of the staff. The Club set up a darkroom with its own equipment, held outings, and arranged lectures and demonstrations on photography. Many members of the staff made good use of the Department's Library, which besides its legal tomes and ancient gazettes has a lighter section for general reading, a radio-gramophone and a mahjong table.
184. The usual informal Christmas Eve party was held in the Land Office, on which members of all other branches converged in the after- noon to exchange Christmas greetings. As in previous years, the legal officers, Assistant Registrars and Executive Officers met for lunch together every three or four months.
Acknowledgments
185. It falls to me once again to acknowledge with very sincere thanks the unfailing and energetic support of all the officers of the Depart- ment, most of whom had to contend with an ever-mounting volume of work. Since the authorization and recruitment of new staff inevitably lags behind the tide of new business, some of the Branches were very hard pressed and delays in some types of cases could not be avoided in spite of much work done outside normal office hours. The difficulties of the Department were, however, fully appreciated by the Solicitors, Account- ants and others with whom it has much to do, and for their friendly co-operation and forbearance I and the Department in general are very grateful. Our thanks are also due to the various Government Depart- ments for whose help, advice and co-operation we have had occasion to call in the course of dealing with many aspects of our work.
22nd September 1965.
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W. K. THOMSON, Registrar General.