TOPICAL READING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3138, 15 March 1909, Page 4

TOPICAL READING.

RECENT MASTERTON SHOW. The recent Master ton A. and P. Show resulted in a profit to the Association of £l3O 4s 6d. The chief items on the balance sheet were : Receipts—Donations £352 15s 6d; entry fees £421 9s 3d; privileges, £ll9 2s; grandstand, £253 5s Gd; gates, £199 12s 6d; luncheon, £155 19a 9d; total receipts, £1,595 15s. Expenditure Prizes, £BOO 10s: luncheon, etc., £2lB 2e Id; total ex-

penses, £1,465 10s fc'd. Ram Fair receipts were £IBB i2s, and payments £B3 8s 7d. Mr Summerell, Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Association, in moving the adoption of the balance sheet at the meeting of the General Committee on Saturday afternoon last, stated that the Show expenses had been considerably reduced, and he promised to furnish a detailed statement of the expenses of each department for next meeting of the General Committee. The balance-sheet was duly adopted, members commenting favourably on its satisfactory nature. EMPLOYERS' DEFENCE FUND. We fancy, says the "Mataura Ensign," that the depression which has been showing itself for some time will trve a greater effect in steadying disputes so far as the labour unions are concerned. It also affords a further justification for the formation of the employers' defence fund. Should present indications of commercial restriction be continued, employers will be forced to be the attacking parties in tbe near future. Those who have gone through previous depressions know that this has been the case in the past, and no doubt it will be the future experience. An employer cannot continue for long to pay wages oat of capital, and would be forced to seek the Arbitration Court for relief. A common fund would under such conditions be advantageous, for it would to some extent compel ' the united forces of the workers and the amployers to meet rather than the individual members of each. By this means there would be less friction, and solid agreements could be more easily arranged to regulate the various trades of the Dominion under the altered conditions produced by the depression.

THE MAORI LEGEND OF NGAURUHOE. The origin of the name Ngauruhoe is described in the legend of Tongariro. It is stated that when the Arawa canoe touched the newlydiscovered shores of Aotearoa ther;e was. among the dusky adventurezs a chief whu bore the title of Ngatoroirangi, a name which signifies in the Maori mythology a high priest or deified man. Atfer the natives had formed a settlement at Maketu, Ngatoroirangi was the first to set out, in company with his slave Ngauruhoe, to explore the new land. Striking into tha interior, he crossed the plains of Taupo, and then along the lake, into wnich he cast his staff, which the natives state became a great totara tree. He also shook his mat over the waters, and from the strips which fell from it sprang the inanga, a small fish which now abounds in the lake. It was in dark and stormy when Ngatoroirangi came to the lake, but suddenly the and he beheld for the first time the giant form of Tongariro. With the keen extincts of a heaven-born explorer, the chief re solved to ascend the great mountain, in order to get a better view of the tin-rounding country; but the snow was deep, and the ice-bound summit of Tongariro was too much for the adventurous travellers, fresh from the sunny islands of the South Seas. Prompted by the unpleasant prospect of being frozen to death, Ngatoroirangi shouted lustily to his sisters, who had tarried at Whakari (White Island), some 160 miles distant, to send him some fire. The summons was obeyed in quick time, and the sacred fire was entrusted to the hands of two taniwhas, named respectively Te Pupu arid Te Haeata, who conveyed it by a subterranean channel which is yet supposed by the natives to connect Tongariro with the still active volcanic island in the Bay of Plenty. It is related that the fire arrived in time to'save the life of the adventurous Ngatoroirangi, but, when he turned to comfort his slave he found to his horror that his trusty follower had given up the ghost. At this juncture Ngatoroirangi took the sacred fire and casting it into the extinct crater of Tongariro, the substerranean fires burst forth. On this account Ngatoroirangi named the crater Ngauruhoe, in honour of his slave.