LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taihape Daily Times, 10 January 1919, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

It is asserted by the New Zealand Locomotive Engineers' Journal that about 1,000 engineers, firemen, and cleaners have resigned from the New Zealand railway service since 1914.

A meeting of the Boy Scouts will be held at Scoutmaster Swindells' residence at 7 o'cflock this evening A full attendance is requested as business of importance is to be brought up.

Crops of potatoes in the Matamata district are reported to have been seriously affected by recent frosts. It is said to be doubtful whether the plants will recover sufficiently to avoid a total loss of the tubers.

Messrs, Ward and Co. will sell at their Tui Street Mart, to-morrow a splendid collection of apricots, plums, new, potatoes, and plums, as well as 20 laying fowls, 'and a large assortment of useful articles.

Shute's Labour Exchange is advertising to-day for "book's assistant, shepherd, fencer, teamster, married couples. engine drivers, hauler drivers, and a number of other hands, particulars of which will be gleaned from the advertisement in another column.

The Minister for iDfcfenfce ptated in Christchurch that the men of the Main Body of the- New r Zealand Expeditionary Force will evacuate France, in order to embark for New Zealand, at the earliest possible date —possibly in iho niiddfye of [this month. Sir James Allen added that the demobilisation scheme is in thorough working order. ,

Prices for fat stock at the Westfield markets on Wednesday were slightly lower than the rates ruling prior to the holidays. Choice ox beef realised up to £2 12s per 1001 b. ordinary and prime quality beef fetching from £2 8s to £2 lis per 1001 b. Runners and heavy vealcrs realised from £3 to £7. Wethers fetched from £1 9s to £1 15s 3d, ewes £1 to £1 9s 9d, and lambs from ISs to £1 7s.

"We are a great people." At last a leading Minister of the Crown (says the London Express) in his place at the table of the Houes of Commons, has said bluntly that the B'ritish Empire has done more than any other country to win the war. Mr Bonar Law, in moving for a vote of credit, of 700 millions, appended to his financial statement a few remarks on the war, and he blurted out spontaneously the simple remark quoted above. It took the House like a sudden gust. A very strong fcelijng exists at Ohakune against the action of the postal authorities in having cut out the town of Ohakune when issuing tenders for the delivery of mails (as heretofore) between the railway station and the town. The result is that mails arriving by express overnight are not delivered in the town and district until after 9 o'clock next morning. The delay causes serious inconvenience to the business people and general public, and there is much .hostile comment on the subject Numbers of private delivery boxholders have cancelled their contract with the post office as a protest. The Nachrichtcn, of Dusseldorf, formerly the organ of the ex-Crown Prince of Germany, says: An extraordinary scene was* witnessed at the railway station at Wurzburg when twelve truck loads of goods of miscellaneous description were seized by the local authorities. These wagons, which arrived under escort and were provided with passes issued by the military authorities, were destined for a number of high military personages who have recently returned to Germany from Belgium. They conveyed complete suites of furniture, including pianos, mirrors and kitchen utensils. Some of them even contained live poultry.

Three drafts, comprising 2080 invalided soldiers, are returning to New Zealand during the course of the next few days. The Defence Department is advised that there arc only nine cot cases and 54 cases of general sickness which will require hospital treatment in New Zealand. This is an unusually small percentage and is regarded as distinctly satisfactory.

Henry Hellesen, the brilliant Danish journalist, who has an exception-

ally close knowledge of Germany's former mighty ones, says that Ludendorff owed his former power not so much to his brain as to his being the "representative')' of Germany's iron industry. The old Germany was ruled by four great industrial families — the Stinnes, the Thyssens, the Halbachs, and the Krupps. These people spurred Germany on to war in 1914 and kept her at it long after she was beaten their placards covering Berlin np to a few weeks ago and inciting the people to fight to the last ditch. But their patriotism was a moncy pariotism, the 'Stinaes, it is said, earning 400 million marks by the war. All these people had sons-in-law or other connections on Ludendorff's staff.

"I now see the approach of what Lord Kitchener declared was his object at the beginning of the war," states the High Commissioner, Sir Thomas Mackenzie, in the course of a letter written in October to Major D. H. Lusk, of Auckland. "I happened to remark to him that we were all looking to him to bring us to a successful issue. Raising himself to his full height, he doubled his fist and said: 'Whether the war will last for six months or more than three years I desire not to leave these Germans until I have beaten them down to their bending knees.' I think that prospect is now in sight." added Sir Thomas, "but whatever be the result the Germans can never restore to us those they have slain, nor restore the maimed, the halt, and the blind to the condition of splendid manhood of which they have deprived them."