“The Decameron.”

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 March 1939, Page 4

“The Decameron.”

Decision was reserved by Mr F. H. Levien, S.M., in a case in which Howard Keddell Sumpter, a principal of the London Book Club, was charged with hiring an indecent document to a plainclothes constable. The hearing began on Friday, defendant pleading not guilty. Defending counsel admitted that the book, “The Decameron,” was one of hundreds on the shelves of the lending library and it was not denied that the constable selected the book for hiring. Counsel contended today that, regarded as a whole, the book was not indecent.

Missed by Inches. Apparently fired from a .22 calibre rifle, a bullet burst through the glass of a window of a front bedroom in the home of Mr Reuben Richards, Kohimarama, shortly after 8 o’clock on Monday night, passing within inches of Mr Richards, who was preparing for bed at the time. The bullet penetrated a double wall on the other side of the room and was recovered from a cardboard box containing silk in an adjoining linen cupboard. After penetrating the window and curtain the bullet must have passed within several inches of Mr Richards’s head before going through a thickness of plaster wallboard and the fairly heavy wooden lining of the linen cupboard. Woo! Guarantee.

A meeting of members of the Farmers’ Union and woolgrowers in Taumarunui to consider a guaranteed price for wool rejected the proposal and adopted a resolution that the meeting was definitely of the opinion that it would be detrimental to the industry for the State to control the sale of wool. The meeting recommended the appointment of a committee by the Farmers’ Union to collect statistics and ascertain to what extent the industry needed assistance and to open negotiations with the Government for a discussion of the most equitable manner in which benefits could be applied. A motion expressing the view that the most equitable and satisfactory assistance would be a flat rate bonus on all wool said by producers was lost. Peat Land Drainage. Drainage difficulties confronting settlers in the Woodlands district near Hamilton were brought to the attention of the Minister of Public Works, the Hon R. Semple, yesterday morning when he received a deputation from the Woodlands Settlers’ League. Farmers in the area were paying high maintenance rates from which they were not getting any benefit, said Mr Allen, M.P. The settlers needed machinery which would break in the land and bring it to a high state of productivity. The Minister of Agriculture, the Hon Lee Martin, stated that after seeing the area on Monday, he had undertaken to have a report prepared on the proposals, and he hoped that the departments concerned would be able to co-operation in the matter.

Old Shell Discovered. The discovery of an old shell, about 14 inches in length and four or five inches in diameter, was made by Mr T. Smith underneath the flooring of a room in his house in Harrow Street, Dunedin. Mr Smith found the shell half buried in the.ground when he was making alterations to the floor of the room, and it is now lodged at the Central Police Station for safe., keeping. The cap is still in the shell, but whether it is still alive only an expert could tell. For its size it is particularly heavy, probably weighing 401 b. or 50 lb., and the casing is made of iron, which is badly rusted and corroded with age. There are marks on the casing which seem to indicate that it has been fired through a gun, but as it must have lain under the house for approximately half a century it is difficult to tell whether the lead markings are the result of rifling or corrosion.