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Cromwell Argus, Volume I, Issue 33, 29 June 1870, Page 5

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, ; . (Fivmoiivown Qgrj't /.■,>}■k, Recently the weather Uiiii \<* '" > of, the day. What u f:.y, mk. f,, ' j says everybody. Uut\ Aw •,,'•'■' u\ ;|' ' busy in every branch required : i * son-—ploughing, threslui:'", -f : :' ■ they smile complacently ajj. ibV * inches of green wheat il 1 '■?;;;. / / ground : they even go ihi !<:)'.,'.!'. ,- ■ ting that things could liar liy' !c•' /.. The miners have been in the ; .i>/.. " fi. ' ward',' predicament: plenty of -,.■::•• (or operations, and no frost to contend whh ; state of affairs quite .uupm.[>(h»,utipd! i■■•, tills time of the year. They hjive Hm\ :io citoppage, and fully the average yield of gold 's the result ".'.'. -' i ' ' ' . .' ■; )\.S*tyi:faw liast Thursday; however the ; we«\tuer. became a trifle too open. Prom \ that 1 afternoon till Saturday mdrnfng, cessant, 'pelting', pitiless rain—cuWainating in another great flood of the A rroV, • From. accounts received, it seems' I 'the damage was done in the Twelve-mile *iktrict. Every claim on that creek and the Arrow river there has suffered more or less, Down the river, the damage done i:i''sak! to be trifling, till, at the township, the pent-up waters broke through the dam of the Chinese claim. Daylight oil Saturday ; shewed it A waste of desolation, the torrent tearing over the eight months' work of from 20 to 40 Chinamen. •""John" caariof safely be called a favorite in the count??, and possibly with some reason ; hut here he has at least earned respect by the indoand -systematic raethod in which he has tackled/ground lying untouched for many years, and which, butfor him, would have lain untouched for as many more. They have had everything either swept away or buried—the 'two water wheels and pumps in the i;.t;er class. The claim has cost them upwards of £I2OO. The flood on the Shotover has been equalled. Fears have been that the water might some day cut-off, communication at the new bridge. On Saturday, this was all but the case. Die flat at the Queenstown end of the-.bridge was completely submerged, travellers on horseback finding the water up to the saddle flaps, and that, t»o, with a conquerable current. The water in the. was backed up till within a few inches 1 o£ the level of Lake Wakatip. The land sale of small sections aroad i Lake Hayes took place on Saturday, :nd all the lots offered were disposed of. ,'ilu's i 8 one of the most picturesque sj;o!:s iv all onr wild lake and mountain region- 5:. desirable sites for residences couid har< be found, even in an auctioneers ad tisement; and the little blocks of i two to five acres brought from upset r> to £7 per acre. It requires little effort iimagine this in a few years the St. Kitd? of the district. The Education Reserves' leases for a term of 21 years, and the prices were doubtless most satisfactory to 'd Board, reaching as high as 21s 6d per at per annum. Surely land is looking up ; although 110 farmers and others 'did- Sflnc 1 a petition to the Provincial Cour.eii i'.:i other day, stating, amongst other thil" that more land was not wanted hexa. is a strange anomaly and worthy of mark that many who bought the lesses the high prices which ruled on Saturn. actually signed the petition in question. So we are to-have a TelegSpr. ststtk.*. at last: the General Government has ..decreed it. It is not a moment tor socr.. We get our Dunedin mails in batches c-' from two to four now, but, at all tinifip, this may be unavoidable, and we may noi - be any worse off in this respect than cur neighbours. But the wire : if we had the wire, we would require to suffer neither loss nor great inconvenience; we could afford to wait a day or two for letters. .'{'•, -,.' have wanted it so long, proves the iotgsuffering and patience of. the Arrawiie:;; and in the matter of streets, these virtu" B are also prominently displayed. Thi recent rains have washed away about half yS t'le mud—the accumulation of weeks ; ,ar.d the townspeople feel inclined to relinquish tie idea of appealing to the Humane society for life-buoys, to be placed at interv.ils along the main street. The n;t>.\-.. tion of that highway still requires, uWever, pretty Jong boots. Where is tko Improvement Committee} In a local $ - par lately, some one took the libert • ,'. suggesting the brilliant idea of a municipality for us. This sounds nicely; tha Mayor, and Councillors So-and-so, better still; and best of all would be the handling of a few hundred pounds bestowed by a paternal Government. We presume; ho?;-U. ever, that by attending to our own particular business we may be successful aiul respectable townspeople without such a institution; without taxing ourselves j* without scheming what to do with s. much money, and probably—as in tli caso of a neighbouring city—being forcea, to buy wooden kerbstones with it for inm/ ginary streets; and, lastly, without rur ning the risk of, in the bustle of public busiuess, the fervour of eloquence, and th heat of debate, making pretty consider?, fools of ourselves into the bargain. I A perfect cue-er.—Cook, the champion V>iiit!, •Waycr.

