LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 339, 15 March 1910, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The Mangorei Co-operative Dairy Company is installing an electrical motor, to be driven from "the borough electrical system. In our report of the Chamber of Commerce discussion on the steamer services Mr. C. H.- Burgess was credited with Mr. S. W. Shaw's remarks. Owing to slackness in the demand for timber two sawmills in the western district, employing 50 hands, have closed down (says the Southland News). Palmerston North intends to offer the necessary guarantee for holding the next championship contest there in connection with the North Island Brass Bands' Association. ' It is estimated that there will be a shortage of about 5000 bales of wool from Gisborne this year. The shrinkage is attributed to the extensive operations in freezing last year. "I have yet to meet the man," said the Rev. F. Rule at the annual meeting of the Presbyterian Social Service Association, Christchurch, "who has not, when a boy, stolen fruit."

Land appears to be rising in price ™ the Waikato. A large number of sales are said to have taken place lately at prices up to £3O an acre. Some people will he biting their fingers!

|i To encourage a medical man to take up his residence in the new country of which Ohakune is the centre, the Wellington Land Board has given Dr. Satchj more, of Ohakune, the right to take up two Crown residential sections in the [ township for £llO.

Farmers in the Wanganui district have recently become very interested in land in the Whakatane district. The local Herald has been informed that several blocks of Government land in the Whakatane district have recently been acquired by well-known Wanganui farmers, and that others are inspecting with a view to purchasing. It is staged that the drained swamp land there is second to none in the colony, and that land showing sixteen feet of black loam can be purchased for from €lO to £ls per acre.

The monthly report of the manager of the New Plymouth abattoirs shows that the stock slaughtered for local consumption during March was as follows: Cows, 20; bullocks, 57; calves, 7; sheep, 478; lambs, ISS; pigs, 175, including four suckers; tripes cleaned, 118. Confpared with the corresponding month of last year the figures show an increase of 26 sheep, 59 lambs and 57 pigs, ami a decrease 01 two cattle, 10 calves, and four tripes. Three cattle, three pigs and one sheep were condemned. Fees due for the month were £IOB (ss, and rents £4 5s (3d, making a total of £ll2 Us 6d, an increase of £l4 14s 7d. Mr. H. Black, electrical engineer to the Borough Council reported to last night's meeting that he did not think it would be entirely satisfactory, from a lighting point of view, to supply tramways from existing lines, even with a battery, because the fluctuations in ,load with a small tramway are so excessive. A safer and better way would be to erect a separate line and run a separate generator at the power-house for the trams, at least during evening hours. A motor-generator would be required in town in any case, but the battery would not then be required. Private motors could be run off this line if desired.

Among the economies that Sir Joseph Ward intends to effect in the Post and Telegraph Department is the cessation of the present system of• taking duplicate copies of telegrams, and the abolition of telegraph'envelopes by the substitution of a combined sheet and envelope, similar to that used for the Post Office Savings Bank receipts. Savings in this and other directions are expect ed to reach from £15,000 to £20,000 a year. The proposed rural postal delivery will be accomplished by carriers on horseback or on bicycles.' Sir Joseph Ward stated to a Herald reporter at Te Aroha thalt whien all these changes are carried out and the proposed system of wireless telegraphy is installed we will not be merely abreast, but will be far ahead of any' other country in the world in regard to postal and telegraphic facilities.

Tne total of New Zealand's products for the year ended last month exceeded those of the previous year in value by over £4,500,000. As a natural result of the increased products, there will, of course, be more to export, and according to the New Zealand Trade Review the total value of the shipments for the current quarter ending on 31st March promises to constitute a record far in excess of any previous corresponding period. Woo], dairy produce and meat will show very high totals, and wheat gives expectations of an exportable surplus still equal to that of i ils t year. The imports seem to be remaining at about the reduced level of 1000. and'the excess of exports over imports will, it is confidently predicted, show a very margin for the March quarter. Bank accounts will thus be substantially replenished, and the financial position further _ improved. As the Government is obtaining money for public works outside the Dominion, the accumulations of the community will be available for «k<meral purnoses. and the prospect, therefore, is for increased ease in this market.

A special prize of £3 has been donated by Mr. W. Little, of the Okato Hotel, to the local sports programme The donation will be added to the first prize in the 18-inch handicap chop, making the total first money £9. The biennial conrerence of the delegates of the Municipal Association of New Zealand will be held in July next at Wellington. The local Borough Council will consider the matter of remits for the conference at next meeting. It is reported that the block of buildings in Devon-street belonging to the J. 0. George estate, which was submitted to auction by Mr. Newton King on Saturday and failed to attract the reserve, was disposed of privately yesterday by the auctioneer to the proprietors «of the New Zealand Clothing Company. Messrs. J. B. Joyce and Co.. of Whitchurch, Shropshire", has written to the Borough Council asking if the timekeeping of the clock in the Post Office tower, supplied by the firm, is giving satisfaction. The firm is anxious, too. to obtain views of all buildings abroad in which its clocks have been placed, and asks ior a photograph of the New Plymouth Post Office, which will be sent. At last night's meeting councilors expressed entire satisfaction with the clock's timekeeping qualities, and it was decided to reply to that effect. rrl* _ 1 *__ x. • i-ii ~ . ~

