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Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3014, 22 February 1881, Page 2

The acceptances for the Napier Handioap, Railway Srnkea Handicap, and the Handicap Hurdle Race, close this evening, at 8 o'clock, at the Criterion Hotel.

Wβ beg to acknowledge receipt of 5a from MvQ. Gillies in aid of Mr J. H. Franklin, who suffered loss from accidental injury to his horee and express a few days ago.

At the Resident Magistrate's Court this morning , , before H. Eyre Kenny, Esq., E.M., David Power was charged with drunkenness, and fined 5a and costs, or 48 hours' imprisonment.

The anniversary tea meeting of the United Methodist Free Church, Shakespeare road, will he held this evening at 6.30. Addresses will he delivered by the Revs. Cornford, Brown, Sidey, Oliver, Bodgers, and Penney,

It will he seen from our telegrams that the schooner Isabella Pratt, well known in this port, on her way from Auckland to Tairua, came into collision with the steamer Albion between this port and Auckland, and has sunk.

Fifty summonses have been taken out by the Corporation against dofaultiug ratepayers. We understand further that it is intended next week to cut the water supply off from premises occupied by those who have neglected to pay the water-rate.

Persons wishing to send small parcels to England will be glad to learn that the Union Steam Ship Company has arranged with the Orient Company's fortnightly line of steamers leaving Melbourne for the conveyance of parcels to and from New Zealand. Particulars can be obtained from the Union Company's agent, Port Ahuriri.

An adjourned meeting of parties interested in the several claims of the Mohaka will be held at the Criterion Hotel at 11 a.m. on Saturday next. The object of the meeting is to receive the assayor'a report on the specimens forwarded from here to Auckland. The assayer's report, we understand, is to the effect that gold was found in eaoh parcel.

Privates Hovell and Galbraith were the successful competitors at the fourth competition of the Rifle corps held this morning. Their scores, 40 and 39, were creditable, when the strength of the cross wind is considered. There was a good muster of competitors, and we are glad to notice that these matches are inducing a considerable amount of practice.

Wβ have received several copies of an admirable address to nurses by Dr. John Blair, delivered at the inauguration of a training , class for nurses in Melbourne. Tne addreeß ia short and practical in the estreme; it is full of suggestions that will be found useful to those engaged in nursing the sick. In addition to the lecture the pamphlet contains a number of short practical notes for the use of hospital nurses. We have several copies of the pamphlet to spare, and shall be glad to hand them to anyone whotakes an interest in the subject.

Mr J. H. Baldwin, in order to test his carrier pigeon " Queen of the South," placed her in the hands of Mr Eobinson, of Taradule, who was proceeding by the steamer Botomahana as a passenger to Dunedin. Mr Eobinson was told to let the bird go afc Wellington Heads. The bird returned to Meanee yesterday afternoon, but as it had lost the message containing the hour at which it was released it is impossible to give the time it took to fly the distance. The Rotomahana left Napier at 1 p.m. on Saturday, and would have reached Wellington about 6 o'clock on Sunday morning.

There was a bolt to-day. A butoher's oarfc belonging to Mr Hatch, of Clive, left unattended we presume, was dragged at a rapid pace by the horse attached to it from the Spit to town, coming down the Shakespeare road hill ai frightful speed. Narrowly escaping Messrs Price and Innes' drapery establishment, and colliding with a cart at that corner, the horse swerved into Hastings-street, and continued its career till reaching Mr Higgins , butcher's shop, where a collision occurred, smashing the springs and a wheel, and causing a capeize, which brought the runaway to a sudden etop.

It is said (warbles an Australian journal,) but whisper it not abroad, that a bather of the female persuasion was disporting herself very recently in the cad sea waves at a popular watering place seven miles from the metropolis, having two railways, an institute, and a jetty, the name of which watering place must never be divulged or indicated, and she (the bather), got cut of her depth. In accordance with a timehonored custom of the fair sex, she immediately took the necessary steps not to save herself, but to faint. She was resoued, and laid out upon the beach insensible. All the known expedients for restoring drowning persons —and a good many not known— were resorted to, but the lady remained obdurately lifeless till someone said, " Bring a nobbier of brandy." the lifeless lady opened her eyes, and faintly whispered, " Get a shilling's worth!" Tables!

Bonnor, of the Australian Eleven, hit a ball 147 yards in practice at illitchnn Green, the distance being marked and chained by the late James Southerton. The late G-. F. Grace caught Bonuor out in the match at the Ovftl at the distance of 115 yards, supposed to be the longest and highest catch ever seen.

That Yankees and British manufacturers are not the only people who practice adulteration may be known from the statement of Mr Medhurtft, a British official in China, who recently wrote that fifty-three thousand pounds of willow leaves were being made ready to be mixed with teas at one port alone.

An American paper faya that a ohild eleven years old was recently sent as a parcel by rail from Kansas, where her parents live, to Philadelphia, a distance of 1900 miles, and arrived quite safely at her destination. She had a ticket hung round her neck, and the railway authorities took and gave a receipt for her, just as if she had been an ordinary express parcel.

