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Ashburton Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 852, 26 January 1883, Page 2

Sporting. —Bundoora is scratched for all his engagements at the Wellington Summer Meeting. The Property Tax. —The total amount of property tax paid throughout the colony up to yesterday amounted to about L 30,000. This sum, however, does not include amounts paid at post offices. Professor Fraser. —This gentleman, who is to be congratulated on the success that has attended his visit here, announces that he will be glad to meet those who wish to have advice concerning their health to-morrow, at the Somerset Hotel. Professor Fraser’s lectures have been both instructive and amusing, and he evidently possesses considerable knowledge of the subjects he discourses upon.

The Direct Steam Service. The Agent-General has cabled that at the last moment he has found it necessary to make a material alteration in the draft contract for the direct steam service to New Zealand, and was therefore unable to forw.ird a copy of the contract by the outgoing mail as he had intended. Inconsequence of the alteration he has been compelled to extend the time for receipt of tenders until April 30fch next. A copj- f the contract as amended will he sent to New Zealand as early as possible, and will be in plenty of time for colonial tenderers.

The Taxing of Bank Deposits. —lt is well known (says the London correspondent of the Argus) that very large amounts of money are deposited on interest with the London branches of colonial banks. The interest received on these deposits is liable to the income tax. Hitherto depositors have been trusted by the income tax collectors to make their own returns, and pay on these sums, together with other items of income. Whether the collectors have reason to distrust the accuracy or fidelity of these returns, or whether they are anxious to escape the trouble of collecting these amounts in detail, they have recently intimated thoir intention to require the banks to pay the tax due on all depositors’ accounts. Notice has already been given to one Australian and one New Zealand Bank, and others are expecting a similar notification in due course. This method of collecting the tax has long been adopted in respect to bank and companies’ dividends, but the attempt to extencf it to interest on deposits is causing considerable stir. It is contended that it is unfair to c impel a depositor to submit to deduction of income tax from a dividend paid by a London branch, while he would receive it intact if direct from the parent establishment in the colony, and it is feared he will adopt the simple expedient of depodt-

ing his money at, and receiving his interest from the head office in Australia or New Zealand. Thus, it is argued, the raison d’etre of the London branches will be gone. The Colonies and India , in an alarmist paragraph, says : —“The question is one of importance to trade in general, and it has also a political bearing, which we will not enter into now. But the justice of a regulation compelling the banks to become tax collectors, to their 'own immediate injury, is self-evident.” It seems to be forgotten by the writer that ,tho banks already act as income tax collectors in regard to shareholders’ dividends, and it seems rather an improbable idea that, in order to avoid a deduction of 6d in the £ on their interest, depositors will incur the trouble of sending their loose surplus to Melbourne, Sydney or Auckland to depasit with the head office in those cities. I think the London branch establishments will survive the blow. Tiio new arrangements, however, will give groat additional labor to the clerks.

Divorce.— ln the Divorce Court at Wellington yesterday, two cases were decided. The first was Maynard v Maynard and another (Gisborne). The petition was for dissolution of marriage on the grounds of the adultery of the respondent with Honi Mokai, the co-respondent. The petitioner is a butcher residing at Gisborne, and was married to the respondent, Catharine Moko, in 1866. Two children t,F :were the issue of the the marriage, both of whom were dead. In 1870 the petitioner was scouting with despatches in the Mounted Volunteers, and on his return, after an absence of two days, he found that his wife had left with a man named Thatcher. He did not have time to follow her. In 1872 or 1873 the chief of the tribe to which respondent belonged told petitioner that she was

dead, but petitioner saw his wife while living at Ormond, ne <r Gisborne, last February. One of the Maoris (Honi Mokai), with whom she was in company, said, “I have got your woman now.” He added that she had borne him one child, and another was shortly expected. Petitioner then instructed counsel to institute proceedings against her. Kawiri Karaka said he was Secretary of the “ Maori Committee ”at Tologa Bay. He knew respondent, who was now living at Tologa Bay. He slept in the same house at Honi Mokai. The Committee demanded payment of a fine from them for committing adultery. They admitted the offence, and paid the fine. This closed

