ST. BATHANS

Dunstan Times, Issue 408, 11 February 1870, Page 2

ST. BATHANS

(FROM OUR OWN cob respondent.)

It is matter for congratulation that

miners’ matters are becoming a more cheerful subject of communication from St. Bathans. Tierney and mate, after a tbr< e months washing have netted about £SOO. Tiie Enterprise Company have also ended their washing up in a satisfactory manner The .Scandioaviau Company are g

fomg on

vigorously uith their claims and entertain

sanguine expectations of their washing, which, they expect, to come off in about two months. Several shares in this Company have recently changed hands in a manner favorable to the shareholders. The extension of the main sludge channel— Dickie and partys’ main tail race—is steadily going forward On tko whole the prospects are cheering. Some old residents have recently left on their way to Europe, and some have it in prospect to renew the emotions of “ Auld Lang Syne ” hy revisiting their native shores. D> several instances these departures retain their mining interests in the Creek, a proof that they have certain confidence in the permanent pecuniary value of such investments. The Entertainment on behalf of the Dur,stan Hospital has come off and proved a great success, Mr. Pyle’s magic lantern brought vividly before us scenes in manv Lands, transporting our minds to Old England, to modern Paris, to beautiful Venice, and to far-off, classically, sacred Jerusalem. We rove on, if not up the Rhine, in the Tyrol, even as far North as Iceland. Not content in placing us in close relations to boiling springs and burning mountains, he suddenly sent ns shivering into Greenland into too very centre of an Esquimaux Township, where we examined some greasy specimens of that dirty race. AI any other things we saw, “ the which when wo had seen ’’ as John Runyan hath it, “we wished ourselves among them.”

Then came tho second part, Mr. George I’urton was called to the Chair, and in an opening speech explained tho object of tho meeting. Misses Smith and Lynch together with Mr. Grierson sung tho opening song, “ Father come home, ” then Mr. M'Cormiek’s “Highland Fling” dressed in “the garb of Old Gaul” footed it to perfection, eliciting an enthusiastic encore. In the course of the evening, we had Mr. M'Diarmids reading of “ trial scene from Pickwick ” and renewed our acquaintance with Serjeant Buzfuz and our esteemed friend “ Sam Veller Miss Smith rendered “ Annie Lisle ” very sweetly, and Mr. M'Connochie proclaimed his entire unfitness to obtain such a boon from Heaven as “ Annie on tho banks o’ Dee ” very effectively'. Then we had an original comic song from Mr. Grierson, in which ho hit off several of our local characters very smartly, and jet so gcnally, that none

"could feol off ne I. '1 his gentleman is about to leave this district for Cromwell, ami the Chairman in' making allusion to his departure elicited much genuine good feeling towards Mr. Grierson, in truth the enthusiastic good feeling towards him which was displayed has been fully merited by him. In any Entertainment for any object, Mr. Grierson has strained every nerve to make it a success. His great powers as an original “Comic” renders such aid very eett'etive. Mr. King too was very great in the comic line, and was most effectively got up as an old woman in the song, “ I’ve lost my child”, Mr. Pyle Junior discoursed very good music, in a solo on the concertina. To this gentleman and Messrs Kellie and Wheeler we were iudebted.for all the music of the evening, and the entertainment would have been less successful without such A hornpipe by Mr. M'Cormick, dressed in character, and. another comic delineation by Mr. Grierson, and “ Johnie comes otaroiling homo again ” by Mr. W. Pyle, Junior and Company exhausted, 1 think, the programme. Everybody knows how well Mr. M'Cormick can dance, and how well Mr. Grierson can perform, if they don’t, they can come and see if they ever get the chance. A vote of thanks was given for Mr. Pyle to which he responded briefly. Then dancing begun, and* when it ended, your correspondent knoweth not, being then “in the arms o’Poipua” as Sam Teller would say. And here endeth the chronicle of events.