LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 232, 6 February 1911, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A touch of winter—Saturday's and yesterday's weather. A shoal of kingfish was seen off Moturoa the other day. The New Plymouth Gas Company has declared an interim dividend of five per cent. The Taranaki Guards will parade at the Drill Hall to-morrow evening, wheu new uniforms will be issued. Welcome rain fell on Friday and Saturday at Wanganui. January was the, driest month experienced there for many years. Mr. Chew Chong is soliciting subscriptions in New Plymouth for the relief of the starving millions in China, and meeting with considerable response. A report was current last night that a house had been destroyed by lire in or near the town at about eight or nine o'clock, but up to the time of going to press we could not obtain any verification.

About eighty priests arc taking part in the retreat of the Roman Catholic clergy of the archdiocese of Wellington, which includes Wellington province, Hawke's Bay, Taranaki, Marlborough, and the greater part of Nelson. Mr. John Holmes, of Wellington, formerly Trade Commissioner for New Zealand, took the political platform lit Southwold, in Suffolk, and at Lowestoft during the recent general election, in England, on behalf of the Unionist side. Mr. J. S. S. Medley, registrar of births, deaths and marriages, New Plymouth, has been appointed census enumerator for the counties of Taranaki, Egmont, and Clifton. The appointment of sub-enumerators in the various districts is now being made for the census, which will be taken throughout the Dominion on Sunday, 2nd April, of this year. Yesterday afternoon at the Kaw'nroa Park rotunda, a large audience thoroughly enjoyed the rendition of the following programme by the Garrison Band:—Contest march, "Our Defenders;" contest selection, "Boccaccio"; march, "Cards du Corps"; contest quartette, "White Heather"; waltz, "Rose Bloom"; quickstep, "With Sword and Lance." Mr. C. E. Bellringer, the Provincial Secretary of Oddfellows' Lodges, said, at his annual visit to Te Kiri Lodge, that this year had been an exceptional one for sickness in Taranaki. At Stratford the lodge there paid out more sick benefits this year than on any other occasion. At New Plymouth it was a heavy year, and the same at Kapongit and Te Kiri. In fact, it was the same all through the Taranaki district. The Lord Mayor of Melbourne stated a few days ago that he had taken action to have the streets cleared of all people begging, whether they were blind or could see, whether halt or could walk. Under the. present laws, he added, every man and woman could obtain a pension from the Federal Government, and it would apply to the majority of mendicants on the streets of Melbourne. Mendicants were an intolerable nuisance.

The new gold coinage, which is to consist of £5, £2, £l, and the half-sov-ereign, will each bear the effigy of King George, and on the reverse side "the image of St. George, armed, sitting on horseback, attacking the dragon with a sword, and a broken spear upon the ground." The inscription on the fivepound and two-pound pieces on the obverse will be: "Gcorgius V. Dei gra; Brit: Omn: Rex fid: Def. Ind: Imp." On the sovereign and half-sovereign the inscription will be: "Georgius V. D.G. Britt: Omn: Rex F.D. Ind: Imp." At the Magistrate's Court, Stratford, on Friday, Con Allen was charged with having obtained the sum of £5 5s from John Blair Crossan by meanß of a false pretence—pretending that a cheque drawn by himself on the Bank of New Zealand, Timaru, waß a genuine order for the payment of the sum. Detective Boddam conducted the prosecution. Allen reserved his defence in each case, and was committed to the Supreme Court for trial. Bail was allowed—accused in liis own bond of £SO, and two sureties of £IOO each.

A conference was held at Waitara on Friday between representatives of the Clifton County Council and the Whangamomona County Council with reference to the suggested alterations in the boundaries of the two counties. The proposal of the Whangamomona County that a number of sections—about forty at the far end of the Ngatimaru and Mokau ridings be transferred from Clifton to Whangamomona was approved by the conference with alight modification. The Clifton County Council at its last meeting confirmed the decision of the conference.

Mr. Arthur Sadler, toll-gate keeper, Puniho, writes:—"l don't know who your occasional correspondent is, hut I think he might have found out the truth about the caterpillars before he wrote to the press. 1 want to give you the facts about them. In tho first place, your correspondent said that the furniture and walls were literally covered. Wfcli, they weren't quite as bad as that, but we have Been catching quite 40 or 50 inside at night. We are only troubled with them inside after about 8 p.m., and it is generally about 10 p.m. before we can retire. He also said that file battle ended on Sunday morning, but the battle hasn't ended yet, though the caterpillars are not quite as bad as they were, and we have tried salt and lime and several other things without success. 1 '

