LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 84, 29 September 1911, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Wellington has the lowest death-rate of the four cities of the Dominion. A mail for Auckland and north will be dispatched per Corinna this afternoon, closing at 2 p.m. We, are indebted to Mr. H. Okey, M.P., for a copy''of the Representation Commission's reports, with the maps of the new electorates, eitc Miss Ruby Allen (teacher Mrs. Bollinger) passed the London College of Music elementary theory examination held last July with 65 marks. Members of the Tisch Memorial Committee visited the Esplanade yesterday with a view of selecting a portion for beautification as a public memorial to our late Mayor. Among the latest suggested improvements on Caroline Ray, Tiniaru, is the formation of a. lake from one and a-half acres to two acres in extent, on which model yachts and children's boats could be disported, tt is proposed that the lake should be about two feet deep. LAn accused person in the prisoner's dock at' the Supreme Court, Timaru, the other day desired to leave the uncongenial environment, so, looking down at the reporters' table (which ig immediately in front of the dock), he said in 'sweet, persuasive tones, "I want to leave for half an hour. Will one of you gentlemen plflase take my place?" The only daughter of a Bulgarian family at Uskwb, after ailing some time, was found inanimate recently, and her parents, think her dead, had her buried, in accordance with local customs, the same evening. A few .hours afterwards a policeman passing the cemetery heard stifled cries from the newly-made grave. He ran to the parents' house, and a large number of townspeople attended the exhumation, only to find that the girl had died a few minutes previously from suffocation. A New South Wale* settler has been very successful in poisoning rabbits by maws of strychnine placed in the roots nf thistles. The rabbits will take, poison this way when they refuse to take baits made by any other method. A trapper secured a large number of rabbits in the following manner:— He. cuts the roots of thistles into thin slices and places them above the traps, taking care I that they will not interfere with the jaws of the traps when closing, as the rabbits would otherwise be, able to free themselves.

It looked as though a clue as to Powelka's movements had been discover<»d, says the Times, in Whitenmn's Valley, -between Tuitii and Tpper Hntt, where a. cotton singlet was found, on which was stencilled a broad arrow, but this was evidently a practical joke played by someone. The stencilling, on close observation, was found to be quite recently done, and was smudged. Moreover, the prisoners at Terrace Gaol do not wear this kind of singlet, and thus the police are not aible in any way to identify it with Powelkn. IT IS THE RESOLVE

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A town section in Napier, having a street frontage of 33 feet, almost opposite; the (Viiincil Chambers, which was bought si.\ years ago for £IOO, has just changed hands for '.C1200.

Fruit blossoms in some of the rural districts of Hawke's Bay are at present a wondrous sight, the trees being. literally covered with blossoms. The Burbank plums* are the most beautiful, and urc more heavily laden with snowy blossoms than any other variety. Hawko's Bay weather prophets predict heavy frosts to follow the snow with which the ranges are now covered. It will be remembered that frost last season were attended with dire effects as to the fruit crop, a great quantity of which was destroyed.

A Howe paper states that plans arc well" 'forward, for the acquisition of a well-known mansion in the South of Ireland on behalf of the King. It is believed his Majesty will spend at least a month of each year in Ireland, and that practically each residence will be in occupation of members and relations all the year round. A native was before the Court at Waipawa on a charge of leaving a'cow at large on the public road. Jt happened that the animal was left lying on the road, apparently dead lame.' It recovered, and attacked a local doctor who was passing on his motor cycle, the machine being seriously damaged, and the doctor having experienced a narrow escape. Eventually the cow was shot. Defendant was fined 2fls and costs, in default seven days' hard labor:

Many fal.se rumours are being circulated regarding Hie new hotel about to be erected on the Egmont road track in the Egmont National Park. It has been openly stated that the guarantors will run the hotel and receive all profits, also that it is intended to apply for a license to sell alcoholic, liquors. Mr. \V. Armstrong, chairman, of the Egmont National Park Boaird, informs us that there is no truth whatever in these statements. The hotel will be managed entirely by the Board, who will receive all revenue derived therefrom, and there is no intention to apply for a license to sell liquor. At the Magistrate's Court yesterday, Henry V. Oallaghan, charged with being drunk whilst in charge of a' horse on Wednesday and with haiving obtained liquor during . the currency of a prohibit/ion order, was, on the application of Senior-Sergeant Dart, remanded till 'Tkuroday next, when other charges against Callaghfln will also l>e dealt with by the magistrate. For leaving a horse without having it under propei control, Miss Stephenson (for whom Mr. J. E. Wilson appeared) was fined 5s and 7s costs. J&hn Ellis, for a breach of the by-laws in burying niglrteoil in his garden was lined , r >s with costs 10s. Messrs. D. Berry and T. <_'. List were the presiding Justices.

The formation in the United States of a league the chief aim of whi«h is to prevent smoking in puhlie thoroughfares recalls the faet that less than a hundred years hack this practice was penalised in parts of Germany. In the early part of the ninetecntn. century a Prussian law absolutely prohibited cigar smoking in the streets. As the result of agitation, a concession was made, allowing cigars in public, provided they were fitted with wire protectors, which were supposed to serve as it protection against fire. Eventually this restriction was removed, but up to 1848 no smoker in Prussia dared keep a cigar in his mouth as he passed a sentry, under pnin of arrest.

During his visit to England, Ronald' Opie, New Zealand's rapid runner, who competed at the Festival of Empire Sports on New Zealand's behalf, had a fly in an aeroplane. He was taken up at Brooklands, England's famous race ground, by Picton, the English aeronaut. Asked as to wliat the sensation was like, he stated, "It was like a ride in mid-air on a (SO-mile-unhour motor-car, and made one wish he had been born an eagle instead of something that creeps along the earth." 'J"he flight, which was* delightfully exhilarating, had given him an increased respect, not unmixed with envy, for the whole of the feathered tribe. He would like very much to go in for an air machine, and may yet.

The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He, is content sometime* with the dead crackle- of notes; but far more often with the mere repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs to eggs. And as for comfort, (lie old miser could he comfortable, as many tramps and savJifces are, when he, 'was once used to being unclean. A man could find some comfort in an miswept attic or an unwashed shirt, But the Yankee millionaire can iind no comfort with five telephones at his bed-head and the financial world changing every five minutes. The round coins in the miser's stocking were safe in some sense. Tho round noughts in tho millionaire's ledger are safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with their increase depresses him with their diminution. As tho miser gathers gold lie cannot eat, the millionaire counts figures lie cannot buy or sell. The miser at least collects coins; his hobby is numismatics; the man who collects noughts collects nothing.—(i. K. Chesterton, in the London Daily. Xew.s.

Butter ami cheese and dairying nre all very 'well in their way, and represent a great deal that is o,f value on the material side of the activities of the. provincial district, hut when attention is (■ailed to the fact that in Taranaki there is not one secondary educational institution .which, judged by the University lists, has attained a condition of efficiency fairly comparable with that of institutions in nearly all the other provincial districts, it must he realised that there is room for a. forward movement (says the Hawera Star). As to .the District High schools, we must confess that experience has been disappointing. Some, years ago when propo-als for their constitution were under consideration a warning was given by educational experts that anticipations of good secondary work hcing done at these schools wore scarcolv likely to be fulfilled, and we are afraid it be conceded that these, warnings have been justified. A letter ■written by Mr. Shore gives an explanation which shows th.it in .the nature. O'f things it cannot be expected that there will lie sufficient specialisation to give much hope of great, success. And we fear that the length of pupilship has. generally speaking, been too short to give teachers a fair chance, and this difficulty is likely to be accentuated under the stiller conditions imposed by the Senate of the University, imposed, it is needless to say, not with -the object of discouraging secondary education, but in tile hope of securing that the University professors and tutors may have more mature and better prepared material to work upon in the lecture rooms than in the pa.sl, they have too often found waiting for them. Pour years is not by any means too long a term of preparation for an ordinary pupil in a .well equipped and officered secondary school i,f the University course is to lie entered, upon seriously and intelligently, and if it is hard to get pupils to stay at the, secondary schools for this .period it must bo rare that they can be retained so long at the District High schools. If the pupils do not stay something Jilie this period, what can they learn at. material value?