the case for the petitioner, and His Honor granted a decree nisi. The other case was that of Barber v Barber (Wellington), petition for a dissolution of marriage on the grounds of his wife’s adultery with one Adams, deceased. The parties were married at Wellington in 1856, and lived together until 1869, when respondent left petitioner. Petitioner had been to church, and when he returned he learnt that his wife had gone. Subsequently he heal'd that she had gone to Australia, and had been living with a man named Adams, a fireman on board the steamer Tararua, who was drowned on the wrack of that steamer. Respondent returned to Wellington about twelve months ago, and had a child with her. Evidence was called to prove that respondent admitted that Adams was the father of the child, and that it was born in Queensland, His Honor granted a decree nisi.

Educational. —At a recent meeting of the Ashburton branch of the North Canterbury Educational Institute, Mr W. J. King, of Elgin, was chosen president, and Mr JEt. Cape-Williamson, Elemington, was re-elected secretary and treasurer. In order to meet the increased capitation to the Institute, it was decided that the annual subscription should be raised to 10s per annum.

Ministerial Movements. —The Hon. Mr Bryce leaves Wellington to-day for the West Coast of the North Island. He will inspect various Constabulary posts along the coast, and after a short stay in Taranaki will proceed to Kawhia for the purpose of making needful arrangements in connection with the opening of Kawhia Harbor. The Hon. Mr Rolleston is expected to return to Wellington from the South next week, and will then go up to Kawhia and join Mr Bryce there. The Premier will visit the South as soon as he can conveniently leave the seat of Government, and it is not improbable that His Excellency will make a tour of the South Island before long. Reaper and Binder Trial. —There was a good attendance of farmers and others at Mr Hunt’s farm, Wakanui road, yesterday, for the purpose of witnessing a trial of a Hornsby twine binder. The principal featurei of this machine are the simplicity of its construction, and the rapidity with which it works. It has al-o a fast and slow speed driving wheel for knife and binder. The trial was thoroughly satisfactory, only one sheaf out of the five acres of oats that were out being missed, and this was due to a defect in the string. It was the opinion of the farmers that were present that the Hornsby machine was the best that they had seen working in the district this season. Mr John Anderson, of Christchurch, is the sole agent for New Zealand.

Religious Conferences. —At thejWesleyan Conference at Auckland yesterday the Rev Mr Morley was appointed ta advocate a loan fund, a junior minister being appointed as his assistant. Messrs Abernethy, Dellow, Hudson, Isitt, P. Wills, and Murray were admitted fully as ministers. Messrs Lowry, Bothwell, Nowbold, Wallis, and Dean were received as candidates for the ministry, and finally were made supernumerary for one year. A deputation from the Temperance Societies of Auckland was received. A deputation was appointed to convey a friendly greeting to the Primitive Methodist District Meeting.—The Primitive Methodist Conference was formally opened at Auckland yesterday; delegates were present from nearly all the churches in the’colony. The Rev O. E. Basley, of the Thames, was elected President.

The Coming Vehicle. —Dr B. W. Richardson writes :—“ Hitherto I have written as if the advantage of tricycle-rid-ing were confined to the male sex. I would not like this to be the impression gleaned from my papers. On the contrary, I am of opinion that no exercise for women has ever been discovered that is to them so really useful. Young and middleaged ladies can learn to ride the tricycle with the greatest facility, and they become excellently skilful. One young lady, who is very dear to me, can beat me both in pace and in distance, and in a tour we have made of several miles on a beautiful country road, we have enjoyed ourselves as much as when we ride, out together on horseback, while we have a better exercise. I shall rejoice to see the time when this exercise shall be as popular amongst girls and women as tennis and the dance, for the more fully the physical life of our womankind is developed, the better for men as well as women.”

