitors to Taupo for the holidays, and the weather was splendid. The trout are in better condition than for many years past. A fly fisherman landed one 14-pounder and an 11-pounder. \ launch party trolling one morning caught 14 fish, the largest being 111 pounds, and only one was under ~lb.

Dr. W. A. Chappie (formerly of Wellington) who has again been elected a member of the House of Commons, lives within three minutes of St, Stephen’s. He has the division bell connected up with his house, so that he can be called to vote at any hour ol' the day and night

“No serious musician should scoff at machines like the gramophone and pianola,” declares Sir Landlon Ronald, the famous composer and conductor. The greater the musician the less contemptuous of these mechanical instruments, a curious fact of great aesthetic and social significance. It is not their defects, which are obvious enough, but their value that a genuine music lover, as distinguished from a dilettante, inclines to stress. That value may be illustrated by analogy. Both of them are doing for music what the printing press has done for literature. They bring delight to all. The pianola may' be compared to the printed page; the gramaphone to the colour print. A page of print cannot be compared in beauty to the illustrated manuscript that it displaced; the colour print falls short of its original in purity and delicacy of tint. But it is only a hopeless antiquarian or a millionaire with a fad who would refuse to open a book or buy a colour reproduction.

A serious case was reported to the Wanganui health officers last week. An elderly man up-country stated he believed he was suffering from leprosy. As a result of receiving this information, Dr. Monk and Mr Pargeter, the health officials, might have been seen making a hurried departure fromAVanganui for the man’s address to make sure that he was a fit and proper person to go to Quail Island, whither he had applied to be sent. The amateur physicfanxlad been reading up all the medical books he could get his hands on. He had already had personal knowledge of nearly every disease he could contract, and he was sure his latest complaint must be leprosy. However, Dr. Monk's latest diagnosis did not coincide with that of the victim, who was sent on to the town hospital. “He was more fit for Porirua than Quail Island,” said Mr Pargeter, when recounting the incident. to a reporter. The Health Inspector also had something to say about the way the public in general, and women in particular, read up doctor’s books, and worried themselves into the belief that they had diseases. Some women developed a craze for operations. They were never happy unless they were feeling miserable and wanted to be cut up.

A Nelson lady met with a peculiar accident last week. While walking in her garden she slipped and fell, breaking both of her wrists.

Wood is one oi' the strongest substances in the world, but its strength lies in one direction only. A thin strip of wood cut with the grain will withstand about three times as heavy a pull as steel wire of equal weight. But if the strain is across the grain the strip will be broken by quite a small weight. You cannot puTT a stick in two, but you can snap it quite easily across your knee. It occurred ;o au inventor some time ago that it would he possible by using several layers of wood, cut at various angles to the grain, to produce a material of enormous strength. And so plywood was made, which, weight for weight, is vastly stronger than steel. The layers, sometimes no more than one-hun-dredth of an inch thick, arc glued together and subjected to great pressure. The result is a material little thicker than stout paper which will bend but not break. It is being used nowadays for all' kinds of purposes where strength and lightness are required. It is even employed for making the wings of aeroplanes. So successful was the idea of using several layers of material that it has now been applied not only to wood, but to metals, for they also have a grain of a kind.

Let all birds take warning (says the Christchurch Sun). Electric transmission wires provide a fine perch, but there are certain drawbacks, to say the least, associated with their use for this purpose. A little bird iu Fendalton found a resting place on one, and it was placidly enjoying the sunshine, when a fly settled on a parallel, wire. Promptly it stretched out its neck and pecked at the delectable morsel. Something happened! A bird, whose slight-ly-singed feathers tell the tale of a short-circuit, now hangs, head downwards, from its original perch.

When tho Northern Steamship Company’s steamer Kawau was off Kawau, a man named Bergin fell overboard. The steamer was immediately put about, and as it came up to the struggling man, a steward, named Phillips, jumped overboard to the rescue. Bcrg:u sank just as Phillips came up to him. Thereupon Mr A. J. Morris, a member of tlic Royal Life-saving Society, who was a passenger, dived into the sea and caught hold of the dr awning man ns he rose to the surface for the first time. Mr Morris brought Mr Bergin alongside the ship, and willing hands helped the two men on board, together with Mr Phillips.

As the result of the defeat at the polls of recent loan proposals, six members of the Dargaville Bbrough Council have resigned their seats.

It is reported, says a Wairarapa paper, that a Carterton resident recently secured a large sum of money from a big sweepstake held in Australia.

“If we are going to condemn every good thing of the world because the devil is mixed up with it, I don’t know how far we shall go,” said His Grace Archbishop Julius in his Christmas morning sermon at the Chritchurch Cathedral.

Dunedin possesses many enthusiastic go-ahead wireless amateurs. Here is a recent report from the GTago Witness: Passers by the Savoy oh Saturday afternoon were mystified to hear voices and music apparently from the sky. The question on everyone’s lips :vas “What is it? Where is it?” but none could volunteer any information. The music seemed to fill the whole air and the source could not be located. The buildings from the Octagon to Rattray Street were flooded with the strain of John McCormick singing “I hear you calling me” played on tiie Columbia gramophone, while Jascha Heifitz playing “Aye Maria” created a wonderful volume of sound. The source of the music was the experimental station on the top of the Savoy, where Mr Norman Arundel and his assistants were doing some experiments in sound amplification by means of the Magnavox. Using the Columbia gramaphone and a special amplifier, the sound may be amplified over 100 times, SO' that the operator speaking in an ordinary voice can make himself heard half a mile away. It is intended to give a further demonstration.