Shannon News TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1924.

Shannon News, 5 February 1924, Page 2

Shannon News TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1924.

The usual fortnightly meeting of the Borough Council wilL be held in the Council Chambers this evening.

Tiie monthly meeting of the Shannon Chamber of Commerce will be held on Thursday evening.

'A number of local residents journeyed to tiie Top Camp on Sunday, an enjoyable day being spent in picnicking and sightseeing*

Miss Mona Neale, who returns from her holiday to-day, is re-opening her classes on February 8. She will be pils at her residence, Nathan Terrace, at any time prior to that date to make arrangements for. the new term.

The need for persons being careful when Weeding tliG garden was demonstrated in Shannon a few days .•ilgjo, when a lady resident evidently handled a poisonous weed as 'each portion of the skin, it came in contacli with was poisoned, necessitating the attention of the doctor.

Til el following 'letter accompanied by cheque inis been received by the Mayor, the letter, he says, being as much appreciated by him as the cheque : “I have much pleasure in enclosing her/e-wilh a cheque for ten guineas as a small contribution to your Hlmnnon Soldiers’ Memo rial Fund. I also wish to thank yourself and your committee for the excellent work yon have done in connection with the above memorial. I am sure Sbalnnoiii is {proud of .Its memorial and it will bo valued more as years pass on as a remembrance of those Great Chaps who fell in the Great War—Yours silncerely, Ronald J. Law.”

Ati tlie Shannon railway st/utton yesterday, a passenger wlio had losi his luggage check was put to a good deal ol' unnecessary inconvenience owing to there being no declaration forms available at the office. These, we understand, are only procurable at the police station and have to be signed in the presence of a JJP. A,s the local police officer is often away from the office a lot ol' inconvenience is caused and \t has been suggested to us that blaiik forms should be kept at the railway office and the station in aster should be empowered to deal with such matters. In the present case the passenger had to procure the services of a local J.P. to draw up mji, declaration form. The Justice of the Peace in. question informs us that this is the third occasion on which he iha.s .had to draw up a similar document.

We understand a large number of men are being put on at the Mangahao Hydro works with a view ■ to speeding-up the w.ork. The friends of our erstwhile residents, Mr and Mrs W. McKegg and la-miiy, intend giving them a sendoff at the Parish Had on Thursday evening. A meeting of the committee to make final arrangements will be held to-night.

.Preparations. are. now being made ior connecting up with the power house at Mangaore for the supply ol “juice’’ for Shannon, and it is anticipated everything! Avill be in readiness to turn it on locally m about two- months time. “I am starting the mew year at a pound fine,” said Mr Barton, S-M., in dealing with a cyclist for riding without lights., at the Wanganui Court The Magistrate added that if the pound fine did not have the desired efftect, he would increase the amount. A farmer in Poverty Bay who owns one of the properties through wlii-ch the fire recently swept, says that there had- been a wonderful clearance oi heavy timber, and that although he had lost many fences-the clearing-up of the land more than repaid him. ... The Prime Minister stated this week that, prior to leaving London, ho had applied on behalf of New Zealand for a special loan of £4,000,000, in connection with the offer made by the British Government to the Imperial Conference, of financial aid to thie Dominions, in respect of new developmental works, in advance of programme.

Boys are now offering freely in Dune-din as apprentices to the carpentry trade, but the employers are not very kelen labout indenturing them, saying that the - apprenticing conditions by law are such as to give the masters a considerable amount of trouble, says the Post’s Dunedin correspondent. One of the employers put the position concisely by saying: “I want apprentices but I don’t see my way to wet-nurse them.”

“We have found the sandy land on the coast’ the best to farm after all,” declared Mr W. H. Field, M.P., at the A. and 1 P. Association smoke concept on Wednesday night, and the statemien t elicited a chorus of “hear; hears” from Ids audience. Continuing Mr Field urged that the Government should be persuaded to plant trees on the land on, the other side of Lake Horowhenua. He had found through personal experience that trees added greatly to the value of such land He believed that a good deal of it was native property and nothing better could be done with it.

Among the' recent visitors tins district was M,r Button, a Now South Wales pastoralist who is engaged m the dairying industry on a. large scale. He milks a thousand cows and has a thousand acres down in ImcenieThe visitor is at present engaged m inspecting |i|ei leading dairy herds in the Dominion, and he was greatly pleased with Mr B. L. Horn’s Jerseys at Ohau, which he considered were amongst the finest type of dairy cows he had seen. It is more thanliitfdy that some irepresenWtives of the kuku strain will find their way to New South Wales as a result of the good impression they made on Mr Button.

Bitumen is a very fine thing foi road surfacing, but it is very much more than a nuisance in any other direction (says the Nelsdn Evening Mail). Ot»e of toe Counity Council staff engaged in the work on the Stoke road had an experience ithe other day thalt gave his friends a good deal of merriment. Sitting dOAVn on ’a Chair for a lew minutes on his return home he found himself a firm fixture there. The -only Avay movement could be secured was by taking the chair with him. This proved awkward, iahd no doubt the individual concerned Avould have divested himself of his clothing had this been possible. As it Avas, tbe garment in question had to be completely sacrificed, the portion adhering to the chair remaining there. Fine bitumen appears to have wonderful adhesive powers. Others also have had rather curious experiences. When legs have Ifen grossed during ]ujnch*ioh hdjoutrnments, (they have become joined fast together, much to the embarrassment of the OAvners.

