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Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3000, 5 February 1881, Page 2

Judge Kenny will return to Napier tomorrow, and resume his duties here on Monday. It has heen resolved by a number of residents of Norwood to establish a Mechanic's Institute, and subscriptions are beino - collected for thfi purpose. A hall and reading-rooms will be built on the site granted by the Government. We are requested to call attention to the change in the hour at which the funeral of the late Mr Gavin Peacock will reach town. The procession will pass the bridge on the new Taradale road at 2 o'clock reaching, the cemetery ahout 3 o'clock. The scholars—past and present—of the Napier High School have presented their principal, the Rev. John Campbell, with an address designed and illuminated by Mr P. Bear. The design is chaste, and the colors arranged with great taste. It is one of the most effective productions we have seen of Mr Bear's. At the Resident Magistrate's Court ihis monrng, before Captain Preece, R.M., Henry Start and William Irwin were charged with using threatening behaviour by which a breach of the peace occuired in the public street. Start was fined 10s an'l costs or seven day* imprisonment with hard labor. Irwin wa-< fined 5s and costs, or 48 hours imprisonment with hard labqr, We are given to understand that numbers of cattle are dying about the Meanee, whether from tho extreme dryness of the season or other causes it has not yet been ascertained. We also learn from Clive that the flocks are suffering from the staggers. Some few years back this complaint was very prevalent in the Clive district, and we sincerely regret to hear of its destructive return. Mr J. Northe, the contractor for the floating of the Silver Cloud, we are glad to report, has been successful in the accomplishment of the first step towards the floating of the vessel, which was to haul her over on a level keel. This work was performed by means of lines from the mast-heads to the Western Spit attached to anchors, with guys to Spanish windlasses. The first attempt, that was made yesterday, failed through the anchors coming home, but a better hold being secured to-day the vessel was made to slowly right herself, end at low tido her decks will be dear of water.

We have to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of a pamphlet containing four reprinted aitides from the pen of Mr F. S. Peppercorne. The subjects are " Bar Harbors," " Australian Meteorology and Hydrography," " Influence of Forests on Climate and Rainfall," and " Irrigation and Canalisation Works."

At the Resident Magistrate's Court at Waipawa, before Captain Preece, R.M., the following cases ware disposed of:—C. Harding v. Bishop, judgment summons; adjourned till next court day. A. Nicholls v. Bishop, judgment summons; adjourned till next court day. TA Hegarty v. F. Anderson, judgment summons; ordered to pay within one month or 14 days imprisonment. Cosrkie and Rdbb V; E. Olsen, judgment summons for _14 17s 9d; ordered to be paid forthwith with costs and counsels fee, or imprisonment for one month. Brighouse v, v 'yers, claim for £16 16s for horse and sadddle, with costs and solicitor's fee. Woodward v. Mouatt claim for £1 10s 6d; the plaintiff was nonsuited with costs and counsel's fee. E. Harwood (rate collector) v. J. McKenzie, claim £3 10s, judgment for amount with costs and counsel's fee. Same v. de Lisle ; the plaintiff was nonsuited on the ground of informality in the demand, plaintiff to pay costs and counsel's fee.

The Meanee Domain Board met yesterday, and resolved to offer the race-course reserve for lease by auction for a term of twelve years. Before this can be dene, however, the Governor's assent to the proposal will have to be obtained. The Board also resolved to recommend the Governor to appoint the Mayor of Napier a trustee etS officio. We have no doubt that the courte proposed to be taken by the Board is the direct result of the agitation on the subject during Mr Rolleston's visit to Napier. But whatever the cause we congratulate the Board' upon the action that has been taken. To convert the reserve into an enjoyable reoreation ground a very considerable outlay will be necessary, and this money Can only be obtained by the lease of the land. To make a good race-course on the site of the old one not more than about £150 would be required, but the " extras" would amount to a heavy item. A grand stand, tree planting, fences, and an embankment, would have to be considered, but the total expenditure upon all these improvements would be amply covered by the public in the support they would give to holiday sports held on the ground.

Mr John Conway, the well-known cricketer, in a letter to a Sydney paper, states that the visit of a professional team of English cricketers this year is determined on. He says:—" Alfred Shaw and Lillywhite's team purpose starting from England in the autumn of 1881, play four or five matches in the United States, leaving San Francisco for New Zealand by the October mail. Their first match will be played in Auckland at the end of November, after which they will journey South, and play Wellington, Christchuroh, and Dunedin."

