TABLE TALK.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Issue 37, 13 February 1905, Page 1

TABLE TALK.

Another hot day. Suez mail arrived. Australia v. Auckland. Ellis sentenced tio death. - Band contest began to-day. 'Frisco mail leaves on Friday. '_ Victoria for Sydney tins evening. "Star" Summary on Wednesday. Cricket match resumed this morning. Zealandia arrived from Sydney ycster« day. Auckland Harbour Board election today. Fire gutted a 5-roomed house in Grey Lynn. Japan has ordered four battleships in England. Taylor-Carrington Company in "Never Despair." Roman Catholic Cathedral dedicated yesterday. St. Petersburg situation is regarded as, threatening. Japanese captured a fresh position on Thursday, The Aurora 'Australis was observed at Invercargill on Friday. French Chamber favours the separation of Church and State. The drowning of three young men ia reported from Palmerston North. St. Petersburg police twice flogged a wounded girl student with birch rods. M. do Witte's house has been searched and a mass of documents has been seized. The civil sittings Auckland Supreme Court will begin at __ o'clock next Monday morning. A savage bullock caused miieh alarm and did some small damage at Onehunga od Saturday afternoon. A romantic story of a young Maori girFs ekrcement was told in the Auckland Supreme Court to-day. '; At the time of his assassination de Plehve was carrying an order for the search of M. de Witte's house. The Danedin Law Society has affirmed tlie desirability of re-establishing the.' law lectureships at Otago University. The English mail via Vancouver, which" left here on December ,28, arrived in London on the afternoon of the 9th inst. A cabman and another man concerned in robbing a drunken man iv a cab at Newmarket have been sent to prison for two years. Miss Taylor, daughter Of the Harbour Board foreman of works, was rescued • from drowning by the master of the ferry boat Eagle, front which she fell into the harbour. The weekly return of the Mt. Eden Gaol shows that the total number of prisoners is 202 males and 21 females, of whom 2S males and <> females wer* received during.the week. Th recent census in Bengal reveals the fact that there are 4000 baby girls in that province alone who have been married, and of this number 600, all less than a year old, are widows. The Victorian Cabinet has decided to establish an .inebriates' retreat, but it has not yet determined whether a special institution will be-erected,-or a Kait_bl« building taken:> on. leasee for. the purpose. A train proceeding from Melbourne to •> Fort l?airy ran into a mob of qatfcle two miles from Pirron Yallock the other night. Two carriages were derailed. NC passengers were hurt, but eight bullocks were cut to pieces. The temperance crusade of tho Ker. Father Hays in Melbourne has aroused the greatest enthusiasm. The meetings have been crowded, and thousands are said to have signed the pledge as the result of the crusade. Mr Grigg, of the Thames Observatory, states that there is at present crossing the disc of the sun the largest spot he remembers having seen. To form some idea of the area, it may be mentioned that Mr Grigg calculates that, roughly speaking,, the area of the sun-spot is 5000 million miles. A well-known Kosryn Bush farmer informs the "Southland News" that young turnips are suffering severely from the ravages of a grub and the green fly. He has considerably over one hundred acres in crop; those sown early look well, but the late-sown ones have suffered so severely that an almost total failure is threatened. His Majesty's cruiser Andromeda, which sailed from Wei-hai-wei for Port Arthur after the fall of the town, carries two surgeons, and nearly the entire staff of the Government hospital, SO tons of stores, including 350 beds, and a hundred thousand pounds of provisions. Th© cargo was rushed, on board during the night, following' the receipt of official permission to go on an errand of mercy. A firm in Christehurch is exhibiting a novelty in its bedstead window, which certainly appeals to the average man who has no one to get up and make him. a cup of tea in the morning. It is in the shape of an alarm and tea-maker combined. It wakes you up, tells you the time, strikes a match, lights a spirit stove, and boils the kettle, and when boiled the kettle empties itself into a teapot, and.makes a pint of tea. . A curious incident is reported in connection with the bells of the new Roman Catholic Cathedral at Christchurch. The case containing the clappers went astray, and, notwithstanding that a strict search was made for them, no trace could be found, but a local firm of tea merchants importing some machinery received amongst others a case containing some parts the use of which they did not understand. In tbe meantime the authorities of the Cathedral heard of the case, and on'making inquiries found that it contained tbe missing clappers.