LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 36, 7 February 1912, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Carbolic acid has, by Order-in-Coun-oil, been declared to be a poison under the Poisons Act. The order will come into force at the expiration of three months. A witness in a Court case at Hawera made the unusual statement that he had not a single loss in calves for five years, and he attributed this to careful feeding with new milk. The rainfall at New Plymouth last month was 2.09 in., as against 2.64 in., in Janaury, 1911. llain fell ono 11 days. The maximum shade tenfperature was . 72.96 degrees, as against 75.35, and the mean temperature 63 degrees, against 64.8. For driving a gig at night without lights, in Auckland streets, and giving a wrong name and address, with the result that another man was summoned, defendant was fined £2 and costs. His Worship said he had no sympathy with men who gave wrong names in this way. American housekeepers as a rule eagerly engage a newly-arrived German couple, for, while the man has a thorough knowledge of the duties of housemaid, as well as valet and house porter, the wife is usually an excellent cook. She is also .capable of doing the family marketing and buying to good advantage. A very strange incident occurred at Vauyert, France, during a recent storm. A man, eighty years of age, was caught up by a whirlwind and hurled over a hayrick. He came down in safety on the other side, but as his friends were congratulating him on his escape the old man was killed by lightning, which spared the other men who were standing round him.

A copy of the first newspaper printed in Afghanistan has reached Peshawar. It is called the “Snraj A 1 Akbar,” and bears the date tire loth Shawal, 1329, which is equivalent to October 9, 1911. It consists of six sheets, fifteen by ten inches, roughly lithographed, and its contents are a combination of a gazette and a Court circular. The first issue was distributed free.

What is said to be the longest train to leave Palmerston, pulled out from the station■ yards on Friday afternoon, says the; “Standard.”, It was fully a quarter of a mile in length, and contained ninety-three waggons, drawn bV’ two engines'. ' When the whole train had been put together the front engine stood in the middle of the Square while 1 the'luggage Van was’as fah'bafck hs the ; Cook'Street crossing. ’

Fishermen, it is said, have long been acquainted with a method of mesmerising lobsters by rubbing them gently along the shell of the back with the tips of the fingers of one hand, while they are held downwards with the beak resting on some solid substance by the other. The lobster becomes,torpid, and will remain in a; state, of trance or Uy.piriti.sih fpj, a variable length of time. Lobsters. recover immediately if plunged into sea water, but, adds “The Field,” crabs take about ten .minutes to recover . Scientists have known,of. mushroomgrowing ants for a long time' ai d t was generally believed that the ant was the only insect possessing sufficient intelligence to make a successful mushroom farmer. Professor J. Bouverie, the French entomologist, has found that a certain wood-boring beetle known as the Bostrychide is as familiar with mushroom cultivation for home consumption as the ant. Professor Bouverie discovered that the beetles bore holes in the wood and half fill them with a prepared fungus which makes an ideal mushroom bed.

The garden is carefully spawned and tended, and in course of time the mushrooms appear. In this way the beetle provides itself with a food sufficiently tender for its feeble jaws. Thirty spinsters in New York have formed themselves into a SelfGovernment Girls’ Club. Every member has made a solemn promise neither to marry nor to become engaged for one year. The club badge is a pin in the form of a latch-key, signifying that the members do not require male escorts in getting to and from their homes at night. The following fines have been fixed for failure to keep the club rules :—Engagement 10s, marriage £l, elopement £2. But the men, the club rules declare, must pay the fines. Meantime, how would it do tc tax members who keep the rules foi the privilege of doing so? An interesting calculation has just been published, which shows that m bee performs feats of aviation, compared with which the records of om most valiant champions are absolutely ■insignificant. Basing his calculation on certain well-known data, such arthe cubical capacity of a section of a hive, the mean length of the journey of a boo, and Die normal load wind it carries on each trip, Mr. Cailler jrrives at the conclusion that a quar ter of a litre (somewhat less than hall a pint) represents over 12,000 trips oi the part of a bee. At the time of full activity, as for instance, in June, tin workers of a hive travel daily over an aggregate path equal to t wice Die distance from the earth to the moon.

Twenty-eight years ago a Now Italy settlement was established on the north coast of New South Wales. Some four or live hundred natives of Italy settled in the district, and the success of that' settlement has been brought to the notice of Mr. Trefle, the Minister for Agriculture, with the suggestion that efforts should lie mad' to people the Murrumbidgee irrigation settlement, nr at least part of it, with Italians. How far the Government, in view of its fear to deal with the subject of immigration, will be inclined to accept such a proposal will be for the Government itself to say but the fact remains that this “New Italy” has been described as one of the most successful attempts ever made to introduce foreign settlers into an English-speaking community, and that further enquiries are being made with a view to supplying the Government with information as to the possibilty of carrying out a suggestion that Italy might with success lie exploited by the agents of New South Wales in order to provide some of the labour needed bv the State.

Rain yesterday morning gave a cheek to harvest operations in South Cantorburv.

