DOMINION NEWS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 47, 1 July 1913, Page 5

DOMINION NEWS.

BOROUGHS CO-OPERATE FOR WATER SUPPLY. [Pur Press Association.] Hamilton, July 1. The Hamilton and Frankton Boroughs have decided to co-operate in a gravitation water scheme from Pirongia mountain, 20 miles away. The undertaking will cost £IOO,OOO. The hope was expressed at the meeting of delegates of both bodies that thu would be the first step towards the amalgamation- of the two boroughs, whose town halls are situated barely a mile apart.

' BAND CONTEST. THE SOUTHLAND TROUBLE. Invercargill, June 30. A meeting of the Band Contest Committee'was held to-night. It was decided' to notify the executive of the South Island Bands' Association that the committee would withdraw from 'further negotiations with the Association. The meeting also decided to circularise competing bands, asking them if they would give assurance of their support if the contest were gone on with under Mr Percy Jones (Geelong) as adjudicator.

NEW OIL DISTRICT. Wellington, June 30. Messrs Mander, Dickson, and MacDonald, M.P.'s, waited on the Minister of Public Works to-day, on behalf of an Auckland applicant for an area of 1000 acres near Waiotapu, which it is proposed to prospect for petroleum. There are two other applicants, and the Minister decided that he would grant the application provided certain conditions were complied .with, but until the Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Act of last session was amended, prospectors were restricted from operating in a thermal district. Mr Eraser said to-day that, before granting any concession, he would like to see all the applicants. It is said that the applicant whose claim to-day's deputation put forward, represents a syndicate which is picpared to spend a considerable sum of money on this undertaking.

A SERIOUS CASK. Writes the Waverley correspondent of the Patea Press:—At 8.45 a.m. on Friday last, two little girls, aged thirteen and eight years respectively, were riding along the road to the Nukumaru school, when they were accosted by a strange man, who, it is alleged, made improper proposals to them. The appearance in the distance of a settler living near by caused the delinquent to jump into a ditch at the roadside, and the children rode on to school, where the head teacher was informed. The man, who was subsequently taken into custody to Wanganui, gave his name as James Bailey, and it was ascertained that he is a man of some note in the New Zealand criminal records.