The Auckland correspondent of the Lyttelton Times (N.Z.) states, on the 14th ult: —" J. L. Lundon, late a priest in the Canterbury Mormon Mission, who left Auckland with Elder Pearce for Utah, has se it a letter to Auckland, in which he says that having learned there is to be another exodus of deluded Mormon victims frem New Zealand to Utah, he considers it his duty before God and man to warn intending immigrants. He says that the Mormon priesthood, as a rule, consists of liars, debauchers, and murderers, and instances John Taylor, who had four wives living while teaching in France that plurality of wives is not taught by the Mormon doctrine. The letter gives instances of the seduction of women, and he concludes Mormonism is nothing but a well-organised system of disloyalty and deception, carrying thousands to poverty every year."

The Southland News has evidently no very high opinion of the prowess of the local cricketers, when in an artiole on their performances in the late match with the Australian Eleven it says :—On future occasions something should be done to relieve the nervous apprehensions of the twentytwo representatives of local cricket—some-" thing that would enable them to go to the wickets comparatively free from " funk." As it was, the least observant onlooker conld not fail to perceive that nearly all the local men were " all of a quiver" as they faced the bowler, evidently regarding the ball as a dangerous missile. Now, this could be obviated by making it a condition that any future crack Eleven should use a different kind of ball, say a soft elastic one, nicely inflated, so that it could not possibly hurt anybody. Of course there would have to be a proviso against anybody being " caught out." Or it might be made a condition that the Eleven should play with one eye blindfolded, or even that there should be only two stumps about a foot apart instead of three when the local men were "in."

Doesn't Boucicault know his way about? In a recent number of the London Times appeared this highly characteristic announcement: "Mr Boucicault regrets to perceive that certain scenes in his new play 'The O'Dowd,' continue to provoke expressions of displeasure from a portion of the audience. He has no wi?h to offend any one. He is informed of a general opinion that the censured scenes are ill-timed, and ought to be omitted, or the language changed. If the public will kindly refer to the announcement with which the production of ' The O'Dowd' was prefaced, it will be seen that the features objected to are essential to the design and intent of the work. It is, therefore, in no captious spirit that the author declines to alter it; but rather than lose the favor of any of his audience, he will amend his error by withdrawing the play altogether." But he didn't do anything of the kind. In the middle of November <[ The O'Dowd" was still being played. The Figaro, which hints at the move being one of those dodges to advertise a play gratuitously which the great dramatist understands so thoroughly, remark* : " Ts not this noble ? Is not this sublime ? Mr Boucicault will not derogate from his principles; he will not betiay his country to tho Saxon:

" For he himself has said it, And it s greatly to his credit, That he is an Irishman. And in Bpite of all To make certain alterations. He remains an Irishman ! vl

According to St. James' Magazine, Siberia is a singularly misunderstood region. Richer by far than Canada, it enjoys a climate neither warmer in summer nor colder in winter. In all the Dominion there is no soil like the black earth along the Obi and Yenessei; and even the lumberman of the Ottawa, the St. Lowrence, and the Fraser would find himself in an Elysium among the forests that line the banks of the great rivers which intersect Liberia from the boarders of China to the shores of the Polar Sea. Yet in this fine country, with resources greater than Western America, to which thousands are yearly flying from overcrowded Europe, land is a drug, and owing to the difficulty of getting anything out, produce ir almost valueless, and foreign goods exorbitant in price. In the valley of Yenessei dried fish can be bought for " next to nothing," grouse are 7d a brace, capital beef 2£d a pound, and at Krasnoiarsk a cargo of good wheat could be obtained for about 25s the hundredweight. Corn and hay are, indeed, so cheap that Mr Reebohm, a recent traveller, paid for post-horses over the great steppe between Tomsk and Tjumen only one halfpenny per mile. At Tenesseisk a ship's mast of hard larch, sixty feet long, is worth a guinea. On the Obi live ducks fetch five farthings apiece, the large fiph called " yass" 1M a pair, and pike a farthing each. Young calves can be bought in villages away from the great overland route for 6d each; and in the rich blaok-earth country, immediately north of the Altai, land is leased for per acre. On the other hand, a ton of salt, which can be bought in Liverpool for 16s, commands on the Obi or Yenessei £15, and on the Lena a still higher price,

. :j The World's London special says ! It k understood that the new Government Bill for the suppr. sing of corrupt practices at elections will prohibit the use of publichouses as committee-rooms, and order them to be closed on polling days. The publicans are in despair over the intelligence. It is now rumored loudly throughout - London society that there has been a serious rupture between the Queen and the Princess Louise. An attempt was made during the recent visit of the Princess to her mother to make the quarrel up, but it failed. Most romantic reasons are given for this royal family jar; When travelling in South America. last year Lady Florence Dixie came across a South American jaguar with its cub. The mother savagely attacked Lady Florence, who in the most plucky manner shot her in self-defence and captured the cub, a young male. Lady Florence brought the oub to England, and last winter the jaguar was out in the open during the oold weather, having only a small kennel-house slightly heated by a gas stove. The jaguar had for a companion a tiger cat, and these two animals were subsequently transferred to the Fishery, Windsor, where they were allowed a large open space, with an abundance of fresh grass and trees, which they were very fond of climbing. Being close to the Thames they never omitted to have a swim in tbe nvar of a morning. Their food was varied, but what they liked best was the heads of sheep and bullocks. Lady F. Dixie's jaguar is a beautiful specimen, so tame and gentle that if he were not so mischievous he might go at large. As Lady Florence is about to leave England for ' Africa, she has deposited her pets at the Zoological Gardens.

