LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 29 April 1921, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The Waikato River is unusually low at the present time. Three women were elected to the Otago Hospital Board, out of seven members.

An exchange states that the' freehold properties held by the Salvation Army in New Zealand are valued at £176,997 2s fid.

Game is reported to be very plentiful in tfie Waikato district this season. In the last two months over 1000 birds have been liberated from the Cambridge Game Farm alone.

Several residents of Palmerston North claim to have been relieved of physical infirmities after placing themselves in communication with Ratana, the Maori miracle-worker.

At Eltham, after the declaration of the half-holiday poll on Wednesday night, Mr. W. J. Tristram said that the Saturday Association had estimated a majority of 200 for Saturday in Eltham, which showed how much reliance was to be placed on voters’ promises.

Local sportsmen should note that the I shooting season opens on May 2 this year and not on the Ist, as usual. The society has received notification from the Department of Internal Affairs stating that shooting licenses are only available for the district in which issued. The Taranaki Acclimatisation Society is therefore unable to endorse licenses from outside districts.

A sitting of the Native Land Court in New Plymouth opened yesterday morning, Judge Acheson presiding. The court will probably be occupied here for considerably more than a week. Today the sitting is being continued at the Magistrate’s Court, but thereafter the court will sit as usual at the Foresters’ Hall.

A winter school for teachers will be held in Stratford from May 9 to May 20. This school is being arranged by the Education Board officials in the interests of those teachers who are not yet certificated, and who are required to sit for examinations at the end of the year. < A wonderful collection of flags and war trophies obtained by the Rev. C. F. Askew for the military chapel which it is intended shall be attached to the cathedral on the site of St. Mark’s Church, Wellington, is being exhibited m the Empire City. Although there has not been ,a great deal of activity in the property market in Wanganui lately, the demand for houses is still greater than the supply, and good dairy lands are finding new* 1 owners. Last week one farm near Wanganui changed hands at £l2O per acre.

According to a recent visitor to America, the trade between the States and New Zealand is practically crippled. A 30 per cent exchange on the top of an excessive import tax will make it impossible to land goods here much under a 100 per cent advance on American prices.

“I quite agree,” said Mr. R. A. Singer, during the hearing of a maintenance cfi.se at Auckland on Saturday, “that £2 per week, is not enough to keep a woman and three children, but if husband and wife will not live together then they must suffer the inconvenience.”

New Plymouth gave Labor the answer which its policy deserves, and their best scorer was nearly a thousand votes below the Ratepayers’ Association’s lowest candidate (says the Hawera Star). The result of the elections therefore is most satisfactory, and it is clear that extreme Labor is not making the progress which its keenest supporters claim for it. The extreme Labor Party is really losing ground because the very nature of its platform makes it essential that it perish. Its fate is undoubtedly fixed and its platform must perish under the pressure of British common sense.

In the course of a speech at the military re-union in Palmerston on Saturday a senior officer told a pretty story, which is worthy of repetition. He stated that a number of returned soldiers were assembled in a hotel in the south, and were recounting the incidents of the war at great length. At last a tired civilian who had been slumbering in the corner was aroused, and asked in a loud voice: “Have you ever been in the d.t.’s ?” The answer was an emphatic “No!” “Then you have seen nothing,” was the crushing reply.— Manawatu Daily Times. A machine new to the 'Dominion arrived at Bluff by the Tarawera to the order of the Electric Light Power Board last week (says the Southland Times). This machine, which is in the form of a complete earth-boring unit, will be used in the erection of pole lines. It is complete with a special truck for transporting poles and is capable of excavating holes and hoisting and placing the poles therein. The machine is said to be an enormous saver of labor and time. It will dig holes from one to eight feet in depth and from 2 to 24 inches in diameter. The complete outfit cost something like £5OOO.

Writing under date of February 25, 1921, the Guaranty Trust of New York report regarding prices of goods in the United States:—“During the last fortnight price fluctuations have covered a narrow range, the tendency being on the whole downward, but with constantly diminishing speed. Wheat, corn, and oats have shown a disposition to go up, ai'<l beef, pork, copper, tin, and steel are wi.houf notable change, but other commodities show measurable declines from the high points of the present year, as well as from those of the corresponding period of 1920. As for the margin between wholesale and retail prices, a statement by the Department of Labor shows that while wholesale prices ot 327 selected commodities fell off 61-3 per cent in January, as compared with December, the retail prices of 43 household commodities in 51 cities showed a decline of 3 per cent. On this same basis a decline of 28* per cent in wholesale prices has occurred within the year, while the retail price decline the same period- was W» per cent Both wholesale and retail prices in January last were about 75 per cent higher than in January, 1913.”

