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Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3004, 10 February 1881, Page 2

It is reported that the s.s. Macri is ashore in the Mohaka river.

Macs will be celebrated by the Rev. E, Reignier next Sunday at Olive at 11 a.m.

The Government are calling for tenders for Hie supply of one hundred tons of Portland cement. The ceiuent must be manufactured in New Zealand.

The number of telegrams forwarded through the telegraph stations during the quarter ended December, 18S0, was 325,856, the cash revenue received being £17,189 3s 2d.

At the Resident Magistrate's Court this morning, Waka Taraki and John M'Manus were charged with drunkenness, and each fined os and co«ts, or 48 hours imprisonment with hard labor.

The stock of Messrs Cornish and Co., of Meanee, was finally disposed of yesterday, after a two days sale by Messrs MonteitL and Co. The promises were afterwards sold to Mr B. Black for £100, subject to a mortgage of £200.

The following gentlemen have been "appointed members of the Licensing Court for the District of Ngaruroro:—Messrs J. M. Batham, J. A. Smith, T. Tanner, E. Tuke, J. N. Williams, F. Nelson, and E. P. Williams ; three to form a quorum.

" Res Regis" writes from Wairoa to say that the Constabulary (seven men and two sergeants) would be better employed at road work than in keeping the fence in repair surrounding a paddock in which the servant's cattle are kept. He also states that the Constabulary station buildings are in a dilapidated condition,

A notification appears in the New Zealand Gazette that sittings of the Native Land Court will shortly be held at Wellington, Porirua. Taupo, and Nawa. It is therefore desirable that applicants should forward to the Native Land Courc office at Auckland their claims to land in the abovenamed districts as soon as possible.

The Australian eleven commenoed a match against a Nelson twenty-two yesterday afternoon. Nelson won the toss and went to the wickets, and at the close of the day's play were all out for 83. Fowler made 30 and Halliday 14 for the Nelson team. Boyle appears to have been very effective with the ball. The game was to be continued at eleven o'clock this morning.

The clouded sky and change of temperature this morning brought to remembrance that this day four years ago—February 10, 1877—after a bng period of hot dry weather,heavy rain set in, which culminated in the floods that caused so much damage on the plains and at Meanee. ■ As we write the weather appears clearer, and all chance of the rain that is so much needed has disappeared.

A fire occurred on the Western Spit about 3 o'clock yesterday afternoon in a cottage, occupied by Mr T. Galbraith, while he was away at work. It occurred through a piece of lighted wood falling out of the stove on to the floor. Tne blaze was seen by the neighbors, and as there was plenty of water handy, the flames were extinguished before very much damage was done. The cottage, which is uninsured, belongs to Mr Johnson.

A series of matches has been arranged to be fired between members of the Napier Kifle corps, commencing to-morrow morning at 5.30. The first part of the matches consists of eight preliminary firings, at which the two highest scorers fall out from the remaining firings, until at tho end of the eighth preliminary competition sixteen men have been selected. These sixteen will then fire a set of three handicap matches at 200, 400, and 500 yards, 400, 500, and 600 yards, and 200, 500, and 600 yards. The aggregate scores of the three matches taking the prizes. The prizes, in addition to small match prizes, will consist of cups or other trophies, medals, &c, of considerable value, and will include a wooden spoon for the lowest scorer. Ammunition will be provided at half price. Six attendances out of the next nine paradea, at least (unless a member can show that he was from illness or absence from Napier unable to attend), will be necessary to entitle any member to a prize.

We find in a California diary the following glorification of a quality we are not sure we should like. A man of few words is very well, but a woman of few words is a ma'jter open to argument:—"l encountered to-day, in a ravine some three miles distant, among the gold-washers, a woman from San Jose, was at work with a large wooden bowl, by the side of the stream. I asked her how long she had been there, and how much gold she averaged in a day. She replied,' Three weeks and an ounce.' Her reply reminded me of an anecdote of the late Judge Blank, who met a girl returning from market, and asked her,' How deep diet you find the stream ? and what did you get for your bntter ?''Up to my knees and ninepence,' was the reply. 'Ah !' said the judge to himself ;' she is the girl for me; no words lost there;' turned back, proposed, was accepted, and married the next wefk ; and a more happy couple the conjugal bonds never united; the nuptial lamp never waned; its ray was steady and clear to the last. Ye wha paddle off and on. for seven years, and are perhaps capsized at last, take a lesson of the judge. That' up to the knees and ninepence,' is worth all the rose letters and melancholy rhymes ever penned."

