INTERPROVINCIAL AND INTERCOLONIAL.

Dunstan Times, Issue 930, 13 February 1880, Page 3

INTERPROVINCIAL AND INTERCOLONIAL.

On tho night of the 3rd instant a comet was visible throughout the southern Colonies of Australia. The wool season at Melbourne is nearly concluded, 120,000 bales were sold, representing a value of L 2,000,000. The Queensland Government have resolved f o call for a direct steam service for mails and immigrants. A steam hammer weighing 23,5001b5, was landed at Christchurch, on the 3rd instant, from the American barque Ada Wiswell, for the railway workshops At Sydney, on the 4th instant, in the course of a debate in the Council. Sir John Robertson suggested the conversion of the Garden Palace into ameatand wo J depot, and his remark was cheered by the Council The Te Anau has arrived at 'Melbourne with a number of practical agriculturists as passengers to settle : n New Zealand. Private cables received in Melbourne report very great excitement in London over the success of the Strathleven experiment. It is commonly considered the value of station property must advance from 15 to 20 per cent. During the past week three separate attempts have been made to upset the trains on the Napier-Kopua line by placing logs on the rails. The police are investigating the affair. ° In the Nelson district harvesting is now drawing near, and there may be said to be a good average throughout. It m anticipated that fully 100,000 tons of gram will be shipped at Lyttelton duiing the season, as against 40.000 last year. At Orahamstown. a young man named M alter Ratcliffe has been committed for trial for making a false declaration of the age of the girl he married a few days ago. The mother of the girl prosecuted. A Wellington telegram states that Parliament will probably be called together for the despatch of business about the 20th of May Every effort is being used by the Government to get the business in such a forward state that the meeting mav ta’o plane then, and the work of the session be proceeded with without delay. A telegram from'Melhourne states that the Irish Relief Fund amounts to L1L323, and at Sydney, LI 1,500.

Elder Batt, president of the New Zealand Mormon Mission, has sent for ten more elders from Utah, who will be located in various spheres of labor in the Colony. At Gisborne a mulatto has been sentenced to imprisonment for three months for paying midnight visits to the houses of widows and women whose husbands were away from home.