DOMINION NEWS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 84, 6 April 1912, Page 8

DOMINION NEWS.

CF&r Press Association.} j Auckland, April 1. Basil Arnold, aged 14, left his home on Monday morning for school and has not since been heard of. There is no explanation of his disappearance. Adam Ales, caretaker of the Rocky Nook Bowling Club, dropped dead while working on the green. Ho wan aged 70. He was one of the heroes of the Arctic expedition under Naves and Stephenson in the early seventies. While a boat's crew were incapacitated by scurvy lAles travelled a hundred miles across the ice to >. obtain relief. He was a chief petty officer in the British Navy and was in receipt of a pension. Wellington, April 4. i A fire broke out this morning in tho premises in Victoria Street owned by Mr Evans, of Timaru, and occupied by the Welsbach Light Co. as a manufactory and by the Union S.S. Co. as a store depot. The fire was discovered on the first floor and the firemen climbed through thick clouds of blinding smoke. Much damage was done, including the destruction of approximately a quarter of a million mantle boxes. The building was insured for £SOOO in the Queensland office and the Welsbach Co.'s stock for £7OOO, cf which the State office held £SOOO a;:d the Royal Exchange office £2OOO. The Union S.S. Co.'s stores were insured for £4OOO in various offices. Interviewed by a X > ost reporter the Prime Minister (Hon. T. Maclcehi.i-5) said that Cabinet asked Sir Joseph' Ward to allow himself to be nominated on the Empire Trade Commission! and he was pleased to say Sir Joseph consented, with the result that New Zealand would have for that- spoei.il work its most qualified and experienced man on the most important commission that had ever been held id the interests of the Empire. The position carried no salary for any of the representatives, expenses only being paid. Mr Mackenzie said he felt confident that the trade of the Empire must be enormously benefited by its work and New Zealand would, he wr.s sure, be proud to have so distinguished and capable a representative on it. "When I decided to accept the position," said Sir Joseph Ward to a Post reporter, "I felt that there was very important work which could be done by the commission in the general interests of the Empire. It will not interfere with my position as a member of the House of Representatives. It is .not my intention as a result of the appointment to retiiv.- from public life in New Zealand. I understand thai' it is very probable that the commission will sit in New Zealand and Australia first.", ~ ..,.'/", .' "■"; In reply to'a question Sir'Joseph said he thought tho Work Would take about two years.' "Dunedin, Aprils. Francis Peter Ranee, a prisoner in the Dunedin Gaol, while exercising this morning threw himself over a balcony about twenty feet from tho ground and fractured his skull. He was removed to tho hospital, whore he died. He arrived from liondon in 1910, and was serving a sentence of three months for " false pretences, which he had almost completed.