GENERAL NEWS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2357, 25 November 1908, Page 7

GENERAL NEWS.

The tlioughtfulnesis of officers bn the various liners trading between London and New Zealand, in providing entertainment for tho passengers, has often been spoken highly of.. The last voyage of tho New Zealand Shipping Company’s liner Ruapehu to Wellington was no exception to the rule, hut calls for special mention, as an opera, written .and composed by I)r. R. Galbraith lteid, the ship’s surgeon, was staged on the ship’s spacious decks, and was an undoubted success. The dialogue is well described as brilliant and sparkling, overflowing with wit and humor, and the music is of a very high order, full of life and beautiful melodies, as a voile fully justifying tho reputanon of so. clever a musician o’ Dr. Reid. TV. whole piece was full of originality, and at the close of the performance, Captain Focbcs present pci the author and artists with h uqxiets, which were ingeniously made from carrots, turnips, etc., from tho ship s larder, which were excellent imitations of genuine bouquets of flowers.

A Sydney , man just back from his first tour through the far-out country gasps with horror when poison is mentioned (narrates a Sydney exchange). “It’s „ marvellous there’s a man alive out there,” he exclaims. He tells of the careless ways in which bushmen handle arsenic, strychnine, and other deadly drugs. I’ve seen rabbit-skins, painted with arsenic, suspended over a shearer’s dining-table. I’ve seen the stuff dripping on to the table within half a foot of a round of salt beef. On the table in tho cook’s gallev I’ve counted three strychnine bottles, two half-full, jumbled up with savico .and picklo bottles in constant use. Men treat skins with poison, handle them, pack them up, and, without washing their hands, grasp their food and help themselves with tlieir fingers. ‘Don’t eat that,’ said a cook to me. It was a bit of damper I picked up; I didn’t mean to eat it; I was merely smelling it and wondering what it was composed of. ‘A bit of poison slipped into tlie dough,’ remarked tlie'cook.”

Tho depression in the timber trade, reported from Invercargill, is not likely to be experienced in the Northern industry, says the Auckland “Herald.” The decision of Invercargill sawmillers to reduce the output by at least one-third, and' close down the mills on sth. December, is attributed by one ‘leading Auckland sawmiller to the large importation of Oregon to such placos as Dunedin, Christchurch, and Lyttelton, which formerly were large customers for the rirnu timber supplied by the Invercargill yards. It is admitted that the Auckland sawmilling trade is aict quite so good as it was, but several of the large firms have a good many orders on their hooks at the present time. It must also be recollected that Auckland is the centre of the kauri timber industry, and kauri, being one of the best timbers in the world, is always in demand. So long as kauri is available in the district there xyill be no great depression in the Auckland timber market. It is prophesied, however, that in ten years’ timo kauri will no longer be available.

The scientific expedition which returned recently from the Kermadccs made its headquarters on an island about 7260 acres in extent. The party carried on in the heat of summer, and to first accustom themselves to an open-air life whares had to be built. This entailed a large amount of labor, as, owing to the presence of rats it was unsafe to leave anything except in a wbare built on stakes with a piece of very smooth tin fastened round the bottom of tbe stake. Before leaving New Zealand tbe members of the expedition had decided they must conform to the habits of the islanders and live on the produce of the islands, with muttonbirds and goats as their flesh food supply. By the time the whares were completed/ and everybody was settled down, it was necessary to lay in a stock of mutton-birds, as these were procurable only at that time of the year. The preserving of this article of diet is an intricate process as carried out by these islanders, but tho product is much superior to the Stewart Island bird. These formed the staple flesh food, for though goats were plentiful in the hack country, it required a good deal of time and no little skill to procure them. It was expected that fish would form .a considerable item of food, hut though they were abundant, not many weie caught. The chief vegetables used were taro, yams, and bananas. English vegetables are also easily groan.