When flour is sent out from the mills to the bakers there is in each sack a ticket. It sometimes occurs (says the Lyttelton Times) that in the hasty opening of the sack the ticket becomes submerged in the flour and so passes unnoticed. In due course it reaches the consumer in the middle of his loaf of bread, and then the baker is called upon to answer irate questions. When asked at the Bakers’ Conference whether it Avould not avoid trouble if the ticket Aver-e placed on the outside of the sack. Mr F. R. Cortson related that it was not always the baker Avbo heard of it. Tt- lin'd occurred that where members of the public had bought a sack of flour from, his firm, some had returned the ticket, drawing attention to the number on it, and inquiring what prize they had Avon.

The death occurred in London recently of Alfred Russel Price, and passed almost unheeded, whereas it was worthy of special notice, for he sucodedhd fn accomplishing wihat thousands of people have itched to do, hut could not; he gave the boy who later became German Emperor a good sound thrashing (says the Christchurch Sftar). It happened ytearo ago. when Wilhelm was the Crown. Prince, and was visiting Ilfracombe, an English seaside resort with his tutor. Wilhelm in a playful destructive mood, began to throw stones at some bathing machines belonging to Price’s father. He was told to stop but took /exception to this infringement of (his regal rights. Young Price took off his coa.t and be "an to belabour the royal youth so .successfully that he had administered a. black eye and several cuts and bruises before the tutor succeeded in calling off hostilities.

Three New Zealand singers wlio arc taking instruction at the present time in Komis are Miss M* Esquilaut, Miss Teresa McEnroe, and Miss Eileen Driscoll, all of Wellington. Mr. E. H. Bakcwell, senior inspector in the Wellington educational district, is to take up his duties in ithc Otago district for three months from April Ist next. Mr. G. W. Garrard, of Auckland, Avas previously announced to take the Otago inspectorship,' but the decision has been altered. Tire reticulation of Shannon under tiro Horowhenua Power Board’s group system is progressing: very favourably, thirty odd dwellings having already , been wired. The main line from Shannon to Foxtail lias also been commenced and when finished will complete the local main line circuit. A total eclipse of the moon will take place on Thursday, February 21 next. Only narro\yly on Thursday, as it will begin at 12.45 a.in. and continue for some six hours. The sun should be well up before the eclipse is properly over, and a total eclipse of the moon will rule for a long period (two hours at least). The greater part of the phenomenon will he visible in all parts of New Zealand. The Horowhenua Power Board’s Reticulation officer, Mr J. R. Jack, last week commenced a canvass for the first reticulation group in Levin and so far has met with every encouragement. This group will cover the left side of Oxford Street, and an indication of the favour with which electricity is regarded is given by the fact that out oil 35 proprietors of shops and dwellings approached so far, only one refusal has heen received.

During his visit to Palmerston N. on Saturday, the Minister of Railways, the Hon. J. G. Coates, said that he could not yet commit himself on the question of the Palmerston North railway deviation, as he wished to treat the matter as a whole, and to do this he must first conclude ihis programme of inspection of all the lines in the Dominion. The southern section yet remained to be covered in tiiis schemie. A fire occurred in Mr T. Bowe’s milking shed at Marotiri in the early hours of Wednesday morning, resulting in the destruction of the engineroom and plant and A, number of cow bales. The fire was discovered at about 3.40 a.m. as the family were preparing for the morning’s milking, at which time it had a good hold on the building. Besides the loss occasioned by tlie conflagration, Mr Bowe is greatly inconvenienced, having at the present time a herd of about one hundred and seventy cows to handle. Writing to lier parents from London under date of November 27th, Miss Mai da Hooker, of HaAviua, makes an interesting comment bearing on the price of food commodities: ‘‘Meat here is a price. English meat avo neVet buy, as it is sold from Is 5d to Is lOd a pound. We ahvays got imported, but even that is Is 2d per lb. Week-ends our butcher sells special priced beef at fid a lb—a Avonderful bargain unsurpassed elsewhere in London. Potatoes are about Is fid or Is 9d a quarter, a cauliiloAver (for tAvo people) 4d, cooking apples 4d and 5d a lb, eating apples up to lOd and Is a lb, and cabbages from 2d up.” Mr. 'William Acton Adams, an early Nelson colonist, died,in London recently at the age of 80 years. Mr. Adams, avlio arrived at Nelson in .1850, Avith his parents, Avas the eldest son of the late Mr. William Adams, first Superintendent of Marlborough, ami leader of the movement for the separation of (he Wairua district from Nelim., Avhich resulted in the creation of the Marlborough Province in 1859. Mr. Acton Adams represented Nelson in the House of Representatives, for a term in 1879. He aftenvard resided in Canterbury, but moved to England several years ago. He leaves three sons and a daughter. ' , The report of the recovery of the ship’s safe from the wreck of the steamer Wairarapa, which is unfortunately not true, raises an important question, remarks the New Zealand Herald. Canon Basel den, Avho was Avith the rescue party for twenty-one days at the wreck, Avrites: “I think that besides much belonging to the Union S.S. Comoanv, there would be in the safe a good deal of money and valuables that belonged to the passengers. We recovered an astonishing amount, and the Public Trustee received it from us and took much pains in restoring it to the heirs and friends of the lost. But probably experienced travellers gave a lot to the purser and be would lock it up in the ship’s safe. 1 do not know of the law on the subject, but I think that- the divers, if they recover the safe, will probably have to send all the passengers’ property to the Public Trustee. I have lists' of all the passengers, both saved and lost, end many particulars, and shall be quite Avilling to let the divers see. them. I will be delighted if Mr Veor is successful. I hope he is being verv careful, as the sen gets up very quickly and tire currents are dreadfully strong at times round Miners’ Head. The Wairarapa struck at eight minutes past midnight on Sunday, 28th October, 1894.”