The Ellesmere Guardian says:—" We are pleased to learn that the spire of Christchurch Cathedral will be proceeded with shortly. The tower has been completed for some months past, but no funds were available for the spire. The Misses Rhodes, of Timaru, have, however, come nobly forward to the rescue, and with large-hearted liberality have subscribed the amount required for its construction, so that we may fairly expect to see the work commenced forthwith.

The following is a verbatim ct literatim extract from the letter of the secretary of a local school board in a country town to a firm in Sydney : —" lam desirous of Being informed whether you would supply me with four school desks, to Be Capable of holding 6 (six) children with iron legs and cedar tops, and what the freight would be to also the price of iron legs eacli if you would. sell them separately, or without the wood." The firm replied that they had no children of the kind described, and always sold whole those they had.

A discussion was carried on in one of the London sporting papers some time ago as to the height that a horse can jump. A correspondent states that "on the 3rd of September last, at the Dublin Horse Show, a Mr W. .Alexander, of Somerton, Bally - moto, made a bet with another man that his horse, Retainer, would jump six feet without touching. The bet was taken up, and the horse jumped six feet three inches without any sort of excitement, and only a few yarda of a run. This is probably the highest jump on record." Is it?

Even in a cricketer, and that a Wellingtonian, there is (the Times says) to be found an amount of verdant and juvenile innocence which in these days is perfectly refreshing. " Spoffortheats jelly at lunch," said an aspiring Wellington bowler sotto voce, " and bo will I." And he did eat it, but one has the stern duty of saying that, whether or not Spofforth's greased lightning spots are accelerated by jelly, it was perfectly certain that the local bowler did not gain a single wicket after devouring several plates of the savory compound.

The Auckland Free Lance refers to a contemporary in this manner : —" There is a sewer in this city, from which there is hebdomadally scattered mud upon everything honest and respectable, and from which floods of iilth flow as readily as the pure waters from the rosk which Moses struck. We would not have noticed the existence of the miserable inchoate morsel of elementary protoplasm had it not been that our attention has been drawn to several lying paragraphs, casting reflections on the aotion of the able and active secretary of the Eegatta Committee, because the committee did not chose to advertise in the miserable and libellous production referred to.

The rabbit plague must be very bed in Victoria, for we learn from the Mataura Ensign that Mr Chesterfield, farmer,Tou Yangs (Victoria), is erecting a barrier of elabs round a considerable portion ot his land against the inroads of the rabbits that infest the adjacent hills in such countless myriads. The slabs are 4ft in length, and are sunk into the ground to a depth of Bin, thus leaving 3ft 4in standing erect, and topped with a well strained wire about 4in above the slabs. Some farmers in the neighborhood of Romsey went to the trouble and expense of erecting slab fences 6ft in height, but without avail, as the rabbits leapt on the top of the fence, and from that down into the crop within the enclosure.

Baron Kolb, a German, who has been ransacking the figures of the universe, says that the English is the most widelyspread language, being spoken by about 80,000,000 people; German by 50,000,000 or 60,000,000; French and Spanish, 40,000,000 each; Russian, 55,000,000. Every;advance made by a people in morality and healthy employment and useful knowledge adds to its tenure of life. The average of life among the well-to-do is fifty years, among the poor thirty-two years. Clergymen average the longest lives—sixty-six years. Idlers are shorter-lived than the industrious, and statistics prove that in countries where consanguinous m&rriages are permitted there are to be found a greater number of deaf mutes and idiots than elsewhere.

A duel was lately fought in Texas byAlexander Shott and John S. Nott. Nott was shot and Shott was not. In this case it was better to be Shott than Nott. There was a rumor that JVott was not shot, and Shott avows that be shot Nott, which proves either that the shot Shott shot at Nott was shot, or that Nott was shot notwithstanding. , Circumstantial evidence is not always good. It may be made to appear on trial that the shot Shott shot shot Nott; or, as accidents with firearms are frequent, it may be possible that the shot Shott shot shot himself, when the whole affair would revolve itself into its original element, and Shott would be shot and Nott would bo not. We think that the shot Shott shot shot not shot, but Nott; anyway, it is hard to say who was shot.

Apropos of the Hop Bitters contest a leading English sporting weekly writes : — " With an Australian and a Canadian rowing for the Championship, and the Thames made an advertising stream for an American firm of distillers, boating in England has come to a pretty pass! Sport is piostituted when it is made a medium of advertising. If we continue to go on at the present rate we ehall, one of these days, read as the conditions of the Derby : ' A sweepstakes ot 50 soys each, half forfeit, for three-year-olds, with a challenge packet of Eno's Fruit Salt added ; this salt (price Is l|d), which will niake the dumb speak and the blind see, to be the absolute property of the owner of the horse winning the Derby on three successive occasions, etc' The Thames is the greatest highway in the world, and yet for a time all traffic between certain points is stopped so as to enable an American firm to advertise their bitters."

