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Evening Star, Issue 3401, 15 January 1874, Page 2

Miss Hosiiia Carandini’s benefit last night j drew a large and brilliant attendance. 1 “ The Ragpicker of Paris ” was repeated at: the Princess’s last night to'a fair attendance. , A masquerade ball has been given at Arrowtown with considerable success. The local paper informs us that the attendance was good, and the dresses tasteful—in a word, the ball was such a success that it is to bo repeated before long. Counter-attractions had the effect of diminishing somewhat the attendance at the Masonicnevertheless the programme was most spiritedly carried through. As was the case on the previous evening, Mr Kennedy’s! account 6f his visit.to ,t£e Salt Lake City was 1 ] received with roatS-bMaughticr. I

The Honorable Julius "Vogel left Dunedin this'morning, m route overland for Christchurch. He purposes passing the night at Hampden, and expects to reach Oamavu tomorrow, where he will probably remain on Saturday, and expects to reach Christchurch on Monday. "We have received the following extraordinary telegram from Roxburgh :—“Governor lust passed through Roxburgh. "Great demonstra r tion. Mr M ‘Denali presented Governor witn greep silk umbrella and Superintendent with walking-stick; also condoled with Governor upon capsize on previous day.”

We learn from the ‘ Southern Mercury 1 that the Goldfields M.H.R.’s have transmitted to the Provincial Executive a memo, of 1 ‘ sugges tins for transmission of gold to Melbourne for coinage.” They- suggest that gold receivers should be instructed to receive par cels of gold for transmission to Melbourne; such parcels to have the weight -of their contents written thereon by the transmitters; no parcel to contain less than six ounces; the parcels to be transmitted by escort to Dunedin, thence shipped to the Melbourne mint per first steamer, the Provincial Government paying all freight, insurance, charges, and charging the same to the transmitters; returns to be sent from the mint authorities in the form of a bank draft, if it can be so anranged, and export duty to be collected on the value of the coined gold. These suggestions are only intended to apply to the interim pending the establishment of a branch assay office in Dunedin. The case of Alexander Tod, mentioned in our telegrams the other day, furnishes one more instance of a young man having all his future prospects blasted through yielding to temptation and pursuing evil courses. Tod is a South Australian, and most respectably connected. In 1869 he was taken on probation in the office of the Union Bank at Adelaide, his salary for the first three years being LSO per annum. In January last he was removed to Melbourne, and his salary was raised to Ll5O per annum; on Ist July it was further increased to‘Ll7s, at which it remained up.to the time when, he absconded. A short time since he was temporarily placed in the position of teller,. and in that capacity had as much as L 15,000 pass through his ho rids in one day, and on the 23rd ult. the balance of coin and notes in his solo charge was about L 14.000, as shown by a batement entered by himself in the teller’s daily balance-book. From this amount he had. abstracted L 1,250 in gold, and absconded, with it. The circumstances leading to this , are of the usual stamp. Tod had fallen in with and been facinated by a woman named Elizabeth Armstrong, who has evidently obtained great influence "over him. Although the abstraction of tho money was not known until the 24th inst., it was evident that the .greater portion, if not the whole of the amount; must have been taken some days previously, as the Woman had obtained a draft for LSOO, payable at Auckland, and had also paid for passage for Tod and herself by the Claud Hamilton several days before he made his final balance-entry in the bank-book.

Major Gordon, in addressing the Invercargill Volunteers after his inspection of them, said he confessed that the,lnvercargill Volunteers would compare most favorably with any other corps in Of.ago. He was particularly delighted with the way in which the Artillery had turned out as to numbers, and with the manner in which they had gone through their exercises in battalion—exercises which he was sure no other Artillery Corps in the Colony could so well discharge, just because those other Artillery Corps were uuder the erroneous impression that they had no right to be put through any other exercises than those which belonged to the Artillery proper. This was a mistake, which he was glad to see the Invercargill Artillery had not made. "With regard to the Rifles, Major Gordon was very well pleased with the effective manner in which they had gone through their exercises, but expressed consider able dissatisfaction with the meagre attendance, there being only about twenty present out of a company numbering fifty-six. He was. ashamed to see some who belonged to.the corps standing outside as mere spectators, aud he thought that the officers should bring some pressure to hear upon such as were so coldly indifferent to the creditable appearance of their, company. He felt that something should be done to check this indifference, and he suggested that the commanding officers should supply; him with the names of all wilful absentees, in order that they might be gazetted out of the corps—an action which no Volunteer with a spark of military fire would willingly give rise to. However, he was well pleased with all the Volunteers who were present, and would report them favorably. The recently-formed Highland Brigade was also present, and was drilled for some .time by Instructor Wallace; but Major Gordon was clearly of opinion that it was almost impossible ■ to raise a proper and creditable Highland Company in any town of New Zealand. He knew that nothing in-the way of a Volunteer Corps would be more readily accepted bythe Government, who: desired to see a Highland Company within the Colony; but he was afraid that the obstacles in the way of forming such an expensive corps were too great to be overcome. However, they mighfeee what progress they could make, and their project was certainly a laudable one.”