LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taihape Daily Times, 20 March 1919, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A wireless message from the Ajana, en route with troops from (he United Kingdom via Panama, states that the vessel will arrive at Auckland next Monday.

A discharged Australian, grinding an organ in the slums of London, appealed to Sir Charles Wade for help. This is one of several striking instances of the danger of permitting discharges of Australians in Britain, where unemployment is increasing

Dr. J. Allan Thomson, Director of the Dominion Museum, is to leave immediately for Marlborough, at the request of the Geological Survey Department. He will conduct investigations in thie Kekerangi district with special regard to the oil prospects 1 .

The Hon. W. D. S. MacDonald, Minister for Agriculture, is making inquiries in regard to the suggestion that, Australian shippers havio been unduly favoured by the Australian Freight Committee, which allocates shipping space as between Australia and New Zealand. The Minister is endeavouring to obtain exact figures as to ttoo quantities of frozen moat shipped and in store in Australia;. '

A lady's umbrella, found at a Chaulauqua meeting, is at this office j ■awaiting the owner. j

Dr Strain, of the Dunedin Hospital has been appointed medical superintendent of the Taihape Hospital.

The total number of awards and decorations won by New Zealand troops, nurses, and war workers was, to January 15th last, 4752, including eleven V.C.'s and IGS foreign decorations.

Sir James Allen, Minister for Defence, who has just received particu lars of the Canadian scheme for soldiers' gratuities, states that it will bo a day or two yet before he is able to make any announcement in regard to the New 13aland system of distribution.

The old light cruiser Pyramus, which was on the New Zealand station prior to the outbreak of war, is now on duty at Constantinople, with the captain of the base on board. She had a very varied experience during the "war, having seen service in Samoa, East Africa, the Persian Gulffand the Suez Canal.

Mr Bert Garratt, son of Mr T. A. Garratt, an erstwhile Taihape chemist, returned to Taihape last night. Mr Garratt enlisted early in the war, going away with the Main Body. He ficught through the IGal'Kpoli (cam*: paign, and returned to New Zealand at the fall of 1916. He afterwards went :to England (for medical treat merit. Mr Garratt is the guest of Mr E. W. Smith. M.P., during his stay in Taihape.

Practically a deadlock has been reached between the Wanganui Borrough Council and the Wanganui Fire Board in connection with the latter refusing to pay £SOOO for the present fire station site, and it is probable that the matter will be tested in the Supreme Court by way of an originating summons; One of the councillors summed up the position thus: —■ The Fire Board has the horns of the cow and the Borough Council the tail, and it'dooks as if the legal profession is going to get the milk.

"I have made further urgent representations to the Imperial iGovernment through the New Zealand Ministers in London regarding the shortage of shipping for the carriage of frozen meat/ stated the ,on. W. D. S. MacDonald on Tuesday. He had pointed out the urgency of the position if relief were to be afforded to the industry, and he understood that similar representations had been made through the Acting-Prime Minister by the Hon. D. H. Guthrie, Minister in charge of the Imperial Supples Department.

The following comment is from the Duseldorf Volkszcitung, a leading German paper: The Hohenzollern dynasty is dissolved ingloriously. Burdened with the curses of a disgracefully deceived people, its all-powerful-ness is gone the way of all flesh. It was "towards glorious times" that Wilhelm 11. declared he would lead the German people, yet his reign ends in nameless misery and distress. What did he not want to smash this sham Caesar? He thought he could challenge and subjugate the whole world. Now he himself lies crushed and helpless. What is he now? A man who is politically dead, a curseladen wretch, abandoned even by his own, his very own "God,' and whom no machine guns, cannon, and bayonets would any longer protect against the wrath of those he has tortured and robbed were he now to come among them.