Sdnd Foreign News, (Buroptan Mail.) who assassinated Madame Lamia condemned to death, ;e Grey has joined the Ladies' soeiation for the repeal of the s Diseases Act" 10, on the arrival of a steamer rood at Belfast quay, the conlized a suspicious-looking box, i opened, was found to contain > pikes, rifles, and a quantity of ammunition. It was directed to a person in Belfast, who has claimed it. It is in the possession of the police. The Water/ord Mail of sth April was issue 4 in full mourning, without a leader, but containing the following announcement :—'" Death, by violence, on April 4, 1870, affor the Act of Union, and by the act of the British Parliament, the Liberty of the Press in, Ireland.'', The Irishman jot April 8 placed two of its articles in mourning, in token of,the passing of the Coercion Act, and published what it called the " death-warrant of liberty of speech in Ireland," and gave notice to its readers of its submission to the law thus:—■" On liberty of the press in Ireland! There is no liberty of the press in Ireland." A shocking tragedy was perpetrated on April 6, in the village of Prinl&ws, near Leslie, Fifeshire. A man named Wyse shot his wife through the breast with a gun, and then committed suicide. A son, who worked in an adjoining quarry, on going to dinner found the mother and father dead, in a : pool of blood; one barrel of the gun was loaded, and it is supposed that after shooting his wife he missed himself with the first shot, then reloaded, and discharged with the ramrod. . Wyse, who was a rabbit-catcher, had displayed signs of great mental excitement several days previous to the frightful occurrence. acquittal of Prince Pierre Buonaparte! upon all the criminal charges brought against him in respect of-killing Victor Noir, and firing at De Fonvielle, wub pronounced by the grand jury at Tours, on Sunday, March 27. With some inconsistency, however, the Court afterwards awarded the relations of Victor Noir, or ratler Salmon, .£IOOO, to be paid by the Prime, aR well as the costs of the proceed, iny. The Prince was very enthusiastically recived by his, friends. In deference to pulic opinion" the Emperor—as by Art. 6 of the Senatus Consultum of 7th Nov. 'lß)',}, he has full authority over all his i^^farily —ordered Prince Pierre Buonaparte Franoe for an indefinite period. |fte prince, who seems to have been in no to leave, has, it is said, just taken. Bdeparture for Switzerland. BpA. shocking fire occurred at Cardiff, in on April 9, which resulted in the of four lives. At about two o'clock in the morning the Glamorgan Hotel in that town was found to be in flames, which Vd obtained a complete hold of the buildmg before the discovery was made. The ■nfortunate inmates, the daughter of the landlord, aged 30 ; two grandsons, aged three and five respectively ; and Alfred Giles, aged 30, the ostler, were all so Miindly wrapped in slumber as not to be ■uused until the flames were upon them Bd escape was impossible. The four latter ■ere burnt to a cinder, but Mr Stacey is let alive, although so fearfully burnt about [he body that his recovery is almost impossible. A lodger, Captain Manning, was aroused by Mr Stacey, who told him the place was on fire, and how to escape by the back way, and then went to arouse the other inmates, when he was himself down by the flames. The building w£>s completely gutted. The origin of the fire is unknown. \ The information communicated by the 1 Aberdeen clipper Alexander Duthie, Capt. .T'TDouglas, which arrived in London on 9th April from Melbourne, creates a hope that the crew of one, at least, of the several missing ships from Australia and New Zealand have reached land. On the 6th January, when about twenty miles off the North Cape of the Aucklands, the thick weather which bo frequently envelops those dangerous islands- suddenly lifted, and shortly afterwards several fires were seen fbh the brow of a cliff. The desiro to rescue these castaways was, of course, uppermost in the mind of Captain Douglas, and the small chart in the margin of Imray's " South Pacific " wag anxiously consulted. The returning fog, the wilderness of the sea, the strong current, the precipitous character Of what the flying nature of the wind made at times almost a lee-shore, and i the probability of the wind shifting and it quite so, combined with the 'tenderness of the ship, at last decided [Capt Douglas in deeming it too serious a risk to attempt to allow either his vessel or a boat's crew to endeavour to communicate. To this decision he was in Bome degree reconciled: by the knowledge that depots containing provisions, slops, guns, ammunition, &c, are -publicly advertised as having been for some time established on various parts of the islands for shipwrecked mariners, and that they are every i now and then visited l by vessels of one „ kind or another, under the direction of the L "New Zealand Government, with a view ] their replenishment and the rescue of who may have landfxl j