The usual quarterly meeting of the committee of the Taranaki branch of His Majesty's Veterans' Association was held in the Drill Hall on Saturday. There were present: Colonel Ellis (vice-presi-dent, in the chair), Messrs. Wells. Oliver, Oxenharii, Humphries, Kenyon and Black (secretary). It was resolved that the anniversary of the Taranaki branch be held on March 31st, the day appointed for unveiling the monument at Moturoa. Messrs. Black and Humphries were appointed to represent the veterans on the monument committee. The chairman reported that the Imperial pension ot J. Conway had been increased from lOd to Is Gd per day, to take effect from 30th May last. " Colonel Ellis also reported that His Excellency the Governor, president of the Veterans' Association, wished to express his thanks for the goodwill expressed by the veterans ot Taranaki on his visit to New Plymouth. At the request of Mr. J. S. S. Medley, registrar for .the New Plymouth district, we publish the following, being section 20 of the Registration of Births and Deaths and Marriages Act, which, I he states, should be more widely known: | "It shall be the duty of the occupier of any house in which a child is born alive to give notice of the fact of the birth, the date on which it occurred, and [ the name of the mother or father of the ! child, to the Registrar of Births of the district in which the birth took place. Such notice shall be in writing7delivered or posted by registered letter to the said Registrar within seventy-two hours after the birth if in a city or borough, or twenty-one days in any other case. If the occupier fails to comply with the provisions of this section, he shall be liable to a fine not exceeding £5." The requirements of this section are in addition to, and not in substitution for, the requirements of the Registration of and Esaths Act, 1875.

ltumor hath it that four gun batteries are to be formed at Hamilton and also at Palmerston. An old resident of Victoria, a farm laborer, has succeeded to an Austrian title, all other male descendants having died, lie also claims relationship, distant, but distinct, with the Emperor of Austria, lie maintains that he will not abandon his friendship for the working classes, with whom he has spent all his life. i A syndicate, with headquarters in Germany, has decided to attempt the production of line wool on a large scale in (lerinan South Africa. The wool clip ot the Fatherland has fallen off largely of late years. That country only produces twenty-six million pounds weight, as against her consumption of 440 millions. English papers state that card-playing is now greatly diminishing at the English Court, neither King George nor Queen Mary having any liking for cards. The Court also keeps much earlier hours than formerly was the vogue, 11 o'clock being now the closing hour, King George also°making it a point to be in his study liy 10 o'clock every forenoon. It is rumored in Wellington that the members of the Cabinet are not quite the happy family that their outside actions would indicate them to be (says an exchange). At least one has shown an inclination to be fractious, and rumor has it that he has been given a very plain hint that his room would be better than his company. It is thought that something definite may transpire before Sir Joseph leaves for England. Among those who are devoting time and capital to aviation studies may he mentioned the name of Mr. Duigan, who was referred to in a cable message lastweek as having invented a successful airship. The inventor is a nephew of the late Mr. James Duigan, formerly editor of the Wanganui Herald. For some time past Mr. Duigan has devoted practically all his time and a lot of money to aviation and apparently not I without considerable success.

A feature of Sir Joseph Ward's motorear trip through the district south of Auckland on Tuesday, was the fact that at many points of the road whole families, fathers, mothers and children, turned out to cheer him. Sir Joseph spoke a word of thanks to many of these family groups. At Waitangi there was a gathering of ladies under an inscription worked in°greenery, ''Welcome to our Premier by the settlers of Waitangi." Sir Joseph Ward stopped the car and said a few words in appreciation.

A distinguished British military officer in Major-General Broadivood is in the South Island, after paying a visit to the West Coast Sounds. He is a young-look-ing man for the service he has seen, tall, active and alert, the real type of an English soldier. He has thoroughly enjoyed his trip to the Sounds. He is looking forward to a journey through the Buller Gorge, and he will afterwards make his way to Rotorua. Asked if he would say anything about our defence scheme and universal training, he replied that he was very interested in our defence scheme, and that one of his objects in travelling was to see what was going on.

The value of the evidence of a witness was tested in a novel manner at the Magistrate's Court at Auckland recently. A laboring man was the complainant in a enarge of theft against another man, a stranger to him, and in his evidence he said he identified the accused by his appearance and by his eyes particularly. After a cross-examination of over half an hour, Mr. Hackett, who appeared for the accused, turned accused in the dock so that he stood with his back to the witness. Turning to the witness, Mr. Hackett asked him to tell the color of accused's eyes. Witness could not uo this, and although he had been facing accused for nearly/an hour, and described how he identified him, the fact that accused had light blue eyes did not seem to make any impression on his mind.

Sydney has been described as one of the greatest centres of swimming in the world, and every visitor is impressed by the vastness of the numbers of bathers at the various watering places. Mr. F. A. Hornibrook told a Lyttelton Times representative recently tl\at during his visit to Sydney he lia<l observed that tlie pastime had increased in popularity during the two years tlmt had elapsed since his previous stay in Sydney. An estimate of the important position which surf-bathing occupied among the pleasures of the people might be formed from the fact that at Bondi the local authority had undertaken the construction of a brick wall, costing £2500, outside the

surf-line, for the sole purpose of reducing the force of the breakers and minimising the dangers to bathers. Referring to the question of bathing costumes. Mr. Honibroo'; said that many bathers wore the double-garment Canadian costume, but the ordinary neck-to-knee costume, with trunks, was also largely worn. Mixed bathing was, of course, general. , There were separate baths for the two sexes at most of the beaches, but even in the baths mixed bathing was alloweu on two or three evenings a week. The clement of larrikinism had absolutely vanished from all the beaches, and the conduct of the huge joyous crowds of bathers was beyond criticism.