LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taihape Daily Times, 20 December 1917, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A Berwickshire farmer named John Trance, for failing to dip 600 sheep and furnishing a false declaration stating they had been dipped, was fined 10s for each animal. TEe total penalty amounted to £3OO.

The Austrian military authorities have issued an urgent appeal to the public to contribute old clothing and linen for the troops in the field. The appeal has been issued "only under the pressure of inexorable necessity."

A few years ago the "fleece-oh" in a shearing shed was glad to receive £1 5s per week and found. This year

in the Wairarapa this class of work has commanded Is 6d per hour, which works out at £4 10s per week, with several meals a day given in.

In a speech at the Wellington Technical College, Mr Hanan, Minister for Education, remarked that it would come as a surprise to many people to know that about one-half of the pupils who left the primary schools last year did not continue their education, and of this number approximately 75 per cent, reached the age of 14 without having passed Standard VI. This was a most regrettable state of affairs.

The Athens correspondent of the "Times" telegraphs that it is unirnpeachably reported that the internal situation in Germany is most critical. The civilian mortality is appalling, and the people's . resentment most savage and acute. It is most threatening concerning the premature calling up of the lads of 1918 and 1919 classes, whom, it is believed, are con signed to certain butchery. Theiv partings with their parents are piteous.

The depth of meanness was reached by the Education Department when it directed Education Boards not to pay the war bonus to teachers who had left the service unless they made direct application for it, of course providing no means of telling such teachers that the bonus was available on application W-hat a contrast is the action of the Postal Department in a similar connection. In a telegram to Mr Sidey, M.P., the Post-master-General stated that arrangements had been made to pay the proportion of the war bonus to those exofficers of the Department who had ceased duty since April Ist last.