Shannon News FRIDAY, JULY 24, 1925.

Shannon News, 24 July 1925, Page 2

Shannon News FRIDAY, JULY 24, 1925.

The fortnightly euchre and dunce under the auspices oi' ithe Ladies' Guild of Ven. Bede's Church will be held in the Parish Hall an Tuesday evening next.

Mr Ben Roberts, the N.Z. Labour Parly's candidate lor the Manawatu seat, will speak in the Maoriland Theatre on Sunday evening, at 8.15 p.m., when he will take as his subject, "Labour, War, and Religion."

Up to July 14 the Hbxowhenua Power Board had connected up 1770 consumers with the service lines out of total applications of 1926. Eightynine industrial motors were in operation and 128 milking motors, while 84 electric ranges were in commission, 14!) water heaters and'ls37 heating and ironing points. The total connected kilowatts was 30.72.

■The chairman of the Horowhenua Power Board stated at this week's meeting that' the whole of the Board's reticulation and construction work would be completed at a cost of £175,(K)0. The original loan sanctioned by the ratepayers was £160,000. Of this the first instalment was £BO,OOO, and two instalments of £40,000 each from tlie Government Life Insurance Department. Of this loan an amount of £II,OOO has yet to be lifted, and this will enalble the Board to carry on for • the next three months. Thereafter more money will be necessary and a new loan of about £15,000 will be raised, the exact amount not yet having been fixed. It is anticipated that this will complete the reticulation in the Board's district.

The next demonstration of the United Fire Brigades' Association will be. lie Id at Dunedin during the exhibition.

The growth of Rugby football in Wanganui has necessitated a search j or more grounds to accommodate the ever-increasing number of teams.

There is reported to be a very brisk demand for small dairy farms in the Waikato and a number have recently changed hands.

A Foxton fisherman is reported to have succeeded in netting 21bs. of whitebait. Other catches are reported to have been made also since the flood- waters have subsided.

Evening weddings are becoming more popular. Of the marriages celebrated in the- big Auckland churches, no less than 90 per cent, take place in tiie evening.

The largest sheep station hi the world is at Tierra del Fuego, the most southern part oi .Squith America. One * company shears more than 2,500,000 sheep every,, year.

A company is being formed to plant 300 acres, of swamp land in the Thames district with flax. It is reported that a similar .undertaking is being started shortly in the Hauraki Plains.

A legacy of £lot>, has been left to the New Zealand Nurses' Memorial Fund under the will of the late Miss 11. K. Payne, for many years matron at Wellington, and how forms part of the invested fund..

At the auction sale of the benzine saved from the Cyrenia at Wanganui prices ranged from 3s 9d to 4s 6d per tin. About 5000 cases were sold. Empty cases for kindling met with good demand.

Whitebait have already made their appearance in Taranaki streams. Usually they do hot appear until about September, and the fact that tliey are up so, early is considered by the Maoris to be a sign of a long summer.

A visitor to Oamarui recently stated that he had been employed in the Central Line in London for 38 years, and had come to New Zealand for a holiday. The climate Avas so congenial and the people so sociable that he decided to settle in. Waimate. He said he had never met such a fine- lot of people, and he had toured the Avorld.

Now celebrating its 100th birthday, the Wesleyan Chapel, St. Germans, Cornwall, owes its origin to a false pair of butcher's scales. By means of the scales a servant to- thej Earl of St. Germans-unjustly accused the butcher of fraud. The.■ Earl, in reparation, offered the man anything he liked to select He chose. ju site lor a chapel.

The public libraries o* England circulate nearly 60,000,000 books a year.

A man named Innocent was found guilty, on a charge at Tottenham, London.

An insurance cover of £86,000 lias been taken over the Dunedin Exhibition buildings.

The Rongotea Dairy Co. has made a.ll advance for June of Is 6d per lu lor butterfat.

The Wellington subscriptions to the Massey Memorial Fund now amount to about £6OO.

The Dunedin City Council has decided to guarantee £IOOO for the entertainment of the American fleet.

During the last half year 81 new houses costing £76,189 have been erected in the city of Wanganui.

Passengers by air who left Croydon (England) in one week of 192.4'numbered 1000; for the same week in 1919 the number of passengers was 20.

The 12th German destroyer has been .salvaged by iScapa Flow salvagers, it is expected to raise ail the destroyers by the end of this year.

"JL'here are signed up in Mai"ton 421 inuividual consumers of electricity, uio current being received from the wanganui steam plant.

Gisborne Borough Council has decided to give a bitumen coat to all borough streets which it re-metals henceforth.

An early spring may be anticiputeu in'the Wanganui district if the prolific flowering of some plum trees m the city at the present time is to be taken as any criterion.

When, felling bush near Kinohaku recently a party of bushmen, in the course ol their work, stripped away a screen of tangled scrub, disclosing a limestone cave of some size. Examination or the interior revealed the presence of a number of old-time Maori skeletons, presumably placed there many years before the advent of the white man.—Kawhia Settler.