Ferrets. —A correspondent writes to the Field on the subject of introducing vermin into the colonies : “A Colonist” enquires how stoats and weasels could be procured and transported to New Zealand, but objects to ferrets as delicate. No doubt many ferrets are delicate, so would any animal become under like conditions— kept in a close hutch or old tea box among damp litter, and sometimes not taken out once in a month. But if “ Colonist ” were to take out some healthy brown ferrets, turn them into a house with a yard to it, like a dog kennel, and let the ferrets live and breed there, the young ones would grow up as healthy, strong, and wicked as stoats; and, if turned out into the bush, if they did not in a generation or two become actual polecats, they would be a very good imitation of the polecat. If a ferret escapes or is lost in a wood, it generally in a day or two makes its way to some neighboring house, where it is caught, but sometimes (though rarely) they do not return, but remain running wild. A ferret that has been running wild for a month in a wood is as active, quick, and iifficult to c itch as any stoat. 1 have seen such a case more than once. The editor of the Field warns “ Colonist ” and others that they should be o ireful in introducing foreign animals that may eventually become a scourge. He might have gone even further, and said that any man introducing an animal that might eventually become ascourge ought at the same time to introduce its antidote or natural enemies, or he might for a time upset the natural balance of nature.

Frozen Meat. —In the course of the admirable paper recently read before the Colonial Institute, Sir Dillon Bell spoke as follows regarding the prospects of the frozen meat trade ;—When the first shipment of 5,000 sheep arrived, fears were entertained that the inroad of such numbers roust have a very evil effect on 'he value of land in England; and even the Duke of St Albans said so in a letter to the Times. 1 believe any alarm of the kind to be a complete delusion. But if it were otherwise, surely it cannot be denied that if we in Australasia can afford to supply you with sweet and wholesome meat at 6d to 6id a pound, there is in it the promise of a great boon to the poorer classes, and one that will be welcomed in every household. I was saying just now that there was strong prejudice to overcome; and really, if you had to believe the butchers, you would imagine there was something dreadful and disgusting in the idea of eating frozen meat, forgetting how many millions of the human race even now subsist on frozen food for a large part of every year. I dare say some of you have read a lively and entertaining account which appeared last August in the Daily News, in which wo were told of milk sold by the cubic foot, and wine sold in lumps like coal; of the Gostinnoi market-place with its countless rows of oxen, pyramids of pigs, mountains of sheep and goats, sacks ot little fish that rattled like walnuts, blocks of salmon and

sturgeon cut out of the snow with axes, and sledge-loads of snow-white hares and reindeer lying as if asleep ; where the butcher made no distinctions about his joints, but sold them in square blocks, and whore the children gathered up the dust that fell upon the snow, for ft was powdered meat ; or of another market-place in Canada, where there were singed pigs standing uprisht, deer from the backwoods, obelisks of cod and haddock, and solid milk in columns. Even now nearly 12,000,000 of the human race are consuming a million tons of frozen food each year ; and the wonder will soon b.i that there should bo any prejudice about it in England. I ask you whether this new industry of ours is not a matter of national

importance ? And I say again to-night, as I said in answer to the Duke of St Albans’ letter, that if the land-owners and farmers of England are tempted for a moment to look askance at so novel a competition from us, they ought to think how vast is the supply that must be had somewhere every year, and how much better it is for England that she should come to us for part, rather than continue to be dependent on foreign countries for the whole.

The Volunteers. —Major Lean will be in Ashburton on Monday next, for the purpose of swearing in the Volunteers of the district under the new regulations. Lost. —A mysterious disappearance is reported from Wellington. A man named James M‘Mahon, a bottler, lost his child while at the Druids' sports on Monday, and the same night he went in search of it. Nothing has been seen of him, and it is feared that he has met with some fatality. Holloways Pills. —Nervous Debility. No part of the human machine requires more watching than the nervous system—upon it hangs health and life itself. These pills are the best regulators and strengthened of the nerves, and the safest general purifiers. Nausea, headache, giddiness, numbness, and mental apathy yield to them. They dispatch in a summary manner those distressing dyspeptic symptoms, stomachic pains, fulness at the pit of the stomach, abdominal distension, and overcome both capricious appetites and confined bowels —the commonly accompanying signs ef defective or deranged nervous power. Holloway’s Pills are particularly recommended to persons of studious and sedentary habits, who gradually sink into a nervous and debilitated state, unless seme such restorative be occaionally taken.—[Advt.]