PROVINCIAL AND COLONIAL.

Cromwell Argus, Volume III, Issue 133, 28 May 1872, Page 7

PROVINCIAL AND COLONIAL.

Miss Aitken, the famous elocutionist, is in Auckland. Westport is being greatly encroached upon by the sea. Labour is reported to be very s:arce in t'ao Cpromandel district. Land in the city of Christehurch recently realised at the rate of £16,80:) an acre. In four weeks, a Southland cutter captured 10,000 mutton-birds, which sell at 4d. each. The yield of the Caledonian quartz mine j at the Thames, for the week ending May 4, I was 900 ounces. | A report is current in Auckland that Mr | T. B. Gillies, the Superintendent, is to be oli fered a Judgeship. Westport is said to be " choked " with machinery and stores awaiting shipment up the Buller to Reefton. 200 cattle are said to have died from tutu on one particular hill in the Mataura district within the last five years. The miners at Ross have requested theGoI vernment to grant Messrs Brogden's applica- | tion for the Mikonui water. | The Superintendent of Canterbury and liis i Executive are at " loggerheads " ; and a dissolution of the Council is urged. Invercargill, according to the Times, " c; n now boast of an accomplished burglar, as an additional variety of local talent." The amount annually expended in Auckland on " drinks" is, according to a coriesi pendent of a local paper, £05,000. The ringleader of a gang of smugglers, who carried on their operations in the Poverty Bay district, was lately lined £IOO. Mr J. W. Walker, who is a mining manai ger at the Thames, offers to fire any man in i the Colony for from £250 to £2500. i In Wanganui, a man named Peter M'Millan has been committed for trial on a charge of rape upon his stepdaughter, aged seven. I The Auckland Government are to pay 10s. a week each for the keep of the nine prisoners I who were lately transferred to Dunedin gaol. ! From the 11th February to the 10th May, i at the Immigration office in Dunedin, applications were made for passage; for 107 persons. The Wanganui people are reported to bo in a "pleasant little flutter of anticipation'' over the discovery of some quartz near that place. Mr Yogel has been presented by the United States Government with a series of magnificent engravings representing scenes in America. The steamer which brought the nine prisoners from Auckland to Otago required extra insurance on account of the number of despe- ] rate criminals on board, i The Otago Meat Preserving Co., at Green Island, is likely to close shortly lor the sea--1 son, the prices asked for stock being now so | high that no margin is left for profit. An insane individual got through the window of a private house in Christchurch in the middle of the day recently, and, among other vagaries, kicked a hole in the pianoforte. A late native meeting at Putiki, near Wanganui, is said to have cost £2500. 'J lie feast is said to have been "the most sumptuous affair the natives themselves had ever seen." | A Thames paper is infoimed, on very good I authority, that there are two ratives, a man j and woman, at present in Ohinemuri, who measure about Oft. Sin. and Ifc. lOin. respectively. A great scarcity of blasting powder has j been experienced at the Thames recently. , Many men were thrown out of work in con- ; sequence, and in some of the claims gunpowI der was used. Owing to the absence of the other members i of the Ministry from Wellingti n, Mr Gis- | borne, the Wellington Telegraph says, has had nothing but "one dem'd hoi rid grind" ever since lie joined. An exodus of sn all capitalists from this | Province to America is said 10 be taking I place. Ten left Tokomairiro in one day rej cently, and it is said others are to follow. I Several have i lso left Oanwu. The men in the Cassh s claim, at Ross, rei cently struck a; ainst the ten hour system. 'The effigy of the manager of the Morning Star claim, at the same place, was burnt the other day by the miners, owing to a reduction of wages. A c writing to the Daily Timrs, says there are tens of thousands of acres in Southland on which bhv k pine probably forms one-third of the timber ; and asks, —Why then send to Australia or anywhere else for durable timber I Colonel Brett, in the Canterbury Provincial Council recently, said that out of the 700 volunteers in the Colony, not 50 would come to tl.e front if occasion d< m mded. lie said, " Would the married man risk his life for nothing I He would not. He would skedaddle with his goods and chattels to the bush."' At a r, cent meeting of members of the medical profession in Auckland, " two major causes were adduced for the high death rate amongst children : the liberal use of soothing powders, which really had a 'soothing' effect; and the great amount of artificial feeding of :" children which existed. Steadman's soothing powders were said to contain a large per i centage of calomel." A reporter on the Commandel Mail had a bootless errand the other day. A rumoured find of gold sent him off on a four hours' journey, through swollen creeks and a downpour of rain, in search of the latest information. His only discovery was that he was " "sold": an inquisitive old gentleman had r met a mining party with stores, who hoaxed i him into the belief that one of their bags i contained rich specimens,—news which he industriously circulated.