Miscellaneous Extracts.

Cromwell Argus, Volume I, Issue 37, 27 July 1870, Page 6

Miscellaneous Extracts.

A promising young fiction writer, Mr Homy Walstab, of Brighton, Victoria, has met with a sudden death by drowning. Ho was missed on Thursday night, from tho house at which ho was visiting at Brighton, and was seen subsequently walking on tho pier at about midnight. Yesterday morning, at about half past one o’clock, Thomas Henry, a fisherman, found his dead body, floating close to the beach, near the railway station and pier. Tho face was much bruised by the low rocks on which tho body had evidently been beaten by the waves. The deceased was in the habit of walking very late at night on the pier, and, as he was very short-sighted, it is supposed that he unwittingly—perhaps while in a fit of abstraction—walked over the edge, and was drowned. Ho was, as a writer of fiction, a contributor to tho Australian Journal, under the signature of “ Hal,” and his writings are said to have shown much talent and power. He was a brother to the more widely known Mr G. A. Walstab, tho journalist, and author of “ Harcourt Darrell,” “ Confessed at Last,” and other novels. He was unmarried, and aged 34. The Australian bunyip, like the American sea-serpent, is always obliging enough to make its appearance when things are rather dull, and current topics somewhat scanty and uninteresting, and also—and this is a peculiar piece of consideration—when the season of the year does not afford the snake incidents which country journalists so love to chronicle. The monster’s last appearance was in the neighbourhood of Dubbo, and is faithfully and minutely recorded in the Manaroo Mercury. It seems that two residents had to leave their places by tho river, and go to a hut on higher ground to avoid the encroaching floods. While sitting by a log firo, they heard a sound “like rumbling thunder,” in the direction of the river. Says one, “Ah me ! there’s at least half an acre of my ground tumbled into the river.” The sound being repeated, the two men, in whom, it is agreeable to read, the writer has' “ the fullest confidence,” went to the hut door, and looked “ through tho darkness” towards the river, They state that they saw “ a huge monster clinging to a very stout and tall tree of the eucalypti species,” in fact a gum tree. “Its head head was like an elephant’s, only the two tusks projected—one from between its eyes, the other, smaller, a little above the nosstrils. The only eye they could see was like a ball of fire. The body was scaly, like the crocodile’s; the fore-limbs long, the talons about ten times as large as a Bengal tiger’s.” They saw all this very minutely “ through tho darkness,” the light being probably supplied by the “eyeball of fire.” As “ the river continued to rise, the bunyip held more tenaciously to the tree, and grinded his teeth occasionally, as if in fear or danger. Once he lashed his tail, and on striking the water the sound was like a diminutive sound cf Niagara. The river still but a limb stopped the monster from crawling up further. There was a struggle to get higher, but his efforts brought down the tree which he was clasping right over him, and Ixotli seemed to float quietly down the Macquarie.” kike Dogqerry, they no doubt “ thanked heaven that they were well rid of a knave.” It would appear from tho above reliable narrative that the bunpip has got considerably bigger since his last appearance. A Mr John Francis Meaher communicates to the editor of the Waterford Mail , vouching for its “ authenticity,” the following extraordinary election bill“ Jim F. II r, Mob conductor and Botheen Boy &c., to Mr Herring’s Election Agent, for tho work and Mudeer done on the day of the polling, Feb. 26. 70—Item to three shouts to Herrings, at 2d per shout 9d : item to three hurrahs for same, at 3d each, Is ; item to four screeches at 4d each, Is ; item to four bounces in the air, 4Jd each, Is ; item to hitting a voter for Kickham a rap of a dead cat, which I spent five hours killing the night before, 2s ; item to making a prod at and giving two strokes of a wattle to one of Mr Kickham’s supporters, for which I got a most awful battering from the Kickhamites, 3s 9d ; item to gripping one of Kickham’s party by the windpipe or throttle, for which I got a slap of a rock over tho left ear, leaving me since in care of the doctor, 6s 7d ; item to striking a voter over the sconce with a mud bag, for which I received cruel treatment from the women, Is 6d ; item on tho declaration of the poll, when Mr Herring was declared elected by four majority, I, took a fit of hurrooing, shouting, scrcechin, roarin, leapin, bonnein, smashin windows, ■dashing into whiskey-shops, swallowing half-gallons of porter, six skelping glasses of whiskey, rowling peelers, until I found myself nearly dead in tho lock-up the following morning, and had to pay one shillin fine, 12s. Total, £1 10s 7d.—P.B. :If this bill is not paid before St Patrick’s Day bo Herrings, there’ll be bad work about it; so look out for squally.—Yours to command, Jim F r." A Sportive Definition.—A Centaur.—A man who has “walked himself off his legs" on a horse that has “ oaten his head off.” Too True.—A pretty girl and njwild horse are liable to do much mischief, for tho one runs away with a fellow’s body, and the other runs away with his heart.