LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 330, 17 June 1911, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A big Maori gathering is expected at Parihaka to-morrow.

There are now over three thousand miles of railway in comse of construction in Oiutadsi.

Tlic Sheffield Choir booking for Palmerston continues to mount up. Hawera has applied for a block of 40. The steam waggon which set out on its first trip to Opunake on Thursday baulked at the newly-spread road metal beyond Oakura. The Minister for Agriculture has issued instruction to the Department to make a comprehensive exhibit at the Dominion Dairy Show. The «iimunl report of the National Dairy Association points out that lack of min this season cost the Dominion KMSJXH) in diminution of returns on dairy produce. Commenting on "motor hogs" at the Kairanga County Council meeting, one councillor stated that if he had his old timber waggon and team of five, as he had in the old days, he would give the motorists all they wanted on the roads. The gross proceeds from the New Plymouth Fire Brigade's recent ball in the Theatre Royal amounted to £BS 3s 6d. The expenditure totalled £lO 2s 3d, leaving a net balance of £B6 Is 3d. This is a record return for these functions. In connection with the best sample of ensilage at the Dominion Dairy Show the conditions have been somewhat altered. All that is required is one cubic foot. This is a nice handy sample, ana should bring many entries. The prize for the best exhibit is £5 ss. The ''civic fathers," or some of them, held an impromptu fireworks display in King street last night. They were probably testing some fireworks for the Coronation night festivities, but it reminded at least one observer of the rejoicings of the small boys orer the failure of Mr. Guido Fawkes to blow some old-time law-makers into another world.

It is) incredible what scandalous conduct some individuals can be guilty of. The other day someone went into the workmen's reading-room at Port Chalmers, capsized everything that could be turned over, daubcu (lie walls, pictures iiml draught boards with red paint, and before leaving turned on nil the gas jets, leaving the gas to escape. The police have the mutter in linnd.

Something up-to-date in show window* lias just been completed for Mr. A. E. Sykes, the well-known chemist, of Devon street. The rectangular form of the windows is the latest, many big firms having lately dispensed with obtuse corners at shop entrances. A particularly good effect is obtained by the use of the glazed brick tiles below the sills. The shop front is now one of the best in the town.

The fatal Maiding of children is almost of weekly occurrence in the Dominion, and yet it would seem tliat parents are still somewhat negligent as to what may lead to tlii.s cla,s« of accident. At Tinmrii a child 2'/a years old was sitting at the table, on which had been placed a tea-pot which had just been filled with boiling water. The child pulled the tea-pot townrds it, with the result that it was scalded from the chin to (he thighs. A verdict <if dca;h from scald* accidentally received was returned.

Rabbiting has proved a |iarticularly lucrative occupation during the past few montlLs in portion* of South Canterbury contiguous to the Waitaki river. The Oamairu Mail states tluit within five weeks one company of three men earned

■CS!) each on a small run. A pound a day hiw been by no means difficult, so tlmt it is hardly wonderful that farm laborers in t.lio vicinity have forsaken the plough and the scud drill to hunt the elusive rabbit. Two factors have been responsible for the big money to be made, the high price of skins and the plcutituae of victims.

"The leper colony in Hawaii has not grown any the last few years," says Mr. 0. B. Thomas, of Honolulu. "In fact, the number of lepers confined on the island of Molokai has beon decreased by the discovery that some of them were not suffering from the disease. The district in which the lepers live is separated from the mainland by a high range of mountains, and tbje lepers have a regular municipal government of their own. They have their schools and their amusements, and pursue their daily work with as much pleasure as the inhabitants of thriving villages."

The new system of conducting the harbor elections by the local bodies has proved very expensive as far as the Now Plymouth Harbor Board has been concerned. The Taranaki County Council's "little bill" was for £92 "s (Id, New Plymouth Borough Council £43 4s Id, Waimate West County £lO 15s 3d, Stratford Borough Council (uncontested election) £ll 7s fid. and Stratford County Council £S Os 3d. The Harbor Board has held up the Waimate West account for further particulars, some of the expenditure having in the Board's opinion been quite unnecessary and the election unlawful. Mr. Hughes wanted to know where he "came in" about his personal election expenses, but the other members only laughed with him at the "joke" of paying out money for an unnecessary fight, or as he termed it, "an imaginary election." A meeting of delegates from the various focal bodies interested was held in llawera on Thursday to further consider the Hawera-Kaiipokoniii tramway project. The following resolution was agreed to: "That in the opinion of this meeting the time lias; come for making the tramway from Juiwcra to Kaitpokonui along the Main South road, and that a, Bill should be promoted to create a board of construction, the members of which shall consist of nominees from each of the local bodies, the whole or portions of whose territory is to be included in the rating area, and that the board be given all the powers of a single local body under the Tramways Act, and the power to levy a rate to secure the interest and sinking fund on the loan necessary for the construction of the tramway. Hie boundaries of the rating area to be New Plymouth railway on the cast to Hawera. thence due south to the sea. thence on to the western boundary of the Waimate West County, uienee on by the railway reserve hackto the New Plymouth line; and that the portion between Skeet road and the railway reserve form a special area to be rated at one-half of the remaining area, the Hawera borougn to form part of the dating area/' The proposed board ia to consist of representatives from the .various local bodies as follows: Hawera Borough Council £, Hawera County, Council 2, Waimatd uu est County Council 2, Mantua Town Hoard I. A committee similarly constituted is to go into the details of the resolution, th'* members to be appointen o.y tue rep; 3ntative bodies. The services in Uiu iWWleley Memorial Church to-morroTV will be conducted be the minister, the Rev. .1. W. Burton. The morning subject will be "The Responsibility of the British Empire for Other Races?: and in the evening Mr. Burton will preach on "(leorge IV. and Geowre V.—a Study in Human Progress."