■While financial matters were under discussion at the meeting of the Otago Harbor Board on Friday night, the chairman (Mr. N. Galbraith) drew attention to the fact that the Auckland City Council had raised a loan of £300,000 at per cent, on the London market, with the guarantee of the New Zealand Government. When Mr. Loudon and himself had been in Wellington recently the Prime Minister had restricted the board to SJ, 5y 2l and finally to 5< per cent., and they had pointed out in support of their request that the accounts of some bodies, such as the Westport Harbor Board, were guaranteed by the Government, and suggested that the Government should guarantee all these loans. Mr. Massey had replied that he was not prepared to do that, his excuse being that if the Government guaranteed thi Otago Harbor Board it would have to do it for everyone else. In his opinion, the Auckland' City Council had scored pretty decisively. Mr. McDonald: “I do not know about that. Six and a half per cent, is a fairly stiff rate of interest.” Mr. M’Donald said it seemed to him an extraordinary thing that any local body in this country should go to the London market for its loans when the five banks, operating in New Zealand held deposits of the people’s money totalling over £60,000,000. That was an amount which should make it quite unnecessary to go out of New Zealand for money. “It strikes me,” added Mr. M’Dohald, “that the interest charges will soon become too heavy for those who have to obtain money.”

This evening, Mr. C. G. Bottrill, M.A., will give the first lecture in a course on Economics in connection with the Workers’ Educational Association. Nowadays political economy is a subject that arouses very general interest, and no one should fail to take advantage of hearing 4,ts problems sot forth and discussed*

! Wires a News advertiser: “Overrun with applicants. Please withdraw advertisement.” Commercial travellers follow the money. Of all the provinces in New Zealand, Taranaki is said to have been least affected by the slump. Taranaki has now become the Mecca of the commercial traveller, and on a recent day there were no fewer than 40 “commercials” in Hawera —36 of whom were located in one hotel.—Dominion.

Whitta, the bookmaker who was sentenced in Christchurch to a term of imprisonment for violation of the antibetting law, is being released by the Government (writes our Wellington correspondent). The reason for this decision is not officially announced. The campaign against bookmakers is languishing somewhat at present and in the meantime betting’ cards circulate as usual and bets are made by bookmakers without much attempt at secrecy. The suppression- aimed at by Parliament seems etill to be a long way off.

Mr. A. Mabin, who is representing New Zealand in the negotiations with the British-Australian Wool Realisation Association, had a conference with the directors in Melbourne at the end of last week, but his report has not yet reached the Government (writes our Wellington correspondent). He is finding his task more complex than he expected and some time may elapse before he is able to make definite recommendations on a basis of the association’s suggestions. The month of May promises to provide an unprecedently active period at the port of New Plymouth, as no fewer than five ovefseas liners, besides the routine coastal shipping, are due to arrive here then. The Port Pirie is to sail fron; New Plymouth for Port Chalmers to-morrow at noon, and on Sunday her berth will be filled by the Port Hacking, which is now loading at the Wanganui roadstead. The Port Hacking will take in 9000 freight carcases of meat. The Waimate is due shortly after and will w<e 6700 carcases of meat. In quick succession will follow two vessels from New York, the West Wind and the City of Winchester, the latter being due on May 14. The Commonwealth Line steamer Australcrag, from the Continent with a large cargo of slag and general merchandise, is also due next month.

There were some particularly fine blooms at the chrysanthemum show held yesterday under the auspices of the New Plymouth Horticultural Society. Indeed never before in New Plymouth has there been so good an exhibition of these beautiful autumn flowers. One authority, whose business takes him to all the principal flower shows in the Dominion, expressed the opinion that he had never seen a better show anywhere. Nearly all the exhibits were meritorious, and the judge had no light task in awarding theorizes. Mr. J. Scanlan took the champion prize, and Mr. Loftus Ptea was we.ll in the running. Mr. L. B. Webster exhibited some fine blooms. The beginners’ classes were well filled with flowers of exceptional quality, and next year will assuredly be heard of in the more ambitious classes. Those who did not attend the show missed a veritable treat. Full details are published elsewhere in this issue.

A man named Jeremiah Crowley, who was arrested in Napier last week on a charge of failing to maintain his wife, arrived in New Plymouth last night under escort, and will be brought before the Court this morning.

“Fairy Wonder” washing powder makes light work of a heavy wash. This wonderful labor-saving compound is to be. found in thousands of homes throughout the Dominion, where it is now considered to be absolutely indispensable. Once tried always used. Of all grocers.