LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 101, 19 October 1911, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

i The Taranaki Education Board lias <leI elded to include tho teaching of poultry in the list of subjects at the technical schools. Mr. Frank Gordon, of Waitara, has been appointed instructor. One of tho Dunedin city clergymen told his congregation on a recent Sunday night that on the previous Sunday evening only 170 out of about 300 worshippers put anything in the plate, and !)3 of them gave a three-penny bit each. One Servian M.P. is said to be putting tlw free railway pass system in rogue for parliamentarians in that country o to good account. In' order to avoid hotel expenses he spends* his nights during the parliamentary session in a first-class compartment of an express which runs between Belgrade and Pnpovo. The latest suggestion of a Minister oi the Crown is that horse-breeding should be encouraged by a system of subsidies. The idea is brilliant. "\Ve will soon have subsidies for the growing of turnips, the breeding of cows and pigs, for the manufacture of iron and suits of clothes and perambulators. But there will be no subsidy for the man with the family.— Masterton Age.

At yesterday's meeting of the Hospital Board Mr. Macßeynolds regretted that the Board had not yet obtained the services of a Maori nurse for work in the kaingas down tho coast. He said that the Hawera Board's Nurse Beetham was working very satisfactorily. The chairman said he agreed that"the time had come when the Board should take steps in the direction indicated by Mr. MacReynolds.

The distance of various New Zealand porta from Sydney are given in a return prepared at the request of the member for Taumarunui, and presented to the House of Representatives this week. The distances in nautical miles are as follows:—-Prom Sydney to Auckland 1278 miles, to Wellington 1230 miles, to Onehunga wharf 1172 miles, to Kawhia 1173 miles, to Waitara 1151 miles, to New Plymouth 1141- miles.

Scene: Terminus of much-frequented 'bus, which is ten minutes late. Lady passenger to gentleman to.: "Is this 'bus ever going to start?" Gent.: "I'll wake the driver up. (Sarcastically to the driver): Can you tell me if this 'bus starts to-day or to-inorrow';" Youthful driver, deeply interested in a "Deadwood Dick," 'To-morrow," and proceeds reading. After completing page, he carefully puts novel away, and starts.

Some great inventors have paid dearly for their ingenuity by losing a limb, while some have sent to other realms during experiments with particular machines or substance. A local inventor of an improved acetylene gas mechanism was (says the Opunake Times) showing the works of his ingenuity to two other persons interested, and to test the validity of a part of the mechanism had a match struck. Off went some gas, and up went some skin and hair, followed by a particle of the machine. Luckily it was a narrow shave—of skin and hair only.

There is much interest for English people at the moment—though, perhaps, no particular comfort—in the announcement that the rainfall of a village among the hills of Assam during the ten weeks from May 1 to July 0 this year was 250 in. The village is Cherrapunji, the rainiest spot in Asia, and presumably in the world. Its annual rainfall is something over 430 in—say, fifteen times as much as London. Cherrapunji stands on a plateau, overlooking the plain of Sylhet, and it is 4450 ft above sea-level. The much-discussed canal scheme between the Baltic and Black Sea is likely to be taken in hand at once. Beginning at Riga and ending at Kherson, the wiiterway will have a total length of 1000 miles. Every possible use will be made of the rivers Dvvina and Dnieper, which will have to be dredged and widened. It is said that a length of about 200 miles only will have to be dug out. When the canal is completed, the entire passage should not occupy more than twelve days. This waterway will not only open up the north of Europe to the, Black Sea grain trade, but it will also make possible the supply of coal from the Donetz district for Baltic ports.

