The Evening Star. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1869.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 2062, 14 December 1869, Page 2

The Evening Star. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1869.

Supreme Court.— There was no sitting of this Court to-day. Information for Carters, His Worship the Mayor, after the sitting of the Court had terminated, remarked that, if carters would not only carry but use their chain-brakes when necessity required them to leave the horse’s head, no officer of the Court would interfere with them. It was their own fault if they were inconvenienced and fined. - Resident Magistrate’s Court.— The only cases at the Resident Magistrate’s Court this day were three small city cases. J. Sinclair and A. Muir were each fined 10s for driving horses without reins ; .and Mr Levy was charged with breach of the Pawnbrokers Act,, by selling pledges without

giving the required notice# These cases properly belonged to the Mayor’s Court, but the summonses having been issued before it was established they were disposed of by the Resident Magistrate, A. C. Strode, Esq. Literary. —The public do not appear to take kindly to Mr Grant’s Delphic Oracle. Tempting as the bait is, the public refuse to swallow it. Certainly it is a creditable production, and as such deserves to be read. In an advertisement in to-day’s issue, Mr Grant complains, first, that the public refuse to take his Oracle. and, secondly, that those who do take it refuse to pay for it. This is a very serious dilemma indeed. But we submit that Mr Grant should shake hands with himself that he disposes of so few copies, when by his own adraGsion he fails to get paid for those ho really sells. i Boat Accident. —Information was received in town yesterday that the fishing craft Blanche Barkely, in crossing the Port Chalmers bar, about four o’clock in the afternoon, had been capsized and all hands drowned. The accident was witnessed by the Signal Master at the Heads, who reported it at the Pilot Station, when the pilot boat was immediately manned and a search instituted, but no vestige of men or boat was to be found. We have been able to ascertain that the boat was owned by Mr Lewis, who was cutting wood in the bush, and did not go that trip. The crew then consisted of two, Francis Drake and A. Brown. Drake is well known in Dunedin, having followed the occupation of a fisherman in connection with this town for six or seven years. Brown only recently arrived from the Hogburn, and but little is known of him, but it is believed both are single men. Neither of the bodies has been recovered. The English Mail.—An eroueoua impression appears to exist with regard to the sailing of the Rangitcto last month from Melbourne without telegraphic news by the English mail. This impression is corrected by Messrs Lalgety and Co., Lyttelton, who in a letter to the local paper state that ‘‘ it was not until the Rangitoto was passing through Port Philip Heads that Captain Maekie know of the mail steamer having been telegraphed, and then only by observing the usual flag flying on tho Queeucliff flagstaff. The last thing before leaving Melbourne (say 3 o’clock p.m.), Capt. Maekie, with Mr Blackwood, went to the telegraph office to ascertain whether the mail had been signalled with the intention of waiting for the telegraphic news. Finding such was not the case, the vessel proceeded on her voyage. With a full passenger list and a largo cargo, the steamer would not have been detained without considerable inconvenience. ,*

Bridging the Waitaki. — A.t a public meeting held at Oamaru last Wednesday, the following resolutions were passed 1. That this meeting, being of opinion that tho bridging of the Waitaki river is of the utmost importance, and understanding that the Canterbury Government are empowered and -willing to provide L 5.000 towards the coat thereof, and that the Government engineers are in possession of sufficient data to warrant tho Provincial Government in at once calling for tenders, earnestly and respectfully requests his Honor the Superintendent and his Executive Council to take tho necessary steps to have tho work immediately commenced. 2. That this meeting is of opinion that the full benefit of the bridging of the Waitaki river will not be attained without tho removal of the present restrictions as to tho crossing of sheep from Canterbury, and desires to urge upon the Provincial Government tho immediate necessity of their abolition. Honor to whom Honor is due.—On two occasions lately, Sergeant Naden. of Oamaru, distinguished himself in attempting to save life from drowning, and on one occasion his efforts were crowned with success It appears that this was not the first time this officer has distinguished himself. In January, 1868, a boat named ths Victoria (schooner) capsized on the Lake Wakatipu in a squall of wind, Sergeant Naden immediately put off in a boat (of which ho was part owner, and which in the first instance was purchased by him and laid on as a lifeboat) and succeeded in saving the life of two men, and immediately after recovered the body of the third, who was drowned. In February, 1868, another capsize took place ; the Sergeant’s boat was again in requisition, and almost entirely owing to his promptitude and exertion, a child, a woman, and two men —who were clinging to the mast of the capsized boat—were rescued from their most perilous position, and safely conveyed to shore. On another occasion, under the supervision of that officer, the body of a man, a waggon and two horses were brought to the surface from a great depth of water, at a place called Half-way Bay, tho depth being 60 or 80 feet. The authorities might safely recommend Sergeant Naden to tho notice of the Royal Humane Society. If ever a man deserved their medab he does. The Maori Prisoners,— The announcement that the murderers of Mr Fulloon have been pardoned and sot at liberty, will prove anything but pleasing to the Colony, and will detract much from the pleasure afforded by Mr M‘Lean’s success in Waikato. It seems that like the laws of the Medes and Persians, it is unalterably determined that whenever Maoris are concerned justice shall limp on one foot. The murder of Fulloon and the crew of the Kate was an act of coldblooded deliberate ferocity, without a single extenuating circumstance to be discovered by the keenest philo-Maori casuist, and committed by a party of the same wretches who had hanged Mr Volkner, drunk his blood and eaten his brains a few months previously. If ever men deserved to die for their crimes, these wretches did. Commuting their sentences into imprison ment was unpardonable weakness, and now, after some three years’ incarceration, to turn them loose is simply an announcement that the administration of justice is a mockery and a farce. Does any man in New Zealand believe that had these murderers been Europeans they would hare been reprieved either from the gallows or from penal servitude ? We need not ask—we require opiy point to the ease of Walter Tricker a? a proojE k°W evenhanded our justice is. There is little doubt—as the Southern Cross says—that the release of Te riura and his companions will afford satisfa-tion to tho King party, but it will be a satisfaction mingled with contempt for the weakness which allowed it. A good deal is said about tho importance of capturing Kooti. hut were bo in Wellington Gaol at this moment it would be safe to take long odds that ho would escape hanging, and after a timo be restored to the “bosom of his family.” —Evening Post,

