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Evening Star, Issue 3410, 26 January 1874, Page 2

The Victoria Insurance Company have made a donation of LlO 10s to the Surat Relief Fund. The Queen’S Variety Troupe, of which mention was made in ‘‘ theatrical gossip”'in. our Saturday’s issue, will ■ open at the Princess Theatre on February 2. The number of nominations sent from Invercargill by the last mail was 601, making a total of 1.779 persons nominated through the immigration offices in Southland since the 20th Oct. last. The Christchurch City Council has adopted a bye-law which requires bathers at the Corporation baths on week days, to use proper bathing costume, after nine o’clock in the morning. Bathing is not allowed after nine on Sunday mornings. To-night will be the last (for some time at least) of the Kennedy entertainments, and a programme worthy of the occasion has been put forward. We have no doubt but that there will be a crowded house, and Would advise those who have not yet heard the family not to neglect this opportumty. The third trial of John Hawkins for specimen stealing at the Thames resulted in Ids conviction. Sentence has been deferred till the Court of Appeal gives judgment on the legal point reserved, which relates to the rights of the prisoner as a partner in the tribute from which the specimens were taken. We hear that a considerable feeling exists among the congregation of the .First Church in favor of making a call, if the negotiations with the Rev. Dr Dykes of London do not stand in the way, to the Rev; Dr Cameron, of St. Kilda, who has occupied the. Church pulpit for the past few weeks. AccordingtotheQueenstown correspondent of the ‘ Mount Ida Chronicle ’ the miners in the Lake district are talking of refusing to use the paper of the banks, unless gold is raised to something like its nominal value; and that the Miners’ Central Executive intend to suggest that course of action to local associations. The Southland papers asserted that when the Governor visited the Invercargill gaol he expressed himself highly pleased with the good order andthoroughcleanliness that characterised the management of the institution. The next day the Governor’s aide-de-camp mote that he had been directed to state that “ his Excellency expressed no opinion officially upon the gaol.” “ Fettered!’ was played at the Princess’s on Saturday evening to a more than average attendance. Mr Hycles’s Tom Tit was really good. At the'fall of the curtain Mr Hydes came to the'footlights, and announced that the present week terminated the occupany of the theatre by the commonwealth company; and that on Tuesday evening, Miss Andrews—“a very rising young actress ” —would take her .first benefit in Dunedin. • Bishop Nevill has, in accordance with a resolution recently passed by the Church of England Synod, prepared a general scheme for the classification of teaching in Sunday schools. It provides a special course of instructions for three divisions in each school. The teachers of St. Paul’s Sunday school held a meeting yesterday afternoon, when it was decided to carry out the proposed system as soon as arrangements are effected. It was also resolved that •an effort should be made to procure more teaching power, the number of teachers attending at present being scarcely sufficient for the work.' ’ In commenting on the recent defeat of the A, E. eleven by the Victorians the ‘Sydney Morning Herald’ has the following:--“ All sorts of rumors have been in circulation accounting for the one-innings, defeat of the Englishmen. Some have said that the professional players sold the match—that there , was a want of temperance also among them. I merely allude to these reports to state that I do not think the slightest credit is to be given to them. Jupp, who enjoys a very high reputation in England as a professional player, was hooted by a portion of the crowd when he retired for 0, and was much cut up at the treatment. He said that in the whole of his career he had never before met with such a reception. However it was only a small minority that indulged in such a senseless proceeding.”

Atticus,” in the Melbourne ‘ Leader,’ tells the following characteristic story of the departed millionaire “alphabet Clarke ”:t- ---■ About a week before his death one of his most intimate friends paid him a farewell visit. Conversational powers flag wonderfully when one is sitting by a dying man, and the old friend felt awkward while listening to the labored breathing and incoherent remarks of the great landowner. However, feeling that friendship required something from him beyond ordinary platitudes, he broke the painful silence by saying, ‘Well, Clarke, yoU haven’t done many good things while you lived, but there’s time yet if you make haste.’ ‘ I don’t know what you call good things,’ murmured the alphabetical,. ‘but 1 know I put out L 30,000 at 124 per cent, no later than last week !”’

‘ The reports from the Medical Superintendents and Inspectors of Lunatic Asylums in New Zealand are exceedingly instructive. The tables _ illustrate in a remarkable manner the necessity for a central establishment, which should be placed under the control of a medical man experienced in the treatment ,of mental diseases, and shew that some lunacy establishments afe overcrowded, while others are almost without patients, or contain at most four or five inmates. In Auckland the number under treatment in 1873 was 118 (83 males and 35 females); in Taranaki, 3; in Napier, 7; in Wellington, 27; in Christchurch, 113 (79 males and 31 females); in Hokitika, 15 (31 males and females; in Dunedin, 171 (125 males and. 19 females. The classes of society which contribute most largely to the number of cases are laborers and settlers, the number of the former in Auckland being as 10 to 2 of any other occupation, and the latter mostly females, as 15 to nothing. This calculation is upon 51 cases in the Auckland Asylum. The figures in the tables furnished by the Dunedin Asylum correspond very closely—laborers 16, and miners 13, or a total of 29 as compared with 5 of any other class. The class which is the next largest coiitnbutor is that of “domestic servants.” Dunedin and suburbs contributed only 14 cases out of the 159 under treatment. The age at which the greater number of lunatics manifest their derangement is from 35 to 40. The total number treated in Dunedin during a period of ten years was 663, of which 405 recovered. The chief complaint of the inspectors and medical superintendents is overcrowding, which makes classification very difficult, .

