LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1728, 30 December 1887, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

An accident oocurred to Mr J. Ward last evening. While driving a trap • the horse suddenly started kicking and smashed the shafts and other portions of the vehicle. Mr Ward sustained some injuries, but not of a Borious nature, and this morning he had almost completely recovered from tho accident. The horse was injured severely by oneof the broken shafts. i Mr Henry James' Annie Laurie, 5 years, was accidentally omitted from the entries for the Tinwald Maiden Plate. Mr A, E, Merewether'a br g Piokwick is scratched for the Tinwald Hurdles. At theR.M. Court this morning, before Mr D. Williamson, J.P., and Mr T. Bullock, £P., Thomas Wilson, for having been drunk on the Railway Station, was fined ss, and for having resisted Constable Smart waa fined 203 with the alternative of 3 days' imprisonment. A first offender was fined ss. James McNeill, for wilfully exposing his person, was ordered to be imprisoned for one oalendar month with hard labor. Some three yeara ago Messrs Anketell and Burrup, of tbe Union Bank of Roeburne, Western Australia, were murdered, and up to the present the murderers have not been dis. oovered. Three men were arrested for the orime but were discharged. One of these, named Bevan, was arrested lately on a charge of attempted wife murder. He tried to cut her throat, and stabbed her twice m the side. She is m a very precarious condition, but may possibly recover. An instance of the rapid strides made m the cyole business is to be found m the prospectus issued by Budge and Co., Coventry, who now" propose to merge their ooncern into a limited liability company. In tbe prospeotus it is stated that the business done by the firm during tbe second quarter of 1881 waß £6185 ; for the same period of 1885 it had increased to £51,163; orders for 2000 maohioes bad to be declined during the : present year, The net average profit on each machine is said to exoeed £12 ; the promoters hold out the tempting bait of 12 per cent, tc intending shareholders. Mr Molntosh, of Inveroargill, is urging the desirability of establishing a National Indus. : trial Bank of New Zealand. He proposes tc start a concern with a capital of twelve and a half millions m 600,000 shares of £25 eaoh, , the object being to obtain money m England at three and four per cent., and lend it oui here at an advance of one per cent., to do the business of building and land societies oe a large scale, and assist the development oi manufactures and local industries with chest, money* We (" Otago Daily Times ") have been shown a very ingenious oontrivance for brand. I ing sheep, woolpaoks, eto., whioh is at presenl 1 being infroduced to the notioe of Otagc flookowners. It is known as " Bowern'f [ eleotric sheep brand," and it is claimed thai ' it will brand 1000 sheep with one filling. The 1 oontrivance is remarkably simple. The brand , has only to be filled with tar or paint and adjusted to the clip to make it ready for use, It was recently tried at Burnside, when a pen of 40 sheep was branded m two minutes, j The brand is the invention of Mr Bowern, ol the North Island, and Mr H. Young is the agent for the South Island. Speaking at Newcastle recently, Sir H Parkes said that it would be very easy by one stroke of the pen to wipe out the New South Wales deficit, by breaking up the land into blocks of 1000 and 1500 acres, and offering them m tbe English market. He waß not altogether against such a method. They ' must either employ some such method, oi . gradually wipe oif the deficit by the surpluses, whioh they hoped to show m future, and oi ' whioh the late Financial Statement gave promise. It is stated that out of some 40,000,000 I gallons of brandy produced and sold m France annually, a large quantity of whioh finds its way into foreign markets, not more , than 12J per cent is made from the grape vir c The remainder is produoed from rice, beet- * root, maize, molasses, and fruit moats, the quantity of wine grown m France being entirely inadequate for distillers' require- • ments. Here is a chance for California, Australia, the ' Cape, and other countries, ambitious to enter the field, to make a big [ trade by supplying pure wine brandy to the - world's markets. ' Hannah More had a good way of managing talebearers. It is said that whenever she was told anything derogatory of another, her " invariable reply was, " Come, we will go and ask if this be true." The effect was some. 1 times ludicrously painful. The talebearer was taken abaok, stammered out a qualification, or begged that no notioe might be taken of the statement. But the good lady was . inexorable ; off she took the scandalmonger to the Boandalised, to make inquiry and compare aocounts. It is not likely that F anybody. ever a seoond time ventured to [ repeat a gossip story to Hannah More. One . would think her method of treatment would , be a Bure cure for scandal. F On Saturday afternoon a little boy named Quick was playing near Buchanan's paddook i and was engaged m that popular but most dangerous diversion of riding on the tail of a cart, when he suddenly fell m front of an express The driver made frantic efforts to stop, but he could not do so until the wheels had passed over the boy's chest crushing him terribly. He lay, by last accounts, m a most preoarious state. His mother was within two yards of the scene at the time.—" South Canterbury Times," There is, remarks the " Wanganui Herald," m the Caversham Sohool a bright-faced oherry-looking damsel who has made what we should think may be regarded as a champion record m respect to atteadanoe, Jane Leal, that ie her name, has never once been marked as an absentee during the eight years she has been on tho roll, and for about five years of thiß period she has had to walk three miles to tbe school and three miles home aga>n. The teachers have subscribed for a medal to be presented to " Jenny " as a tokon of their appreciation of her zeal and general good behavior.