Tokomairiro. —The following items are taken from to-day’s Standard: —A correspondent in the Taieri wr.'tes us that the rain on Monday has had a reviving effect upon the crops. The crops of oats arc getting well forward, and in some favored localities are in ear. It is apparent that, generally, the crops will be light, and the harvest much earlier than usual. —Considerable anxiety and interest are felt as to the result of the tunnelling now going on in connection with the Table Hill Quartz Mining Coy. It is hoped that the reef will be struck in a few days. The cutting is difficult, as the rock is very hard.—Wo have this week to chronicle a melancholy case of drowning in the Tokomairiro river, near Milton. As far as we have been able to learn particulars, it appears that a man of the name of George Balfour, a painter by trade, and pretty well known in Milton, had gone, along -with Mr Reeves, bootmaker, down to the river on Thursday evening, to set lines for the purpose of catching eels. Early yesterday morning Balfour went hy himself to lift the lines, and while in the act of doing so, it is presumed ho must have fallen into the pool, about five feet deep, -ind had been unable to recover himself, and where ho was found between 11 and 12 o’clock in the forenoon. The place whore he was drowned is not far from the trout pond, and as the pool is not of large extent, it is conjectured that he must have hid a fit, to which, we understand, he has latterly been subject. Fears of some accident began to bs entertained when the deceased did not return to breakfast; and on Mr Reeves and another going to search for him, he was found with his face downwards, and grasping part of a line and some grass. The deceased was unmarried.—A few days ago a settler in the Taieri killed a young bullock, about ten months old, which on being put on the scales, showed the extraordinary weight of 540lfis. Thk Franklin Expediton, The New York papers of 15th September contain the following:—San Francisco, 13th September. —A party, vouched for as reliable, writes to the Bulletin from San Buenaventura, that a document had been found on the beach at that place, on 30th August, very badly mutilated On the document was found a request for the finder to forward it to the Secretary of the Admiralty at London, or the British Consul at the nearest port, the request being printed in six commercial languages on the margin. Every vacant portion was filled with writing relating to Sir John Franklin and hjs party. The document was evidently cast into the water in latitude 69 deg. 37 miu. 42 sec., and longitude 98 deg. 4 min. 5 sec. It gives an account of the desertion from the ships Erebus and Terror. The party numbered 105 at the time of the desertion, under the command of F. R M. drossier. They had succeeded in reaching the above latitude and longitude, where they had foqnd relics of the late Sir John Ross. The document states that the party bad wintered at Beechy Island in 1846 and 1847, and that Sir John Franklin had died on 11th June, 1847. It contains many interesting incidents connected with the expedition. Another account, published recently, fixes the latitude at 594, l) ut this is evidently an error. It is not stated in what manner the document was washed upon the shore, whether in a bottle or hermetically sealed can, but it will probably prove to be an exact duplicate of the papers found by the party of Captain M'Clintock on the western extremity of King William’s Island in May, 1859. The extraordinary part of the matter is that the document was tossed about by the waves for twenty-one years, th st it must of necessity have been carried along that mysterious North-West Passage about which so much has been written, and to establish which so many valuable lives have been thrown away and that it was cast up on the strand of the Pacific Ocean, at a distance of more than 8,000 miles from the spot where it was committed to the sea. The incident of the bottle in VHomme qid HU, which enclosed the secret of Gwynplaiue’s noble birth, and was buffeted about for more than twenty years by the unquiet waters of the Channel, loses its improbability by the light of this recent discovery. Dr. Hall, the Arctic explorer, arrived at New Bedford, on the 26th September, from Repulse Bay, after an absence of five years. Ho discovered the sko etons of several of Sir John Franklin’s party at King William’s Land, and fie brings numerous relics of the Franklin oxpeditiqn.

The Battery of the Dunedin Volunteer Artillery Regiment will parade in undress uniform, at the Gunshed, to morrow (Wednesday) evening, at 7.30. —gun drill.