GENERAL NEWS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 118, 26 August 1910, Page 3

GENERAL NEWS.

The splendid block of greenstone, weighting two tons, which Messrs Havill and party unearthed about a month ago in the Callaghans district, and which consists of-an exceptionally fine quality of stone, has evidently attracted favorable notice, as the owners (states the Westport Times) have received an offer of £2OO for it, upon the acceptance of which they ihave not jet decided. The aeroplane that lias been attracting the curious to the Hutt Park during the last two or three days took its departure on Wednesday (says the Times). The trials had demonstrated an insufficiency of thrust-power on the part of the propellers. One evening the machine took a run round the course, 'but the speed attained'—about six miles an hour—was not sufficient to make it leave the ground. Finally the • propellers fouled some trees near the track and were broken. The owner is having larger ones fitted, and will then bring the machine out for fresh trials.

That strange white dolphin known as ''Pelorus Jack," one of the wonders of Hew Zealand, was reported to have disappeared a few days ago. For fully a week the vessels passing through Pelorus ■Sound were not met by their mysterious finny pilot, and doubts were expressed jas to the safety of "Jack." Captain Crawford, of the Pateena, reported the other evening that the fish was at his post tile previous day as usual, and frolicked around the steamer with his customary playfulness. At rare intervals "Pelorus Jack" ta'kes a vacation, which has been known to extend for weeks, but it is a long time since he has been on a holiday, and there was reasonable ground for anxiety as to ihis whereabouts. "Pelorus Jr. ek" enjoys the distinction of being the only denizen of the deep wiho is protected by legislation, an Order-in-Council prohibiting any interference with him. He is an everlasting source of wonderment to visitors to New Zealand, and the peculiar circumstances associated with his habits are scarcely credited abroad, if not treated altogether as a fable.

The United States submarine Salmon, which sailed from Quinscy (Massachusetts) on July 5, arrived at Bermuda on July 1 ! 0. The trip was undertaken to demonstrate the practicability of submarines making ocean trips. The Salmon carried a crew of twenty officers and men. and the speed averaged from six to ten knots.

There are no buggies or vehicles of light build on the Chatham Islands. There are no metalled roads, and the usual roads are mere tracks through the bogs or sand-lvills. The usual conveyances are sledges, some with two wheels at the back, and some without. Another is a low trolley, with four, and on occasions, three wheels. They require a special method of driving. Downhill they are. apt to run on to the horse's heels. A ton is about the weight they are capable of carrying. 'Describing Terra del Fuega (half of which belongs to Chili and half to Argentina), Mr. Fache, a Wellingtonian, who has just returned from South America, said it was only adapted for sheep farming. The major portion of the island consists of a high, well-grassed table-land, ■which is occupied by one of the largest sheep-farming estates in the world. Oil this gigantic estate—which, by the wav, is managed iby an ex-Otago boy, Mr. A. Cameron—over one million sheep per year are shorn, the wool being sent Home as it comes off the sheep's backs, and realises a good price. The percentage of lambs is high, averaging over 75, and between fifty and one hundred thousand sheep are slaughtered yearly and sent to the boiling-down woita. Formerly the fat only marketed, but now the carcases appear in the Home market as canned meat, soups, etc.

A (London paper of July 15, reporting a sale of animals at the Crystal Palace Zoo the previous day, says that lions are now ft drug on the market, owing to the number which are being bred m captivity. "Lions with names that are household words were sold almost for a song. Duchess, for example, a two-year-old Airican lioness, in the pride of youth and beauty, bred in captivity at the Dublin Zoo, and therefore esteemed by wild-ibeast showinen, went for £l6. "Her value is at least £SO in normal times,'said a showman, who bought two lions himself at airemarkably cheap rite. "In Rhodesia, Where the lions come from, you could get £l4 for her pelt." When the auctioneer's man went up to her cage and pointed to her with an iron rod, Duchess nuzzled up to it, and almost purred, so anxious was she to tell everyone that she was a loving sort of lioness to have about a menagerie. But it did not save her the indignity of a final bid of £W The lioness Victoria, dam of Prince,'went for less-14 securing her. Sultan, Prince's father, fetched £2O. Prince himself, by some freak of fate, realised £W-