More aerial activities in the south

MR Mercer of the Aero Transport Company, Timaru, left Dunedin on Sunday afternoon in the Avro machine for Invercargill, taking Mr Mayo as a passenger. The company will be giving passenger flights in Invercargill and the surrounding districts. Mr Mercer hopes to be back again about the end of the week and will proceed to Timaru to make arrangements for having two machines in Dunedin during Carnival Week and also at Invercargill in February about the Show Week there. Mr Mercer desires to express the great indebtedness of his company to the local bodies of Dunedin and to the public generally for the way in which they have interested themselves in flying, and says that if the people in other towns display the same interest a big lift will be given to aviation. The Canterbury Aviation Company’s machine was flying at Outram on Saturday, the first flight being a half hour trip over Dunedin with Messrs D. Nichol and C. Dawson of Outram. There was a brisk demand for passages, but about 3:30pm Captain Gray had to desist owing to slight engine trouble.

Minister’s salary debated

A proposal by a church to pay its minister £250 a year and provide a manse was discussed at the last meeting of the Auckland Presbytery. The General Assembly had resolved that £300 a year should be the minimum, and the presbytery should not approve a salary less than this figure. Representatives of the congregation protested that they numbered only 48 in all, and could not guarantee more than £250. Many of their number had not an income of that dimension themselves. Eventually the salary was allowed, as it was a growing district and there seemed every prospect of the financial position of the church improving.

Prospective immigrants suggested

An immigrant from the North of Ireland, Mr Arthur Hyland, thinks that many of his countrymen would be glad to come to New Zealand if they knew of the opportunities (states the Lyttelton Times). Mr Hyland himself has just arrived by the Pakeha. He told a Post reporter that in the country districts such as in County Down there were many farmers on small holdings of 15 or 20 acres, who would do well in the dominion. They do not, however, read the big newspapers and to reach them it would be necessary to send a caravan through the country.

Macquarie Island reserve

At the Science Congress at Melbourne Sir Douglas Mawson, dealing with the subject of Macquarie Island and its future, said that on that tiny speck of land a wonderful population existed, some of the most interesting species not occurring anywhere else in the Australasian region. Australians must look to that spot for the only specimens of sea elephants and King penguins now existing in the Commonwealth dominions. The depredation of sealers had exterminated certain species and reduced the numbers of others. The continuance of this traffic unchecked would soon depopulate the island and leave it of no further scientific or economic importance. Several possible schemes for the future development of the island were outlined, but the lecturer emphasised that in his opinion the wisest plan would be the proclamation of the island as a national faunal reserve.

— ODT, 24.1.1921.