The Otago Witness has the following : — " Re the ' character book' in which, for the Education Board's information, the inspector records his estimate of the moral, intellectual, and professional calibre cf the teachers under his supervision, a suggestion has reached me which the Board is humbly overtured to take into its benign consideration. Give to the teachers the equivalent privilege of recording their estimate of the Inspectors. Let them compile a book for the Board's information setting forth their impressions of the Inspector's manners, bearing, temper, scholastic, efficiency, impartiality, and general fitness for his post. lam not insinuating that the Inspector's' record' thus obtained would be a bad one. Nothing of the kind. _ All that the suggestion involves is the equitable extension of the Board's system of espionage. The teachers are at present uneasy because the Inspector makes a secret report embodying his estimate of their' character." Allow thorn to report secretly upon his character, and the thing will.be equal,"

The Dunedin Echo, says:—" No sooner does a fresh stock of Paine's Age of Keason arrive in Dunedin than all the copies are purchased. Five hundred copios were received by one bookseller lately, and in three -weeks none were left. And the demand increases. In order to satisfy the demand Mr Braithwaite intends to publish a Colonial edition. We suppose ruo9t pejple must know that Paine, caring more for the publication of his opinions than for his pocket, never claimed copy, right in his works. Would he have believed that within a century an edition of the Age of Reason would be printed and published in New Zealand ? And bo the world moves.

According to " Euffler," in Vanity Fair, Lady Florence Dixie has presented her pet jaguar to the Zoological Society. A correspondend writes to me as follows :—" I happened to be present when the animal was deposited, a few days ago, in the den which had been prepared for its reception in the new Lion House. It was diverting to observe the terror with which some twenty keepers held aloof from the kennel in which the animal was enclosed. With her own hands her ladyship removed the heavy collar and chain from off the great beast's neck, and it was truly touching to see the magnificent animal, with a nature usually so ferocious and treacherous, quietly licking its mistress's hands. Of this famous jaguar I have heard much, but never yet believed in its tameness, until with my own eyes I witnessed a sight seldom, if ever, witnessed before. Apropos of the courageous lady, I am informed that she and Sir Thomas Beaumont intend shortly to visit North America; and to rehearse amid the snows of that region for the trip to the North Pole, which is contemplated next year."

The colossal crane at Woolwich has been upwards of four years in procees of erection. To give some idea of this stupendous piece of mechanism for lifting , great weights, it may be stated that 1,800 tons of iron and three tons of brass have been used in ita construction, and that when it is completed, as it soon will be, it will lift three or four 100-ton guns at once. But a less powerful crane could do that work in detail. This giant among oranes is calculated to raise 1,200 tons, and has been formed for meeting the probable necessity of dealing with specimens of ordnance so enormous as to defy all the means at present available for mounting them on their carriages. The height of the crane is 70ft; it can sweep round, making a circumference of 430 f t; and one man, it is said, can control it at the central cylinder. The motive power is, of course, steam, and our readers may fancy what a 200 or even a 300-ton gun would be like swinging in the air at any height under 70ft, held in the grasp of thia monster machine, which, if placed at the side of a harbor, could lift large vessels clean out of the water.

Referring to the departure of the Australian cricaetera from Nelsou. the Colonist of Saturday last says :—"At the conclusion of the game Mr Lucre again had his fine turn-out ready for our visitors, and on, their taking their seats the Nelson men gave them three hearty but undeserved cheers, for only one (Mr Boyle) recognised the compliment in any way, unless an illtempered scowl can be called bo doing. They were again cheered on their departure from the wharf, whither they were also conveyed by Mr Lucre, but there was the same ill-bred oonduct, and a feeling akin to relief was experienced when the men had really left. Individual members of the team might possibly improve on acquaintance, and it may be that one or two are not in reality so boorish as they appeared. It is, however, generally suppofied that travel gives polish; but if it has done 80 with several of the Australian team we can only deplore their original roughness. Wβ were led to consider the players as gentlemen when they went Home, but nowwell, they have become professionals in the money-making sense, but in another we have met better professionals."

Madame Lotti Wilrnot will lecture thia evening in the Theatre Koyal on " Court« ship and Marriage," at 8 o'clock. A class for the investigation of spiritualism will be held on Thursday evening.

Messrs Monteith and Co. will sell, at the Horse Bazaar, on the 26th instant, 20 hacks and trap horsee. Quarterly meeting Hibernian Society on March 2nd.

Mr Henry Collins has opened a brickyard at Hastings. Messrs Wallace and M'Burnie, of Petane, have dissolved partnership. Tenders are invited for the supply of 100,000 bricks to the Corporation, also for the supply of galvanised iron closet pans at per 100. Tenders are invited for the supply of 500 cubic yards of stone at Port Ahuriri. A number of new advertisements will he found in our "wanted" column,