Last week a carriage and pair drove up to the door of the Irish .National Land League, in Abbey street; a powdered flunkey let down the carriage steps, and handed out of the carriage the Duchees of A. and the Countess of li., and two other ladies. Proceeding in the office, the Duchess asked could she see the pictures. The courteous official to whom she applied was a little puxzled, but suddenly remembering the mural adornments that decorate the Board Room of the jueague, he smiled an appreciative smile "and led the way in. Then he waved hie hand in a gratified manner around the room generally. The Duchess put up her eyeglass and read, as did the other ladies, the green and orange placards which the committees of the various land demonstrations have sent to the Land League Academy, and which have been " hung on the line." Such cheerful and soothing observations as the following met the astonished patrician's gaze : —"Down with the Land Robbers," " Land Thieves Beware," " Nova Zemblahooly to the rescue," " Cease to be landlords, learn to be men," "Landfor the landless people." Her Grace was indistinctly heard to say something in reference to a mistake, and abruptly sought her carriage, leaving the Land Leaguer with a blank face at not hearing some such aristocratic compliment as " awfully nice " " quite too lovely." The carriage and pair, with its inmates in great confusion, drove off, and after some inquiries their ladyships found the establishment of which they were in quest—namely, the residence of a talented illuminator who has on view an address to the Duke of Aberoorn.—Freeman's Journal.

We (Wairoa Guardian) are glad to learn that Mr Neil Walker, of Ohinepaka, has taken up 9,000 acres of pastoral land, in the Waiau Survey District. Another gentleman who was in Wairoa last week, intimated his intention of taking up several sections in the same locality.

In the last number of the Cornhill, the Burmese people are vindicated by a Burman, who tells the following , story of an. English M.P., he met at dinner in England, The 51.P. hearing the name of Burma said, " 1 have a nephew who was in Burma, only he always used to call it Bermuda.

One of the principal paDers draws fin print) the following horrible picture of the present state of affairs in Russia:— " Beetles, flies, and locusts devastate our crops. The diminution of our flocks and herds surpasses belief. Diphtheria decimates the rising generation. Bread has risen to flve copecks the pound, and meat to twenty. All feel that Russia ia living, not on the produce of her soil and industries, but on her capital, cutting down her forests, selling off her stock, tearing the straw from her roofs, the clothes from her back, the shoes from her feet."

In the statistics of the railways of Europe, Germany heads the list with a network of permanent way amounting to 20,305 miles. England ptands next with 18,360 miles of railway ; France has 15,583 miles ; Russia, 14,455 miles ♦ Austria and Hungary, 11,995 miles; Italy, 6,474 miles; and, finally, Greece under nine miles. The United States of America have a network of lines equal to that of five-sixths of the whole of Europe, and show an extent of 84,980 miles of permanent way. The other States of America possess only 12,660 miles; Asia has 9,300, Australia 2,600, and Africa, 1,300 miles.

It may not be generally known, even to Biblical students, tb at St. Paul is accounted the patren saint of upholsterers. Suoh is the fact in England. His credentials are probably supplied by Acts xviii. 3; he came unto Aquila and Priscilla at Corinth, "and because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought; for by their occupation they were tent-makers." This year the festival of the Apostle of the Gentiles occurred on January 25th—Sunday—and it was not professionally commemorated by the up« holsterers of York until the following evening, when they met and discussed " acapital dinner;" and a York paper assures us that, " after the usual loyal and patriotio toasts had been duly honoured, the craft drank to the memory of St. Paul."

The Chinese Rip Van. Winkle was a patriarch named Wang Chib. He vyas gathering firewood one day on the mountains of Ku Chow, when he found a grotto where Borne uld men were playing , chess. As he watched them, one of them gave him what looked like a date-stone, telling him to put it into his mouth. No sooner had he tasted it than he oeased to feel hunger and thirst. By-and-by one of the players said," It is long since you came here ; yon ehould go home now." Wang Chib went to take up his axe, and found the handle mouldered into dust. Undismayed however, he returned home, but found that centuries had passed since he went out woodcutting, and that no vestige of his kinsfolk remained. He retreated to a cell in the mountains, and, deovting himself to religious exercises, finally attained immortality.

In a recent paper, Dr. Manning of Gladesville Asylum, remarks .—" The prevention of insanity due to drink becomes a vast social as well as a medical problem—l. In the reduction of the number of publichouses, so as to lesson unwholesome competition. 2. In the thorough and frequent inspection of all liquours sold. 3. In the introduction into common use of sound light wines, the many forms of effervescent drinks, and more than all of ice. The common use of iced water in America, where it can be obtained in every railway carriage and in every village, has done more, I believe, to reduce intemperance than anything else. 4. In better and more wholesome modes of preparing food s which even in our hotels is of ter so uninviting and monotonous as to disgust and lead, not only to drinking" habits, but to dyspepsia and chronic illhealth."

