LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 15 October 1918, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

At Rawhitiroa School (in the Eltiiam district) lust week, Mr 0. A. Wilkinson, M.P., formally opened the concrete tennis court which has been made by means of funds raised by concerts and subsidised by the Education Board, the actual labor being given by the settlers:

"If ever you want to feel like a worm,'' said Mrs. Kineton-Parkes, at Whiteley Hall yesterday, "travel as a civilian 011 a troopship, as I did to New Zealand." She said absolutely 110 notice was taken of anyone but the soldiers- She said also, however, how very interested she had been to note the progress towards health the 7ii() men hud made during the voyage on the boat on ■which she came out.

The police received a telegram 011 Thursday (reports the New Zealand Times) stating that Charles A'Court Opie, clerk for the Pelorus Koad Board, had been arrested at Havcloek yesterday on a charge of theft of £7l, the property of the board. The accused was remanded till the 16th inst.

A Melbourne cablegram states that Mr. Hughes announces that he has sold to the British Government Australian ■butter for this season. Mr. Hughes caibled asking- the producers whether they desire the arrangeinefts to cover the period of the war, which is at the producer's option. In the course of Tier appeal on behalf of National Prohibition, at Whiteley Hall yesterday afternoon. Mrs. KinetonParkes pointed an effective picture of the fcontrast in the mode of entertaining travelling soldiers in towns where the hotels were open and in those where prohibition was in force. She said at a port of <^.ll—the only port at which the troopship by which she travelled to New Zealand called —the men had considerable leave, and were royally entertained by the townspeople, tout as it was a prohibition place there was not an unseemly incident, and the men returned to the boat as sober as wlien they left it 4 .

\ "It's no use the Government putting our returned men on inferior land," exclaimed a farmer to a Ne\ys' representative. "What it should do is to have a register made of all landholders who have from one cause or another not sent any sons to the war, and take sijcli part of their lands as is required for returned soldiers at a fair valuation. There are thousands of acres o* splendid land thai could lie made available in this way. My plan would inflict no hardship on the owners, it would do less than justice to the boys who have protected the farmers' interests on the field of battle, and it would successfully solve a problem of providing a sufficiency of suitable land for the ex-soldiera. I pass the idea on to you for what it is worth."

Mr Wynyard, solicitor, of Auckland, and Mr McDulT were in Stratford last week, reports the Post, in connection ■with some matters in which an Auckland syndicate is interested in this district, and visited the oil-boring works at Ilniroa. It is understood that the de-benture-holders are about to take over the plant and machinery, as they believe it will be advisable togo down a further thousand feet, making the depth of the bore nearly 8000 feet. In the same connection it is stated that work on the Toko lime deposits, whicli has been in abeyance for some time, is to be resumed. Capital is available to develop these deposits on a large scale, and to provide cheap lime for the district, which should be of great benefit to the farmers.

A ''joy ride" in a motor-car has not always the amount of joy in it that is commonly imagined, and several people found that out to their discomfort on Sunday night. A well-known local garage proprietor had driven a car to his home and left it standing on a section adjoining. Returning some time later, he noticed the car had disappeared. Knowing that the car had just been retyred, he looked for and was easily able to follow its tracks, which led away from New Plymouth along one of the main roads. On account of some previous happenings, his suspicions were aroused, and lie secured another, and powerful, car, and went ; r pursuit. The tracks at crossroads were examined, but no trace of the car havirg left the main road could be found. 1 Kvantuaily, however, at a late hour on Sunday night, a car was seen coming in the opposite direction to that the pursuers were travelling. An attempt was made to "hold up" the approaching car, but the driver refused to stop The car was recognised as the missing vehicle, and a hot puruit followed for some distance, when at last the occupants of the stolen c(ar were forced on to tli.e roadside and had to pull up. The owner, it is said, took his own means of administering a lesson to the joy-siders, and, after somewhat unceremoniously ejecting them from the car, left them, some distance from town, to gjt home a? best they could, the friend they had taken with him driving one ear and he the other back into town.

■ A report was made to Constable Clouston, of Opunake, by a Native named Henare, of Taungatara, that at 0.30 p.m. on Thursday last' hp !-ad discovered a suspicious-looking case 011 the jbeach, just south of the mouth of the Taunga-. tara River. The constable at once proceeded to the locality, where he discovered a ship's raft, which appeared to have been in the water only a short time. The raft measured Oft by 4ft bv lOin dee]), was made of strong galvanised iron, with three air chambers, built like flat boxes. All the woodwork, by means of which the air chambers were secured together, was painted a light grey color, and appeared to of New Zealand white pine, tVe paint looking somewhat fresh. There were no marks whatever on the raft to indicate from whence it may have come. A search was made of the beach in the vicinity of where the raft was found, but nothing else was discovered. The constable too}; possession of such parts of the raft as he c</uld remove, and .pulled the framework well up on to the beach, where it.would bo safe from the time, unless a particularly high tide came up.

Tn our issue of yesterday a number of general stock entries were advertised in Mr Newton King's Waiwakaiho Bull Fair. These lines should have appeared in tlie Waiwakaiho general stock sale to lie held on Friday next, the day after the Bull Fair.

Mothers would do well to pay a visit to Morev's, for a dainty and beautiful array of infants' muslin frocks and matinee jackets is on view. See advertisement in this issue.

Mr F. N. Whitcombe, dentist, New Plymouth, notifies that owing to his proceeding to camp early next month he will be obliged if all accounts owing to him be paid forifcpdtk