GENERAL ITEMS.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume VI, Issue 573, 10 January 1882, Page 3

GENERAL ITEMS.

Obituary.—Ralph Bernal Osborne, the well-known politican, aged 08, and Professor John William Draper, the American savant, aged 71, The following interesting and novel information is given by a writer in Truth (London) :—lt is pretty generally known by mistresses of servants who have tho ill-luck to live near Knightfbridge or other barracks that the best looking among the soldiers are in the habit of charging a small sum to servant maids for the privilege of being seen in public with them. It may interest some of our readers to know the tax tariff, which I heard from a pretty little nursemaid at Kensington the other clay. A private charges one shilling for an evening or a Sunday walk, a corporal eighteen pence, and a sergeant two shillings. A. busby, however, raises the charge ver}- much, and a piivate in a bushy isnottobe secured under half-a— crown. The price of a sergeant thus adorned my informant was not able to give me, such a costly luxury as that being beyond the horizon of her imagination. Tiie gallant escorts exact a certain ! .-im-l'ird of toilette in their companions, ■ Lui'l M 0 m.iOn.-tood that gloves aro de ! rifjuaur on tbi.'.e o>.'-'''a.- ions.

CaptaiX B.'TT, hi tee X.rifa, has received a telegram from Wellington rerpie*tin_r him. ou bis return home, to bring up at Wellington Heads, as the Wellington yachts had arr n?"d to- give him a good reception, ami warn!.l welcome i.io Xarifa's return by orming an escort to her up the harbor. JiJ.-T .fter twelve o'clock ihis mornin : (says Saturday's Lytteltnu 7'im."s), the unusual spectacle of two fires at one time was to be seen in Christchurch. In Hereford street the Onion Bank wan found to be on fire, while a little further away Mr D. Reese's timber ynrd was a roaring sheet of flame. The brigade were busily employed for several hours in getting the flames under mastery, the bank, strange to say, giving them more trouble than the largo timber yard. Ihe bank was insured for £8000, and the timber yard for £23C0. The bank is said to bo fully covered, but Mr Reese calculates his loss at about £2000. Captain Brown of the ship Phasis, from Calcutta, reports picking up Captain Schultz, of the Dutch ship Alblasserwaard, and eleven of the crew, under the following circumstances :—The ship Alblasserwaard lelt Shields on August 11th for Batavia, with a cargo of co ds. She was off Amsterdam Island on November 26 at 6 a.m., when it was discovered that sulphurous gas was escaping from the after hatch, next at the main hatch, and before night from all parts of the ship. The crew were put to work to get at the fire below, but gas came up so fastthat they could not reach the seat of the fire. They started to heave the cargo overboard, and continued to do so until the afternoon of the 28th, when tbecrewgaveoutexbaustecl. The ship's position was 37 S,, 81 E., with the wind strong from the N.W. Finding that the flames below bad got uncontrollable possession, they took to the boats, the chief officer and ten men in one, and the master and eleven iv the other. Water and provision as much as could be safely taken were put into the boats and the position taken, distant 200 miles eastward of Amsterdam and St Paul's Islands. A heavy sea separated the boats the night the ship was abandoned Captain Schultz steered for Kerguelen's lantfto the SOW., and after seven days of hoping against hope, and of methodical economy, bordering on stavation, his boat fell into company with the Phasis. She bad then travelled between 600 and 700 miles.