LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 306, 19 May 1913, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The new traffic bridge over the Waitara river in the borough of Waitara, is to be formally opened on Thursday. Copper production in the United Slates of America in 1012 reached the record figure of 1,'2-10,000,0001 bs, worth ,C40,000.1!0!l -an increase of 151,000,000 llw over 1!)11.

Canada ships an average of 2i0,0(H)ll)s of cheese a, week to England. Last year's exports totalled 105 million pounds, worth C-f,'200,000, and nearly all to Creat Britain.

'.Sonic thirty veterans from Patea and ilawera an; coming to New Plymouth to see the Now Zealand, and it is the intention of the local veterans to entertain tlicm at a smoke concert.

The Inglewood Senior Cadets have, besides a bugle baud, a football club, and a very keen one, judging by a notice calling moonlight practices in preparation for a match against Waitara, on June 3rd.

While -25 horse-drawn sleighs, conveying 121) wedding guests, were going over the frozen surface of Lake Chereminetz, Russia, the ice gave way, and the whole party, with the exception of one man, were drowned.

There was a capital attendance at the Brotherhood yeesterday afternoon, and the address by Mr. O. 11. Dolby, M.A., on "The Theory of Evolution," was closely followed. A beautiful 'cello solo was given by Mr. 15. Woods. It is stated that the bulk of the flaxmills on the Motoa estate, at Shannon, will close down as from this month until the first week in August. . Several other mills in the district, however, will be running through the winter, owing to the high price flax is now fetching. Labor is plentiful at the mills. Of the 138 fires which occurred in Wellington during the year ended March 31', twenty are due to accidents with matches, nineteen to sparks, and twenty to lighted candles coming into contact with inflammable substances. Defective chimneys were responsible for nine fires, incendiarism for nine, airing linen for six, and smoking for five. Enterprise is the watchword of the management of the Royal Pictures, and the latest success is the securing of a fine kinematograph film showing the Captain Scott Memorial Service at St. Paul's. This picture will be screened on the new programme at the Royal tonight and to-morrow night only," as the theatre is otherwise engaged on Wednesday and Thursday. Farmers desirous of ascertaining the whereabouts of a supply of water on their properties should avail themselves of the services of Mr. A. Sorenson, water diviner, of Auckland. Mr. Sorenson lias just been on a visit to Stratford, locating water for the Stratford Co-operative Dairy Company, and will be in New Plymouth at the Terminus Hotel to-day and to-morrow. Mr. Sorenson does not use any stick or instrument.

Inglewood, writes our correspondent, was disturbed by a "runaway" early on Saturday afternoon, when a horse and trap chattered past Messrs. Percival and Messenger's office. It appears that as Mrs. Taylor, of Tariki, was preparing to mount into her trap, the horse took fright and bolted, and the step of the trap struck her on the forearm, inflicting an ugly gash, which necessitated several stitches. The horse was recaptured before it got very far. On the arrival of the North express at the Gare du Nord, Paris, recently, a cleaner found in one of the carriages a ;nm II brown leather travelling case, which contained a large number of important papers, a cheque for £(150,000 issued by a Berlin Bank and payable at the Bank of Italy in Rome, and a passport made out by the German Embassy in the name of Commander Hanrigo Rossi. As yet no one has claimed the papers and the cheques, which have been placed in the lost property office. The police suspect a joke.

In making an appeal for support for tlu» Bible-in-Scliools movement yosterday, Bishop Crossley stated that lio hail recently visited a school in the Taranaki back-blocks and gave an address on the Ten Commandments, and out of 40 children, not one child knew a single Commandment. All they wanted, he continued, was a referendum to he taken so that parents could say whether their children were to have an opportunity, of learning the faith of their fathers, and if they knew the number of children in the back-blocks who never saw a church their hearts would be sore. As usual at the annual meetings of the ratepayers in the Moa Road District, there was a small attendance, only one above the required number for a quorum (six) attending the meeting on Saturday. and of these six were members of the Board, and the other was a contractor waiting to sign a contraet. This evidently shows that ratepayers show very little interest in the expenditure of their rates, or else are well satisfied with the management of the Board. The chairman read the balance-sheet, and. after one or two questions had been asked, the meeting was formally adjourned until the balance-sheet was audited. Mayoral contests in New Zealand are mild affairs, after all. The yellow press of New York lias been giving its attention to Mr. William G. Gaynor, the Mayor of that city, and it seems to have dredged the dictionary for really expressive terms of abuse. "If you will go to the monkey-house in the zoological gardens," says one of the Hearst newspapers, "you will find the macaque, an individual physically eercopithecine and mentally quarrelsome. This interesting pithecoid prototype of the Mayor of New York barks, grunts, coughs and snarls at all who approach his cage. He does not pronounce words distinctly enough to be understood exactly, otherwise his speeches are very much like those of Mayor Gaynor, of New York