In the Inland of San Domingo there is I a remarkable wilt inoiwtain- a mass 61 J wyafcalitc salt, nparly four miles long, j estimate to contain 00,000,000 tons, and said bo In- mi clear Hint a medium-sized | prinfe can be road through a block a \ foot thick:

General Simon, the fugitive ex-Presi-dent of llayti, arrived at Kingston (Jamaica) early hist month on hoard the Duteh steamer Prins der Ncderlandcn, which was specially chartered to bring him to .Jamaica. The ex-President's party consisted of 45 persons, chiefly members of hi* family circle and faithful adherents. All declined to discuss the situation of I he Black Republic, but the ex-President's' secretary stated that the party owed their lives to Mr. Furness, tho United States Minister to Hayti, who rescued them from an armed party which boarded the American schooner on which they had taken refuge, with the. object of carrying them ashore to shoot them.

A Te Aroha correspondent writes to the Thame* Star: —''Humor was rife in this popular health resort the ether evening that, the much-talked-of criminal, PowHka. had been captured on the outskirts of the town, on the edge of a iliix swamp. The supposed desperado was, sk> the story ran. caught lying apparently asleep, arrayed in a white jneket and dungarees, with broad arrow markings. Closer investigations, however, revealed one of the many drunks from the "dry area"' who had apparently been walked over during the night by" some inquisitive weka, pukeko, or other denizen of the »\vamp, and left its footprints over the stranger from abroad!"

Australian eoal has been going at extraordinarily 'ow rates in South America latoly, according to letters received in Sydney by the latest mails from Valparaiso. A New South Wales colliery company, ow> letter says, has token a contract, for some 1)3,000 tons of coal for the railways, delivery in Valparaiso and Takahuano by steamer, at a price a little under 24s c.i.f. Considering that the hewing rate is -Is 2d per ton, that other expenses would probably bring the cost of production up to, say, fla, and that tonnage is said to be Ifls or 208, the price secmH wonderfully low. It is thought there may have been some cable mistake in the quotations. Maori* in the baekblocks (says the Hawke's. liny Herald) appear to use Strang- methods when calculating what is due to ihem. Recently a Maori youth received notice to attend a doctor for medical examination. To reach the place of examination it was necessary for the Maori to go some distance on homeback. The journev there and bnek took one day, but the ambition*, youth determined to lose nothing by it. According he debited (he Department with two bags of chaff (about HiOlb) at Rs, two days' rabbiting at 7s, one extra feed for his horse, and (here is where the unselfishness comes in) one, weal for himself. The Department naturally viewed the account with somewhat mixed feelings- they don't know which to admire most, the man's unselfishness or the horVs "agronomical feat.

An instance of a woman masquerading a3 a man was disclosed a.t Ararat (Victoria) recently, when "Tom" Ralph, who was engaged to act as storeman and driver for .1. Wise, of Klipshurst, met with an accident. Ralph arrived a fortnight ago, and began work. Ralph took a hors-e from the stable on Tuesday and went for a ride. Soon afterwards "he" was picked uj. in on unewnscions condition on the road, and token to the Ararat Hospital. Here it was found that "Tom" was a young woman. The patient was then transferred to the female ward, where she is being treated for concussion of the brain. The yomi" woman w 1!) years of age. She "says" that her father and mother died wlien she was very young, and she has always dressed in male attire. She conies from Sydney, but recently worked in a factory in Melbourne. She is of prepossessing appearance and exemplary conduct.