Millers say that Hour is at present not selling so freely as usual. Inquiring for the cause ol such happening, states a message, one hears the theory that 'families not too flush of money are using less bread and economising .on. potatoes that are now so cheap. And there nuay be something in the suggestion, lor a ton of potatoes at £2- 10s will make a lot of food for hungry children.

"There is no sign of a slump on the horizon so far as 1 can see. 1 A slump is not due for some years yet.' : This a well-known leading business man in Wellington with reference to a statement by the president of the arbitration Court (Mr Justice Frazer) at Christchurch, that "we should go carefully at present, as we are getting the next slump. A further drop in wool might bring this about."

"Black cats for luck" it is said, but' none of the crew of the steamer Wainui at Auckland last Thursday were-particular when the ship's cat could not be enticed aboard. The cat apparently had its reasons, lor shortly after the Wainui collided with and sank the fishing launch Iris Eileen. When the Wainui returned to the wharf the cat walked aboard calmly.

A Scot was asked in Auckland on Sunday, which was a -very cold day, how New Zealand climate compared with Scotland. There is no comparison at all," he replied. "My coal bill here, as far as I can judge, will be for half a ton of coal for the whole season; in Scotland it was no less than for three tons each winter, and when it was a very cold season it rose to five tons."

There is a very polite man in Hastings. He was riding his bicycle near the corner of Karamu Road and Queen Street the other afternoon when he was knocked off his machine by a passing motorist. He did not seem to mind.a bit, and upon receiving the motorist's assurance that he had blown his horn, made the most profuse apologies for not having heard it and for having got in the way. It sounded almost unreal.

The Horowheuua Electric Power Board had the honour this morning of holding the first Board meeting in the new Council Chamber at the Municipal Buildings. The Chamber is not yet complete, the members' chairs not being ready; but the chairman's dais and horseshoe table were in position, and the floor-cover-ing down, and chairs for the occasion were commandeered from the other .offices. Members found that "addressing the chair" was a matter : requiring (Slightly mare effort than in the old chamber, there being a resonance that made close attention necessary if the proceedings were to be followed. No doubt this will be minimised when the Board room is fully furnished and the sound of adjacent hammers is abated.

A nasty accident occurred on Monday on the Buckley road near Shannon. On a hill on the road, a car driven by Mr Eraser, manager for Johnson and Co., met the Horowhenui Power Board's pole lorry, and in endeavouring to puss at a corner, the car was crushed between the trailer and the bank. Mr Fraser and his wife, who was sitting alongside him, were thrown on to the windscreen by the force of the collision and Mrs Fraser had her nose broken and was severely shaken. She was attended to by Dr. Mackereth and then went on to Palmerston. The car was damaged somewhat, the mudguards and a spring being broken. The accident is said to have been unavoidable, as the lorry went out as far as possible to the edge, below which there was a steep drop. The driver of the car did not notice the trailer to the lorry before commencing to climb the hill.

Intending visitors to Loudon may be interested to know JJiat they would have to spend considerably over £SO before they could see all the sights the entrance fee to which is Is.

it is understood that the Meal Commission has concluded its investigations and has drafted its report, which is likely 1 tu be presented to the Governor-General almost liny time now.

"We should try and make the cemetery look like a home for the poor fellows who are in it,'' said a member of the Grey town Borough Council, when speaking on cemetery matters.

luglewood County completed about three miles of bitumen road during the past season. Owing to the local stone being inferior, a total of 3-60 cubic yards of stone had to be obtained from Rangitikei and Levin.

Well-informed political circles in Wellington give credence to a persistent rumour that the General Election will take (place in October next and not in November. At the moment the rumour is. not withoirt some significance.

An unusual scene was presented at the Auckland Magistrate's Court recently in that a wife and husband —the farmer was seeking separation, also maintenance—were almost deaf mutes. An interpreter was called in and acted by means of lip reading.

Continuous rains have caused tin Koputaroa stream to overflow., win the result that the low-lying places are under water. Parts of the Tavistock Road are also covered, but hardly high enough to check the through t raffle.

"Oh, yes, it is quite right that the ladies should be invited to participate at these functions," said a speaker at a recent Jersey Club complimentary dinner at Te Awainutu. He added, naively: "Whatever we may think or say to them sometimes, we are always glad to have their help in the cowshed." (Laughter).

For many years the woolly aphis was a thorn in the side of fruit growers and restricted their industry to a great extent. The usually accepted method of competing with the pest was by spraying, but of later years profitable use is being made of the natural enemy of the blight, a parasite called aphelinus mali, introduced by Dr. Tilyard, of the Cawthron Institute, about three yea-rs ago. Mr Whelan, the Government Orchard Inspector, when in Levin on Tuesday, explained that each female of the parasite lays about 50 eggs, one in each aphis. The eggs are hatched in from 10 to 12 days, and start hatching about the end of October or November, depending upon the locality and the season. The parasite alien kills the aphis by the simple process of feeding on its body. Already the introduction of the aphelinus has had excellent results in many parts of New Zealand, some orchards having been freed from the blight. The Agricultural Department is anxious to help fruit growers in combating the disease so prunings containing the eggs of the parasite may be obtained free of charge from the Department.