In his more decent moods it is advisable to take children to see him, and let them learn what they should not do." Taraiiaki farmers are agnin taking great interest in the competition in connection with the Xew Plymouth Winter Show, Messrn, K (iriffiths and Co.. having again offered a £lO 10s gold' watch or £lO 10s cash for the beat two acres of swedes grown from Garton's seed and Shamrock turnip manure, supplied by them or liv their authorised agents to the competitor. Each competitor has to place on exhibition at the show three of the swedes grown on the two acres. Any competitor failing to comply with this condition will be disqualified from the contest, though the three swedes will not be considered in the judging which will take place during this month by a judge or judges appointed by the society. The judges' decision will be made known the first day of the show. Nomination has been fixed at 2s fld. and acceptance 2s (Id, which is to be made on or before May 24. The society also offers the following prizes for the best three swedes exhibited at the show in the above competition: First los, second ss; no extra entry. WANT A PARCEL SENT.

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A centenarians' flub founded in Tokitfj Japan, by Count Okuma only a year already has more than fifty twelve of whom are more than 110 yea» old, while the youngest member is 92. A mason at Nuremberg, C-ermany, sent the Mayor a wool-lined hamper coutjxiniii<» four babies to which his wilt had given birth, with a that ibe municipality should adopt them, a.i h# had not the means to keep them.

Ducks are reported to be plentiful this year (says (he Auckland .Star), and many sportsman have had no dillieulty in securing the limit of twenty-live per day,, which the law allows. Dr. liaynor and Mr. C. Ingram, who returned to town on a recent Saturday from Lake U'liangape, got 02 birds in two days. One party of four guns, shooting on Lake Waikare', obtained a bag of 140 birds. Teal are reported to be plentiful on the lake. When a woman loses her waist-line slm loses her self-respect. If she gives up corsets she can't be good. Such is th# dictum of Mrs. M. S. Jones in a lecture to the Illinois Women's Reformatory League. The League has arrived at the conclusion that the State's penal institutions fall in the reform of women inmates because corsets and fine clothes are not provided. "Self-respect is the iirst element toward the reclaiming of a woman's soul," asserted Mrs. Jones. "Xo woman can maintain her self-respect unless she wears a corset. Dress our women prisoners well, and they will be reformed. Corsets would make good women who are now delinquents. A woman named Oldenburg set fire to herself ami her two children at their flat iu Hamburg on Tuesday, March 25, during the absence of her husband. She poured a quantity of lamp oil over herself and her two children and the furniture. The fire was noticed by people in the streets, and when the brigade arrived the woman threw one of her children—a boy, aged nine—out of the window, and then herself. Both fell to the ground enveloped in flames, and the boy suecumbed almost immediately, while the mother lies in a precarious condition. The other child—a girl of 2y 3 yearswas found burnt to death in the flat. It is believed the woman suddenly became, demented.

A mother's daring theft of her child from a convent has just come to light in America. Mrs. Nuckols had recently been divorced by her husband, and th« children had been placed in the convent at Merrion, Pa., with the proviso that the mother should visit them at stated intervals. On her first visit Mrs. Xuckols wfent for a walk in the convent garden with her little girl Muriel, four years of age. AH the doors were locked, but at one point in the wall a few projecting stones gave a foothold. She picked up the child, clasped its arms round her neck, and then climbed up the wall and jumped down on the other side. A motor car was waiting for her, and drove away before the hue and cry could be raised. Neither the mother nor the child was traced.