In the midst of the great events of tho • war, such incidents as the following were comparatively unnoticed, and left to be y~ long afterward related in print:—Miss ■ Annie Pickens, daughter of the governor of South Carolina, was to be married, on 22nd April, 1863, in Charleston, to Lieut. Andrew de Rochelle. The wedding party wa9 assembled in the Pickens' residence, and the clergyman was asking the bride if she was ready, when a shell from a Union gun in the harbour broke into the room and burst. Nine persons were hurt, but only Miss Pickens' wound proved mortal. She bore the pain with wonderful fortitude, and was unmoved when informed she had only an hour or two to live. De Rochelle said that ha would like to have her die hia wife, and the poor girl sadly smiled an. assent. The guests remember the scene as far more pitiful than they cau describe. The bride lay on the sofa, her white dress dabbled in blood, and her hair dishevelled, while her pallid face was so wrung with agony that her efforts to smile became futile. The ceremony was hurriedly perV formed, though the bride's " yes" waß in a faint, laboured whisper, and her lips hardly moved in response to her husband's kisß. (She died immediately afterward.

The wife of William Morris, the poet, nan give points to Mrs Langtry and the rest o£ the professional beauties, if a correspondent of the Inter-Ocean is to be trusted:—" is a mysterious, Egyptian-looking woman, with great, sad eyes, and Oriental complexion, burning scarlet lips, and the expression of ineffable remoteness and vagueness that one in imagination gives to the Sphynx. The young lady's face was just one of the inexpressively melancholy ones that the preRaphaehtes adore—just the type of young women coming down the ' golden stairs' in Burne Jones' picture at the Grosvenor Gallery this year —and Morris married her. Not long ago this lady wore at an evening party a robe of the sheeniest, filmiest, white muslin, fine enough to be drawn through a ring. The petticoat under it must been the same, for the folds of the robe clung to her body as if cut by the finest chisel. At the. waist this thin robe was confined by a lonfif supple chain in the form of a serpent, whioh, after writhing round her body, dropped its jewelled head by her left side, where its diamond eyes glittered and burned like fire. Egyptian bracelets and necklace adorned her arms and neck, and an Egyptian masque gathered and held the folds of the robe at the throat. Her black hair, was one thick "mass" of Bhort cur?s, aiid lay close down to her eyes, crept in and out by another golden serpent with jewelled scales and burning eyes. One would havesaid Bhe was a Cleo« ■*- patra, who had turned her asps into gold and jewels, and come to life to dazzle a barbarian world."

A curious incident, which the Precurseur, of Antwerp, states to have positively oo« curred at the Zoological Gardens in that town, is thus described in one of its reoent . impressions. It was the hour for feeding the serpents, and two of them, born a couple of years ago in the gardens, commenced simultaneously devouring the same rabbit, one beginning operations at its head, the, other at its tail. The natural result was that in course of time they both reached the middle of the rabbit, and a dispute arose as to which would swallow the remaining morsel. The larger serpent of the two made the greatest headway, but his colleague held as fast to the carcases, and in the heat of the battle, his vis-a-vis, making , a desperate effort to bolt the rest of the rabbit drew in with it the head of the _ smaller serpent. The body gradually foP •" lowed the heod into its living tomb, aud soon there remained but about two decimetres of tail visible! At this critical juncture the keepers perceived what was passing, and a couple of them entered the cage to rescue the victim from its unpleasant position. After considerable difficulty they ._. succeeded in obtaining a firm grasp on the bit of tail, and with a long pull and a strong pull brought back t'e serpent in safety, none the worse for the adventure. The swallower, however, was rather indisposed for the next few hours, says the journal which relates this most extraordinary story, but both serpents are now in their normal condition again.

