Silverware for brass band

The Balclutha brass and pipe bands met with a great reception on their return from the Invercargill country bands contest yesterday morning. Over 600 people were congregated on the railway station, and the deputy Mayor (Mr Wood) congratulated both bands on their success. The brass band did particularly well, winning both quickstep and selection, and were also first in the quartet and second in the solo cornet competition. They secured about £40 in prize-money, several medals, and also won the Begg silver cup for aggregate points —390, as against Bluff 360½, Mataura 351¾, Riverton 303. The pipe band were third in the quickstep, won by Wyndham, with Southland second, and were second to Wyndham in the selection, with Southland third. Mataura, Tuatapere and Gore also competed in this event. In the aggregate for quickstep and selection Balclutha Pipe Band came third, Wyndham being first and Southland second. Balclutha Pipe Band was the only one to play its full complement of members right through, others resorting to the "weeding out" process, and the Balclutha players were immensely pleased because they were awarded the second highest points for music in both quickstep and selection. The local bands are to be accorded a complimentary social and dance in the Oddfellows’ Hall on Saturday night.

Layer of hair affects hearing

Doctors have always condemned the habit of wearing the rosettes of hair over the ears. One medical man, writing on the subject some time ago, said "The fashion has little to recommend it. An ear, if dainty, is an ornament, and therefore should not be hidden, and even if it be not dainty it is part of a wonderful organ of sense, and should not be handicapped in its functions. The flap of the ear is for the purpose of collecting and conveying soundwaves to the drum of the ear, and to cover up the ear-flap is to hamper the sense of hearing. If the orifice that leads to the drum be covered, there may in time follow considerable and permanent impairment of the sense of hearing, for, like all other organs, the ear is bound to suffer if disused or used inadequately. The drum of the ear is a very delicate mechanism, with membrane, muscles and bones all adjusted so as to vibrate in response to very faint sounds, and if it be covered up so that the fainter and tinier waves of sound fail to reach it, it will lose its sensitiveness, as fingers used only for coarse work lose their delicacy of action and touch, and become clumsy or stiff. Further, Nature left the ear open to air and light, as far as the drum, and if it be deprived of both it will be rendered anaemic and less resistant to disease."

Pennies decapitated

To make two pound notes from one, by the skilful splitting of the paper, has been the harmless diversion of quite a few people since an ingenious rogue in the north gained some notoriety by his successful passing of notes so treated. A deception of an even meaner sort than that of the northerner was practised on a Dunedin tram conductor on Wednesday night when he was tendered, for a twopenny ride, two pieces of copper that, in the bustle necessitated by a full car, were put into his bag without question. When he came to count his returns at night, however, he found among his cash two halves of pennies. The coppers had been neatly split, and it is quite easy to understand that they would be readily accepted by anyone in a hurry. It is presumed that they 
were prepared by someone with designs towards easy money in a "two-up" school, as each of the faces bears the Queen’s head, and the application of some adhesive substance would be all that is necessary to make of them an ideal "double header". — ODT, 10.11.1922