A man who had given his name as Flood when inquiring for a room at an agency died suddenly in Auckland yesterday. Deceased was apparently about 50 to 55 years of ago. The residents of Cardiff and district have arranged a concert and dance to 1)0 held in the Cardiff School on Friday evening next, the 9th inst., to farewell Mr. D. Ogilvy.

In order to save the tide the Wairuna worked through the dinner hour at Westport a few days ago. Under the new agreement the waterside men employed were each paid 4s 4d for the hour’s work.

The Timaru automobile and motorcycle associations have combined to

appoint a traffic inspector to endeavour to make all users of roads comply with the borough and county traffic bv-laws.

4 wo hours previously a fire destroyed a washhouse at the rear of premises in Wellington street. The damage is estimated at £25. The house was saved by the prompt action of Constable Johnston in getting a hand reel to work.

A man named Thomas Heelingan, who had been living for the past two or three days in a fireman’s batch, near Gladstone pier at Lyttelton, was found dead in his bed. Heelingan, up till Saturday last, had been employed as a trimmer on the ferry steamer Maori.

On January 3rd, during the voyage of the Rotorua, which arrived in Wellington from London yesterday afternoon, Robert Paul, aged 81, belonging to Invercargill, who was a second s iloon passenger from London, died of heart failure, and was buried at sea.

A meeting of the committee of the Swimming Club will be held on Friday _ evening, when the matter of holding a big open carnival will be gone into. To date swimmers generally have been somewhat lax in the matter of training, and to-day would not be ton soon for those looking for natatorial glory to make preparations to meet the first-class company which is expected at the carnival. A fatal accident occurred at Mr Embling’s farm, on the Tawhiti road, on Monday morning. His little boy", aged about 4 years, was riding on top of a dray-load of posts. When going up hill, by some means the dray, tipped up, and the little fellow was pitched off. The timber fell on top of; him, severely crushing his head. Medical aid was i summoned, but the little sufferer passed away on Monday night.— Star.

While the Acclimatisation Society’s men at Tariki were liberating rainbow fry the other day they noticed a small eel in the stream, and decided to catch it. About an hour afterwards they accomplished this feat, only to find that the voracious creature had swallowed eight of the youngsters. We commend the folloAving conundrum to cur readers: “If one eel eighteen inches long can eat in one hour eight rainbow fry, how many of the thousands of infants liberated by the Acclimatisation Society will survive the year and see the fisherman’s basket?”

An interesting journalistic event on Friday was the attainment by Mr. Samuel Saunders of his twenty-first year of editorship of the Lyttelton ! Times, Christchurch. Mr. Saunders is ! i a. son of' the late Mr. Alfred Saunders i for mianyi • yearsu&i member -off the m) House of .Representatives,; and ids 'a i . grandson of the first superintendent of Xelsou province'. He succeeded' to ■ his present editorial position, when it was vacated by Mr. W. P. Reeves upon joining the Ministry preparatory to bringing in the first industrial conciliation and arbitration legislation. While Sir Joseph Ward was in Dannevirke on Tuesday last, Mr. H. Monteitli ■ took, occasion to tender 1 to the' " ; Premier ' a qualified apology, for the manner in which he ' interrupted' the' meeting addressed by Sir Joseph here a few weeks ago. Mr. Monteitli asked Sir Joseph to accept his assurance that he did not go to the meeting with any preconceived idea of causing , a disturbance, and what he said he said under the influence of excitement and on the impulse of the moment. Sir Joseph met Mr. Monteitli in the most friendly spirit, accepted his assurance and shook hands with him before he left. —Napier Telegraph. Mr. James Hislop, who has succeeded the late Mr. Pollen as Secretary to the Department of Internal Affairs, was horn in North Taieri (Otago) in 1879, and was educated at the State school there at later on at the Normal school in Dunedin. In 1885 he joined the Post and Telegraph Department, as a cadet, and after five years in that Department was transferred to the Railway Department, in which branch of the public service he remained for nine years, latterly as a clerk in the head office in Dunedin. In 1899 he was appointed secretary to Sir Joseph Ward when Minister of Railways and has remained with him over since. Mr. Hislop has accompanied Sir Joseph Ward to England on three occasions, and has earned popularity for his uniform tact and courtesy on all occasions. The publicity given to the fact that the Carnegie Library Committee has acquired one of Dick Barrett’s trypot for the museum, speedily led to the ■ discovery that the other pot, required to complete the pair was at Bell Block, in the possession of Mr. J. Sampson says the New Plymouth “Herald.” Mr. Sampson was interviewed by Mr. P. White on behalf of the committee and kindly agreed to present the interesting relic of the old days to the museum on terms similiar to those arranged with Mr. Honeyfield of Moturoa. The Bell Block trypot was purchased some years ago from Mr. S. Bundle by its present owner. It was last in use for its original purpose some ten or a dofcen years ago. When a whale was washed ashore at Omato. It is now used for watering stock, and is in the paddock just across the road from Mr. Sampson’s house, close under the hedge at the roadside. i