A wedding took plaoe last month in Virginia under somewhat peculiar circumstances. Tho bridegroom rejoiced in the high-sounding name of Marcus de Lafeyette Hawley, was under sentence of death for shooting the man who had evicted him from his holding in Poor Mountain in June last. The bride, a Miss Nannie Hawkins, was the mother of two of his children, and it was to legitimatise these children and fulfil his promises to their mother that the wedding took place two days before the execution. In the graphic words of the New York Herald, " the bridal chamber was the prison cell, his attire the black habiliments prepared for his execution, and hie bride a > veritable bride of death." Dnring the ceremony, which was performed by a minister of the Protestant Episcopalian Church, the bridegroom was permitted to have his hands free, but the irons were not removed from his feet. After the wedding he made a profession of faith, was baptised and received into the Church. The newly-married couple were seperated immediately after the wedding. Next day they had au affecting interview of half an hour, and the day after the bridegroom was hanged. While on the trap door, " his last dying speech and confession" was read by the clergyman, after which " the minister placed his hand on the doomed man's head, invoked a blessing on him, and bade him good-bye, Hawley kissing him on the cheek." A moment after the trap was sprung, and Hawley was launched into eternity. He was probably the first American citizen who has been married, baptized, and hanged in the brief space of two days.

With a view to give the world an idea of the extended sphere of his missionary labours, the "Bishop of Caledonia" the public in a recent letter that he has preached to "Sailors, traders, Idafers, miners, Greeks, Germans, and Norwegians, V, French, Maltese, and Britons, Russians, y Kanakers, and Yankees, Chinese and Canadians, Jews and Gentiles, whiteand greys browns and blacks, Caucasians, Semites, and Mongolians, Indians of the-salt-water and fresh-water Indians; hunters, fishers, packers, and nondeßoripts; round heads,fiat heads, and peaked headi.'' " I have," he adds, " preaohed on tbe bcaoh and shipboard, iv the miuer'g oaU&and tht

trader's log hut, in the Indian's branchbuilt hunting lodge and his larger but lees agreeable village home, whore tho smoke fails to remove the prevailing ill odour; also amid the tangled forest on the coast and clouds of mosquitoes on the prairie. And O, the joy of it! There have been. no church expenses, no collections or painful pleadings for subscriptions, and no newspaper reporters present to make a hash of the proceedings." The Bishop's sphere of labor has certainly heen an extended one, hut the most remarkable feature of his evangelistic adventures appears to have escaped him—that is, the forbearance of those whom he has preached to. It has not always been thus. Tho missionary who holds forth in the prairie is liable, so history assures us, to be overtaken by the voracious cassowary, and there are certain tribes of " blacks " and " browns " who, for gathering on the beach with the incautious preaoher, are wont to make " long pig " of him, and put his clerk into a pie. To none of these dangers has the Bishop of Caledonia been subjected, and it would have been becoming, therefore, when enumerating the soenes of his operations, to have referred in gratitude to his protracted immunity from the troubles that usually beset the missionary who wanders in " the ancestral abodes of the catamount" or " the wigwams of the beaver."—Daily Telegraph.

A lady on the outskirts of Denver was the victim the ether day of a tramp's practical joke. Even in those vagabonds there is an occasional vein of humor which is worth preserving. The incident happened in thi3 wise:—About the middle of the afternoon the tramp put in an appearance, and asked politely if he could be permitted to cook for himself a plate of soup. " I have the ingredients with me," he said, displaying a cobblestone about the size of an apple. The lady very naturally looked at him in surprise. " You oan't make soup out of that rock, can you ?'' she inquired, in surprise. " Oh. yes, madam. This is what we call a soup-stone." " Well, I should like to Bee you do it;" and she "forthwith made up afire in the stove, and the tramp oommenced operations. He filled the stove-pan with water, and, after it commenced to boil, very carefully deposited the stone in a pan of water. " I shall have to trouble you for a little seasoning," he said, and the lady hastened to get him an onion, a piece of meat, and a tomato. These were carefully out up and put in to boil along with the gtone. In a short time a delirious plate of Boup was prepared. The lady tasted it, and was delighted with the flavour. The fellow Bat down and ate, and his hostess immediately added what was necessary to make a substantial meal. When he left he said that he could get plenty of soup-stones on bis way, and that he would leave that one with her as an evidence of how sincerely he appreciated her kindness. She was firmly convinced that she had come into tho possession of a treasure. That night she told her husband of the oircumstance. He listened to the recital, and then inquired innocently—" Don't you think the meat and the onion and the tomato would have made a very good plate of soup without the rockP" Gradually the triok began to dawn upon her, and if you want to make that lady mad you have only to ask her for the loan of her soup-stone —Rooky Mountain News.

Mr W.Botitledge will Bell at the Town Clerk's office on Monday swamp sections. Tenders are invited by the Town Clerk for the formation of a portion of Havelock road. Tenders are invited for the erection of stables at Havelock. James Oliver declines to bo responsible for the debts of his wife. Mr M. E. Miller will sell on Monday tho 15th at the Spit, pure Lincoln rams. Mr Thomas Clemefcfc has declared his . insolvency.. The Napier Volunteers will parade on Wednesday evening. A number of new advertisements appear in our wanted column.