On April 4, Cook, the then champion played a match at billiards with Stanley, at the Macksworth Arms Hotel, Swansea, on a Burroughes <k Watts' table, when Cook made the unprecedented break of 531, being 19 more than his best previous break. A fearful tragedy took place on April 18, at a house in the Rue du Cardinal Fesch, Paris. A stranger rushed at a banker named Espir, as he was going out, and dealt him a blow over the head with a loaded cane. * Espir stepped back, drew a sword-stick, and ran the assailant through the body. Both are dangerously, and it is believed mortally, wounded. The second match for the billiard championship took place in the large hall of St. James's Hall on April 14. The competitors were William Cook, juii., who gained the title of champion after an exciting contest with John Roberts, sen., on February 11, and John Roberts, jun., the eldest son of the last-named. The match was for £200; and the possession of the valuable challenge-vase presented by Messrs Burrougheß and Watts, Cox and Teman, and Thurston and Co., the three most distinguished firms connected with the manufacture of billiard tables. Roberts, after an exciting struggle, was declared the victor, by 478 points. Madame Patti is said to have discovered behind the scenes of the St. Petersburg Opera House a youthfuf prodigy. The child in question, a girl nine years of age, had heard Madame Patti several times in the part of Margherita, and imitated her singing to such . perfection that once, on making her exit, she fancied that the repetition of the notes she had just bee* singing must be the work of an echo. Finding, however, that it proceeded from a clever and well-endowed little girl, she offered to adopt the yonng songstress ; and, this proposition having been declined by the parents, she procured her admission into the St. Petersburg Conseryatoire. The name of this interesting little phenomenon is Adler. The hearing of a case in which the Rev. John Jackson, the rector of Ledbury, Herefordshire, is charged with immoral conduct towards two of his former servants, has occupied the Court of Arches for several days. Sir J. Karslake was engaged for the defence. Mr Griffiu, the surgeon who attended Parry, one of the servants, during her confinement, related a conversation that had taken place between her and himself, the substance of which was that she charged the paternity of her child on a man to whom she said she was engaged to be married. A statement to this eflect vas also written and signed by her. Several other witnesses who had been fellow-ser-vants of the two women spoke of their indecent behaviour and questionable character. Judgment has been deferred. The journals of Toulouse have published accounts of a mysterious murder at Boiix (Haute-Garonne). A tailor disappeared more than two inontliß back, leaving a wife and three children. He had attended a fair at Saint-Beat, where he went to pay a debt of 800fr., and was seen at an inn with his creditor, who had been overheard to say to him, " Pay me the interest only, and leave the capital to another time." A short time back an anonymous writing was picked up in a street of Saint-Beat, bearing the words, " Search the cellars of the town and you will find the man you are looking for." The authorities of the town made a perquisition, aided by dogs, and discovered some human remains in a vault beneath the inn in which the tailor had been last seen. The body had been cut into pieces, and buried beneath a thick layer of salt, by which it had been preserved from decomposition. At a West End circus may be witnessed a sight which ought to satisfy the most exigent appetite for sensationalism. Fraiilein Laura may, for a small sum of money, be seen traversing a wire with a child on her back any evening. The height at which the journey is undertaken proves how thoroughly well the director of the sport understands the special attraction of it. If the Fraiilein slipped, if her nerves failed her for one instant, she would, beyond a doubt, bo smashed like an egg in the sawdust, and be picked up either a corpse or a maimed and quivering woman with bijpken limbs. One would imagine that when the Fraiilein had gone through a gamut of deadly hazards—now staggering over the rope with baskets on her feet, now making the voyage blindfolded—that she had done enough in all conscience to excite the enthusiasm of the spectatora But no ; the interest of the exhibition is further increased by the addition of a burden on the back of the performer. The weight with which the woman is handicapped is only a little child. The tiny creature is strapped across the shoulders of the Fraiilein by a fine, spirited assistant of the male gender, who tackles the baby to its post with the most engaging dexterity and politeness. When the job is so far got over, the Fraiilein starts on her wire walk, pausing in the middle of it to play for a second or so with the tender sensibilities of her patronß for the evening. When she arrives at the goal the cheei-B of the assembly are deafening, and the little soul whose little body has furnished the spiciest condiment for I the delectablo treat is called out to receive the special honour of a greeting from the i a'udidnce. f