An exchange gives the following as the prosperous farmer's creed : —We believe in small farms and thorough cultivation. That the soil loves to eat as well as the owner and ought, therefore, to be well mauured ,• in crops which leave land better than they found it, making both the farm, and farmer rich at once; that the best fertilizer of any soil is a spirit of industry, enterprise and intelligence, without these lime, gypsum and guano will be of little use. In good fences, good farm houses, good orchards, and children enough to gather the fruit; in a clean kitchen, a neat wife in it, a clean cupboard, a clean dairy, and a clean conscience; that to ask a man's advice is not stooping, but may be of much benefit, that to keep a place for everything and everything in its place saves many a step, and is pretty sure to lead to good tools and to keeping them in order.

Many millions of acres of land in the Far West of America are almost entirely without value unless they can be irrigated by wat6r supplied by artificial means. The arid region of the United States embraces 900,000,000 acres, lying in the Territories of Arizona, Dakota, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming, the States of Colorado, California, Kansas, Nebraska, Oregon, and Texas, and the Indian Territory. Not one per cent, of this vast area has been sold. 200,000,000 acres are mountainous land, upon which, agriculture cannot be successfully carried on, even with an abundance of water. Gf the remainder, 200,000,000 acres, are lava lands, covered with cinders, &c, lands without soil or vegetation, and desert plains of drifting , sand. On the greater part of the 500,000,000 acres not included above, valuable crops, it is believed, can be raised by the aid of water.

In a letter dated 2nd May, 1847, published in the " Life of Bishop Wilberforce," the Bishop says:—" I dined the other day in. company "with Carlyle. He was very great. Monckton Milues (now Lord Houghton) drew him out. Milnes began the young man's cant of the present day of the barbarity and wickedness of capital punishment, that after all we could not be sure others were wicked, &c, Carlyle broke out on him with ' None of your Heavens and Hell amalgamation companies for me. We do know what is wickedness. I know wicked men—men whom I would not live with ; men whom, under some conceivable circumstances, I would kill, or they should kill me. No, Milues, there's no truth or greatness in all that. It's just poor, miserable littleness. There was far more greatness in the way of your old yeoman fathers who, when they found one of those wicked men, dragged him to a peat bog", and thrust him in and said, ' There, go in there ; there is the place for all Buch as thee.'"

There is joy in Burmah just now, for one of King Thee Bau'e graceful consorts has quite recently presented that amiable monarch with a son and heir. It is gratifying to our national vanity to learn that British professional skill was specially summoned to Mandulay for the purpose of bringing this illustrious littld stranger into the world. A Burmese baby-royal, bom not in the purple, but the Buddhist yellow, involves strange associations with white elephants, golden umbrellas, and Eo}al domestic dramas of thrilling interest. Mother and child, according to the latest accounts, are doing well. The happy father is so elated by the achievement of bis spouse, Su Hpayah Lat, that be has announced his intention to wed her younger sister forthwith. This eagerness on his part to extend hie connection with her family will probably be regarded by the youthful wife as a delicate attention—from a Burmese point of view. In other countries it might be interpreted differently. Hitherto, Thee Bau has ehone as a monogamist, but, as the laws of Burmah justify the sovereign taking to himself four queens —one for each prinoipal point of the com-

Jjftes, among whom she of the South takee preoedenoe over the Eastern, Northern, and Western Royal consorts—there can bo no objection of any moment raised to the affectionate impulse which now prompts him to marry his sister-in-law. As he has put to death nearly all his relatives having any claim to the succession, His Majesty cannot be too fervently congratulated upon the acquisition of an heir, from cutting , whose throat he will probably be deterred by the feelings of a father and the interests of a dynasty.—Daily Telegraph.

.Ark of Friendship Lodge, 1.0.GhT., tonight, at 7.30. Messrs Banner and Liddle will soil privileges of cricket ground to-movrow at 2 p.m. The New Zealand Clothing Company advertise specialities. A first dividend in Mr TJ. G-. Gibbon's estate is payable on application to Mr Q-. T. Cross.

Mr H. R. Q-imn has Kamo coals now landing.

Tenders for cutting out, trussing, and carting, are invited by C. Palmer. Lost a pocket book.

The valuation list for the PakowhaiWaitangi Highway District is now open for inspection. The first of the series of rifle contests at the Tutaekuri range to-morrow at 5.30 a.m. Tenders for removing a cottage ai*e invited by Messrs Blythe and Co. Opening ball of the Havelock Hotel on the 17th.

The Havelock Hotol is now open, and affords every comfort and convenience. Mr E. Lyndon will sell on the 15th lollie machine, &c.

Messrs Kennedy and Gillman sell on Saturday next consignment of oats. A number of new advertisements will ,be found in o\ir " wanted " column.