Lions are dangerous pets as was recently proved by the deatli of Mr. Terence Barclay at Colney Hall, hear Norwich last month. A lion and a lioness now about 18 months old, were brought to Colney last February from Mombasa. They were usually confined in a den, but were allowed to run about an enclosure at times and were treated as harmless pets, members of the family, and even visitors going freely into the enclosure. On December 17, about dusk, Mr. Terence Barclay let the lions out of the den. They bounded about the field, and suddenly the male lion struck him down and clawed his neck. He was rendered unconscious, and while the lion was standing over him a gamekeeper fired i gun which caused the lion to return to his den. Mr. Barclay was taken to the house where he soon regained cons'. iousness, and the doctors found that the chief injury was near the windpipe. At first it was announced that tho patient was expected to make a good recovery but the injuries were more severe than was supposed, and one lung was punctured.

Constable Mackintosh left by tho mail train this motiving tor Christchurch on 'a short holiday.

There has been a large influx of children at the Stratford District High School this year, and the roll number stands at over 700.

Tho Court list for Friday’s sitting of the Magistrate’s Court includes ten civil cases (one defended), and three judgment summonses. Of the 530 immigrants by the Rotorua from England, there are 71 assisted, 23 nominated, and 28 approved by the High Commissioner. The seventy-eight mostly consist of domestic servants, farm hands, and wives rejoining their husbands. The presidency of the Industrial Exhibition to be held in Auckland next year has been accepted by Mr. Bart Kent. A provisional exhibition committee carried a motion appreciating the action of Christchurch in standing aside and allowing Auckland’s exhibition precedence over the one proposed in Christchurch. A resident of Parliament street Wellington, last night heard cries outside his house. On investigating he found,a male child about four months old. The child w.as well nourished knd clean, and provided with ample clothing, but there was nothing to indicate to whom it belonged or how or why it was placed on the door step. Messrs Lamason and Melvile, auctioneers and commission agents have dissolved partnership, and the business being now carried on by Mr 1. Lamason, whose wide experience and the high esteem in which he is hold in the district should warrant the continued success of the business. An attractive class in tho Stratford Horticultural Society’s schedule has been added to the vegetable section, the item referred to being a cottage collection of vegetables for amateuis. The number of is limited to nine, putting the prize within the reach of the grower whose back garden is of very modest proportions. A fire yesterday destroyed a flyerooraed dwelling in Stout street, Gisborne, owned by Mrs Jennings, and occupied by H. Stevenson, this evening. Stevenson was hanging pictures and knocked over a lamp owing to the step-ladder falling. This caused the blaze. Nothing was saved. Jho furniture was insured for £175. Ihc insurance on the-house is unasceitainable. •<:

James G. Templeton, aged 23, a passenger from London by the Rotorua, cut his throat aboard that steamer at Wellington last night and died later in the' hospital. Deceased and his parents were booked to the Bluff. They visited England for the Coronation. While there young Templeton underwent an operation for appendicitis, and had been in indifferent health since.

That very popular fixture, the Normanby Horticultural, Poultry, and General Produce Society’s 29th Show will take place on Tuesday and Wednesday, March sth and 6th.' In addition to the exhibition a wonderfully diversified programme has been arranged, including tug-of-war competition, and other amusements. Particulars appear in a notification published in another column. The prize list, it might be mentioned, totals £l3O. The meeting of creditors of Frederick William Johnson, which was not concluded when we went to press yesterday, was adjourned sine;die. An examination bf-.the bankrupt showed that there; were two errors in the statement, the National Bank of New Zealand;being third mortgagees, land J. G. Robertson spcond .(mortgagee, the reverse being stated in the documents. The equity was slightly increased by Messrs. Bullock and Currie’s securities, which,were.given scler. ly as a fourth mortgage, including a bill of sale on the stock, but did not warrant the creditors talcing steps to realise the property. The Deputy-As-signee (Mr A, Coleman) remarked that on bankj-upt’s, statement his positjmi was accounted for ,by being swindled by a property.,,worth- £7OOO. ../ A Feilding ■ Press Association message states? that A. H. Atkinson’s auction -mart was destroyed by fire last night. The building was a wooden one, and was largely stocked with furniture, sundries, farm implements, grass seed, etc., mostly inflammable material. The brigade did good work with a fine pressure of water, and the fire was confined to the one building. Mclntyre and Murphy, solicitors, and Hugh Roberts, woolbroker, had offices in the same building. The latter saved all his papers, but the solicitors had their law library partly destroyed. The building was owned by Mr. Atkinson, and was insured in the Phoenix Office for £llOO. The stock was also insured in the same office for about £4OO. The origin is unknown. During the fire a young man named Smith put his foot through the windoy of McGruer Thomson’s drapery store, next door to the burning building, but in no possible danger. Smith was brought before court this morning, and pleaded guilty to the charge, being fined Is and ordered to pay £lO 10s, the cost of. replacing the window.