It is gratifying to learn that the bonus offered by the General Government to individuals or companies disposed to enter upon the enterprises of mining for and manufacturing iron within the Colony has not been offered in vain. According to an announcement made in the last issue of the§‘ Gazette,’ there have already been received by the Government five intimations of an intention to claim the bonus in question, the claimants being— Manager Collingwood Coal Company, Nelson; Magnus Manson, Motupipi, Nelson; J. C, Stovin,' Awitu, Auckland; Para Para Coal and Iron Company, Collingwood. Nelson; Kichard Ohilman, agent for H. J. Walduck and Companj’', New Plymouth. The precise conditions on which these claims are made are not stated, nor do we remember for the moment what form the proffered bouussea assumed when finally passed by the House, but the following were the recommendations of the committee which sat last session to consider the subject of Colonial Industries:—“ Your committee, taking into consideration the value arid importance of iron manufactures, recommend that, subject to existing engagements entered into by the Government on the’recommendation of the committee of last year, a bonus be offered . for the erection of a suitable blast furnace for the manufacture of pig iron in an approved locality; such bonus not to exceed 25 per cent, on the cost of erection, and not to be paid till the works are in full operation; bonus not to exceed L5,00Q sterling. And your committee also recommend that a bonus be offered for the •rection of suitable machinery for the manufacture of bar and rod iron and rails, in an approved locality; such bonus not to exceed 25 per cent, on the cost of erection, and not to be paid.'until the works are in full operation; total amount of bonus not to exceed L 5.000 sterling, and to available for three years,”

Sir James Fergusson does not appear to have over-pleased the Queenstownpeople. Weread in the ‘ Mail’ that the Mayor, representing the Queenstown division of the district j Mr Hal-; lenstein, M.P.C. for the Lakes district, and Mr Worthington, Clerk of the Court, representing' the official element, went from the racecourse to meet his Excellency at the iShotoVer Bridge. They might have saved themselves the trouble, for though his Honor the Superintendent courteously hailed the above gentlemen by name, liis Excellency passed on with his team witholit According any notice to them. He arrived in Queenstown about 6 p.m., but though a good few persons were about, he was received without ceremony when he reached Eichardt’s Hotel, not a cheer being given or a hat raised. He could not, therefore, complain about any fuss being made about him upon his arrival in the town. A deputation of Chinese were, by written appointment, to have waited upon his Excellency at ten o’clock tha next morning, but when that hour came there was no Governor to meet. After a long interval, Ip.m. was fixed, upon as the hour for the interview, but bv that time the fifty or sixty Chinese who wore to have accompanied the deputation, had doffedi their holiday clothes, put on their ordinary attire, and most of them were off to the races or had returned home in a pet. Under the circumstances,. it was deemed by the remaining Chinese desirable that only . the deputation should wait upon the Governor. His Excellency afterwards drove to the racecourse. He walked back to Queenstown. In the evening, he went to the Theatre, and next morning at 6' a.m, left with his Honor the Superintendent, per steamer Antrim, for Kingston. The ‘ Mail’ 1 thus speaks its mind in reference to his Ex ■ cellency’s proceedings “He was Governor, and acting, as one. He had to be properly approached, and yet at the same time , wished to be treated as a distinguished private visitor. He stood upon his dignity as Governor, and yet desired to be considered as Mr 4 Tom Nobody’ for the' hour. He thus placed the whole district in a false position, and few thank him for that. . . . . . It was determined as soon as it was known that the Governor would visit the district that he should be, received without ceremony, and that only one address should be presented, and that of a congratulatory nature, by the Municipal authorities. But his Excellency managed even to ignore this one. This ignoring of the duties attached ta the office of Governor—this abnegation of the position, and yet its real retention, requires a good deal of tact to carry through properly. Sir James Ferguson may endanger, in a much lesser light of course, the feelings of loyalty that should rather be kept warm and vigorous than become cold and repulsive. We hold that the more the governing class and the governed mix together upon suitable occasions, the better it is for the general interests of society. The tour and reception of a ‘live Governor’ in state may.produce a good deal of bunkum ; we all know it does, but that ‘bunkum,’ like the fragile toy of the child, gives pleasure at the time, and leaves a remembrance behind half pleasing, half ridiculous, to recur to or talk about hereafter.” ' .

The attention of Volunteers is directed to a general order in our advertising columns. There will be a full-dress parade of the North Dunedin Rifles .on Wednesday evening, .at which it is specially desired that every member be present. It will . be seen from an, advertisement. in another column that the drawing of Howell and Hay’s art union takes place this evening at 7 o clock in. the lower nail pf the Atlienamrn. We would remind our readers that Mr W. Johnston, barrister-at-law, gives readings tomorrow evening in the Athenaeum Hull, the proceeds to go to the Benevolent Institution. : The annual pic-nic of the jPort Chalmers Presbyterian. Church Sabbath School takes place to morrow on the grounds of Mr R, Lean, The The Rev. J. G. Baton will deliver an address in the church to-morrow evening.