ITEMS BY THE MAILS

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1361, 4 October 1886, Page 3

ITEMS BY THE MAILS

A BATCH OF ENOOHS,

A great sensation has been cursed at Dunkirk by the notime’y and un xpeeted return, after seventeen years’ absence, of three married fishermen. They bad been cast away in Greenland, where they have been (jo says the story) held in captivity by tbe natives. Like three Enoch Ardens they have returned to find three Phillips in their places, or, as the reports pnt It, “ their wives in the meantime had taken other husbands.” PBINOE ALEXANDER OF BULGARIA. Prince Alexander of Bulgaria Is new 39 years of age, Is brother to Prince Louis of Bittenberg, an cfficer In the English navy, and cons : n to the Grand Luke of Hesse. Be served in the Hessian Dragoons until the RussoTnrklsh war brore out, when he acted with the Russian army, and was an eyewitness of ths battle of Plevna and other campaigns The Bulgarians -chose this German Prince as their ruler but since be baa been on the throne be has suffered much from Russian intdgue. He has 2,G00,0C0 subjects, and can bring into the Asia an army of 80,000 men. A HEARTLESS HOAX. The Labrador horror turns oat to have been a huge bosx originated as a joke. The London Daily News says that the British Government displayed praise worthy alacrity in telegraphing for in formation, and the replies to their inanities havo sat the matter at rest. Toe Admiral on the station heard nothing of the distress, except to hear it denied The Governor of Ke vfonndltnd was s'ill more emphatic in his expression of incredulity ; and the Attorney-General of the province, who happened to be in London at the time, received from » private source a formal contradiction of the whole story.

THE LATE KING OF B AVARIA, Those whose du.y it is to overhanl the effects of the late King of Bavaria are finding many strange things Precious stones, cat sod uncm, have been found to the extent of a small fortune, stowed away in old stockings and sewn np In sofa cushions Love-letters to nearly sll the Royal ladies in Europe, married and sit gle, have come to light. But perhaps the most cartons memento is a box of wooden toy soldiers, each piece being labelled with the name c£ iome prominent cfficer in the *rn>y. What Ludwig ued them for no one will ever know now; but It ii supp sed that be was in the habit of holding private court martial upon them after his attendants had retired for the night.

THE NEW BISHOP OF MELBOURNE,

In the came of the new Bishop of Mel bourne there is a quaint fi ness which cannot fail to strike even these who are fond of exclaiming “ What’s in a name?" Field F.owera Goe ! So they *o ; never was a truer statement, nor one mote entirely consistent with the great doctrine of the mutability of human affairs and the transient character of life which it is the peculiar duty of a bishop to inculcts. That a prelate with such a good name shpuld have been found in Bloomsbury is another very apposite coincidence. The designation and late sphere of the new Bishop of Melbourne, when borre in mind I y those wi*h whom he is in future to be b; ought in con'act, will help him materially in teaching that great truth which is so often heard from the pulpit, that the grass wiihereth and the fi >wer fadetb.