The death is announced from Los < Angeles, California, of Major YV. A. Phipps, the multi-millionaire, and one of Mr. Andrew Carnegie's first partners in the huge steel business which made both their fortunes. Major Phipps. who was very eccentric, was known, the Chronicle says, as the "millionaire hermit," because he had not left his suite of rooms at the Hotel Van Xuys for over eight years. One of his eccentricities was the belief that the Black Hand Society was trying to kill him, and about ten years ago he bought a big ranch near Los Angeles, only to abandon it after eighteen months, when he hid himself in the hotel. He was accompanied by his beautiful young wife, who devoted herself to looking after him, and was practically a prisoner for the eight years of his stay at the hotel. He was never, seen by the other guests at the hotel, for all his meals were taken to his room, and a small staff of guards had a very easy and profitable time "protecting" him from the machinations of the Black Hand. He died very shortly after the death of a pet dog, to which he was greatly attached. Mr. C. 0. Major, who arrived in Sydney last week, has spent the greater part of his life in America, where h* was for many years associated with the Standard Oil Trust. His object now is, says the Sydney Morning Herald, to discover some new country as a permanent residence. As regards the United States, he is bitterly pessimistic. "Die Trusts," he said, "are paralysing everything in the way of commercial development. They have the exclusive power-of crushing all private enterprise —and they use it. In the last few years the cost of living has increased from 50 per cent, to 75 per cent. The working man seems obsessed with the same greed as his employers. Bricklayers, for instance, draw eight dollars si day, and still want an increase.' l Incidentally, .Mr. Major remarked that the exodus of foreigners from Japan was steadily increasing. ''ln another live or ten years," he added, "Japan will be without foreigners as constant residents."

The High School boys' relay race, postponed from last week, will take place to-day if the weather is fit. Seven teams are competing, and as the boys are ail in hard training some good times should be recorded. The course is from Waitara to New Plymouth. The recent boisterous weather has not dealt too kindly with the stranded Pelotu.f, and it is more than doubtful if she would lloat even if her owners were successful in getting her into deep water. Signs of breaking up have undoubtedly set in, and her mainmast is in, a very shaky-condition. Anything in the nature of a gale at this stage will probably mean that the storm-tossed barquentine will go to pieces.—Wanganui Herald. "It is jn-l possible that this lad's life might have been saved if some of the loafers on the river bank had taken prompt action," said the coroner at the inquest at East Molesey on Charles Eley, aged IS, of East Molesey, who was drowned at Hampton Court'owing to the capsizing of a punt. It was stated that although several people were on the river bank at the time, only Sidney George, one of the dead lad's companions, attempted to rescue him. A man who saw the accident admitted that although he could swim, he had not the pluck to go to the drowning lad's assistance.

Some time ago the cadets at Xumurkah (Victoria), numbering about sixty or.soventy. were measured for uniforms. The tape was run over them with great care, but somewhere in the arrangements a hitch occurred, and when the suits were ready for distribution there was neither number nor name attached to them. The result was that the short and fat boys in many cases found themselves with mether garments so long that they needed only a hat to complete the uniform, while the tall youths had big, uncomfortable gaps between the coat and the trousers. There is a good deal of real indignation on the part of the boys and their parents, but an enterprising resident has suggested how evil may be turned to good. He recommended that the boys garbed in their grotesqus costumes should be billed at the Numurkah Hall as the "Queerest Corps on Earth." A drill hall might be built with the proceeds.

In collecting mementoes of the Napoleonic invasion for the centenary celebrations in .Moscow next year, attention (says tho St. Petersburg correspondent of The Times) was drawn to the memoirs of the Comto de Segur and other French contemporaries regarding the fate of the great Cross of Ivan Veliky, the church which dominates the Kremlin. Napoleon had this cross pulled down, believing it to be of solid gold, and intending to have it placed over the Dome des Invalides. He was prompted to this act by a desire to punish the Russians for setting fire to the city, especially as the cross was popularly believed to have, a legendary connection with the greatness of Russia. With enormous difficulty the cross, measuring sixteen feet, was brought down, and, according to Segur, had to be abandoned on the march to Smolensk, being sunk with a quantity of other impedimenta in Lake Semlcvo. The lake having been recently drained, a careful search was made, which brought to, light, innumerable remains of dead horses, harness, carts, uniforms, etc., but no trace of the cross. Letters published in the Novoe Vremya argue that it never left Moscow, and was probably buried under the wreckage »f the Kremlin caused by the blowing up of its buildings at Xapoleou's command. The real gold cross remained undetected on one of the churches which escaped destruction.