The usual fortnightly meeting of the Loyal Egmont Lodge, L0.0.F., M.U., was held last evening, Bro. A. B. Carr, N.G., presiding. There was a fair attendance of members and visiting members. Two female candidates and one male were initiated, and one honorary member who is an honorary member of the Fountain of Friendship Lodge in Auckland. Three candidates were proposed for membership. A letter of recommendation was granted to a brother to visit lodges in other parts oi the Dominion. A Past Grand's jewel was presented to T.G. L. F Webster by P.P.G.M. McGahey. In view of the recent cable news of the death of the Earl of Carnwath, the following item, taken from an English paper, is of special interest:—There is at present serving on a certain P. and O. liner a young and zealous officer known as Mr. Ronald Arthur Dalzell, who in real life bears the title of Lord Dalziell and Liberton, heir to Lord Carnwath, a Scottish earl. He is not the only earl, however, who has served in the mercantile marine. The present Earl of Egmont and the late Earl of Aberdeen both served before the mast, while tlie present Lord Lyveden was at one time a ship's steward.

A meeting which causes very 'frequent and hardly favorable complaint amongst the general public was aired at the Borough Council meeting last night by Councillor Wilson, who, when the report of the Band Concert Committee was being read, suggested that the band management committee be informed that in future they must confer with the Council's committee before the end of October. "It is perfectly ridiculous," he said, "for the band to come to us in the beginning of March to earn a subsidy by the end of March." It might also have been mentioned that these open-air evening concerts would be far more acceptable in December, January, and February than 'in March, when the evenings commence to turn colder, and the twilight is practically nil. The Borough Council decided last ■night, on the motion of Cr. Wilson, to recommend the incoming Estimates Committee to make provision for an experimental groin on the beach, the groin being placed at an angle of about 35 degrees to the shore and running northwards. Should the experiment prove successful others will be erected at •various points, with the object of reforming the sandy beach which has disappeared of late years from the foreshore in the immediate vicinity of New Plymouth, In advocating the experiment Mr. Wilson mentioned last night that a groin similarly placed, and made of boulder stones at the instance of Mr. A. W. Wood when that gentleman was a member of the Council, was wholly responsible for the existence of such a fine beach at the' East End. There was a time when the encroachment of the sea threatened to undermine the ba thing shed there, but owing to the action of ( the groin that danger had been averted and a fine beach formed. He pointed out that the groins now on the beach under the cliffs were successful in catching and holding the sand until a northerly sea came, and his idea of th3se oblique groins was that the sea would not dis- j place the sandbank which was formed under their shelter. The engineer is to J give an estimate of the cost. Sir John Baity Tuke,. who is now visiting the Dominion after an interval of nearly half a century, stated in Auckland that during the two or three weeks he has been in the Dominion, what has impressed him most is the wholesale denudation of the native bush and the disappearance of what appealed to him as the natural characteristics and charm of the land. "You nave undoubtedly civilised the land," he said to an interviewer, "but you have ruined the beauty of the native scenery. I looked in vain when I was in the Wairarapa and the Manawatu for some of the magnificent bush that once was the marvel of the country. The valley or the Hutt is quite unrecognisable, and in a great many cases the de«tru«tion seems to have been entirely apart from utilitarian purposes, for thev planted innumerable European and other trees foreign to the soil, that to my mind look quite incongruous and not nearly so beautiful as the New Zealand forest trees. Little any of ■us would dream as we went up and down the country in the early days," he remarked, "that it would, within our lifetime, become closely settled and dotted with busy, •and thriving townshins. Why. I remember having more than once camped on the spot where Palmerston North now stands, and a desolate spot it was then. When T was there •the other day. I stood on Mount Stewart and looked alone the valley and marvelled. We could have bought land there then for. T think, either 5s or 10s an acre. I have bought some myself except that at that time T did not have the 10s." laughed Sir John reminiscently.

On Saturday the Eltllnm IHiry Company received a cable from London intimating that a consignment (of the company's butter, which was shipped by the Corinthie, had been sold at 128s and 130s per owt. The company's consignment ex Corinthie was over 2000 boxes. ' The question of local bodied ostertaking the expenditure of Government grants at their owa expense was again before the Kltham County Council on Saturday. It was resolved: "That in connection with Government grants for back-block roads, this Council estimates 'that, as its present staff cannot cope with the work, it will cost about £2o9' for supervision and clerical' work, and if this amount cannot be charged to the grants, what shall it be charged to, as the particular part of the county adjoining cannot shoulder the responsibility." It was alsoi decided "that the Council write to all County' Councils air fected asking them to take concerted action in reius'ing to expend any of their rates on supervision and clerical work in connection' with tlie Government's grants for making now roads to Crown lands."