Canoeist To Visit Tahiti

AN interesting traveller, in the person of Mr. S. Alers Hankey, left Sydney early this month for Tahiti, where he will reside for some time.

Mr. Hankey is a member of a well-known English family. Forty years ago, as a youth, he was sent by his father to Australia, to the care of the late James Burns, and he saw service under Burns Philp and Co. Ltd. in Thursday Island, Norman ton and Sydney. Nowadays, his home is in Dalmatia.

Last year he went out to the West Indies with one of the modern canoes—a thing of canvas and rubber, which can be car ried in a travelling bag—and he ended some interesting months by canoeing through the Panama Canal and boarding the Ville de Verdun for Tahiti.

Then Mr. Hankey became very ill and, instead of disembarking at Papeete, he was obliged to come on to Sydney, where he underwent successfully a severe operation.

He is now gone with his canoe to Tahiti; and, if any residents of Raiatea or Moorea should see a handsome, grey-haired man of cheery disposition coming in over the reef in a kind of floating sausage-skin, they will know that Mr. Hankey has arrived.