An attempt is being made to cultivate the Japanese tea-plant in California. 27,000 trees have been imported. Mr Edmund Phelps, the actor, son of Mr Samuel Phelps, has died suddenly in Edinburgh. The deceased was on a tour with Miss Marriott. Maryland (U.S.) proposes to punish prize lighters and their trainers by imprisonment of from one to five years, and spectators of a prize-fight by a fine of from 100 to 1000 dollars. On April 12, Mr Cox well ascended in a balloon from the Gasworks ot Hornsey, and travelled thirty-five miles in an hour and a half, descending some miles beyond Chelmsford. A week or so previously he and his pupils made the first ascent of the season from the neighbourhood of Tottenham; the descent being made four miles north of Bishop-Stortford. M. de Beriot, the once famous violinist, and who was even better known to the last generation as the husband of the great Madame Malibran, has recently died at Louvain, in the 68th year of his age.. For years past he had been blind and paralysed, and lived habitually in Paris, but had lately returned to his native town, Louvain, where he was attacked with his fatal illness. The emigration movement, which has begun for some time past to resume its activity, is not confined to Cork. Large numbers of emigrants for the United States, British-America, and Australia, are leaving Belfast by the Liverpool packets. They are described as coming principally from the northern counties, and as including several operatives from the town itself. A very sad death from burning occurred at Frome on March 26. Lady Lopes, of East Hill House, Frome, was the unfortunate victim of the fire. On the previous day, Miss Archer, her companion, left her in the dining-room for only a few minutes. During her absence the footman suddenly heard shrieks and the violent ringing of the dining-room bell. Hastening to the scene, he found the door barricaded by her ladyship's body. Opening the door, he saw that Lady Lopes was lying on the floor, her clothing entirely consumed, her flesh charred, and her hair was burnt to a cinder. The carpet was:on fire in two or three places, and the curtains were also in flames. Lady Lopes had taken horse exercise in the day, and on her return had put on a thin muslin dress, in spite of the remonstrances of her attendant. While standing with her back to the fire the thin material must have ignited. She continued sensible until within a short time of her death. Lady Lopes was seventy years of age. On April 8, a man who goes by the name just now of " Walker," but who has several aliases, was committed for trial bv the magistrates at Bilston for robbing a widow of a sovereign. The man is, perhaps, fifty years of age, and appeared in the dock wearing dark-coloured clothing and a white neckcloth. His habit had been to get some knowledge of the domestic relations of needy widows ; and then, representing himself at one time as a Methodist preacher, and at others as a man of wealth who believed it to be " his mission, as a well-to-do Christian, to promote the wellbeing of widows," visit them at their houses, read the Scriptures, to them and their children, and pray with them. After such preludes, he usually found little difficulty in obtaining refreshment, arid by-and-by in inducing his victims to believe that he was in earnest when he protested his intention of marrying them, and placing them and their families beyond all further want in this life. In the case under notice he had seduced as well as robbed his victim, with the promise that "she should be made his wife next morning." The money was all she possessed, and was the product of the sale of the clothes of her husband, »vho had been a postman in Bilston. There was a heavy equinoctial gale at New York on March 27, which caused great destruction of property and the sacrifice of many lives. The storm had full sweep in the bay and the East River, and the tide, influenced by the easterly wind, rose to an unusual height. In the afternoon, a large unfinished five-storey brick building fell with a terrible crash. The wall on the west side toppled over on a one-storey brick building, occupied by Benjamin Donnelly, his wife, and four children, who were buried in the ruins. With the exception of a boy named Charles, they were all found in a heap near the front door. Charles, aged seven, was sitting astride a hobby-horse when the crash came, and when found by the searchers he was lying beside it. Both legs were broken, and he was otherwise shockingly bruised and cut. Much damage was done in both the eastern and western districts of Brooklyn. A three-storey framehouse on Bush wick Avenue was wrested timber from timber, and a three-storey brick house lost its roof. Trees were uprooted and fences blown down in every part of the city, and a great amount of damage was done by the tearing of awnings and breaking of skylights. At Baltimore, twenty buildings, some of them in course of erection, were blown down and partially i demolished, and several houses were un-i wfced in different *ectf**<i of th- r''- 1