Local and General News

Feilding Star, Volume X, Issue 27, 14 August 1888, Page 2

Local and General News

New Zealand flax is worth £25 10s per ton in London. The Synod of this Diocese will meet on the 25th of September. The civil sittings of the Wellington Supreme Court began yesterday. Mr Collier has been appointed head teacher at the Halcombe school. Meaxles are very prevalent in Weh lington. The Public Works Statement will be given to»morrow evening. All the available ground »t Mahakipawa has been " pegged «ut." Mr G. Hutchigon, M.H.R., will visit England as soon as the session is over. The Feilding Acclimatisation Societj has a shipment of trout fry en. route. We regret to learn that Mr FitzGerald, the Auditor-General, is seriously indisposed. Major Walmsley took 115 horses to Auckland from Waitara last week, in the B.s. Gairlock. Candidates for the vacancy in the Borough Council must be nominated on Saturday next at noon. | The Wellington Education Board has issued a circular to teachers forbidding " the boxing of ears" of children. The N.Z. Times says it is quite possible there will be even more stonewalling in the future this session than we have had so far. i Heavy floods were reported from Canterbury and Dunedin on Sunday. A good deal of land went to sea, wtile rail and j coach traffic was interrupted. Telling a brother member of Parliament that he was " a shingle short" was I an offence for which Sydenham Taylor had to apologise the other day. We regret to learn that Mr C. L. Mountfort was thrown from his horse on Friday last, at Bulls, and somewhat seriously hurt. BLe is now doing well.

A lad named David Mabey, aged 10 years, was drowned in the Hutt river on Saturday. We have to acknowledge receipt Of a batch of Parliamentary papers and Hansard No. 23. We have received from Father 'Ginaty extended accounts of the opening ceremonies of the Mount Magdala Asylum, for which we now express our thanks. The Mokau Commission have returned to Wellington, and it is understood that Jones will submit himself for examination and will also call several witnesses. Messrs Pringle Bros, had a fine "body" on view on Friday last, which turned the scale at 9601b5. The bullock was fattened on Messrs Pnngle's land near Feilding. It is said that in the Auckland education district school-masters are closing school on days when the attendance is bad, to prevent their salaries being reduced by low averages If Mr Maxwell were to resign hiß position as General Manager of railways, he would be the most popular man in New Zealand in a week, the revulsion of feel* ing would be so great. Yesterday morning at the R.M. Court, "before Mr Kirton, J.P., a man named Thomas Francis was charged with being drunk on Saturday last, and fined 5s and 2s costs with the usual alternative. The Industrial banquet, held in Wellington on Saturday night, was a great success, the whole of the supplies Haying been provided gratis. Thirty-five members of Parliament were there, and enjoyed a good square meal. On Saturday night, during the passage of the steamer lona from Mercury Bay to Auckland, and when the vessel was about 10 miles out, a passenger named George Connor fell overboard and was lost. There was a fire in Campbell street, Wanganui, on Saturday night by which a four-roomed cottage owned by Mr William Whelan was destroyed. Insurance £rt)O on the house, the furniture valued at £100 was not insured. In our article on Saturday referring to the loan for No. 2 ward of the Manchester Road District, we said its amount was £1600. This appears to have been an error as the schedule, as published, shows only £1400. It is said that every man's opportunity comes but once in a life time. The agent of the Press Association had his on Saturday when he took oyer three hundred words to tell us a hotel had been burned down, and some commercial travellers samples lost. Apropos of the liberation of Charles Henry the Herald says : — " Honest men haye very little chance when rogues get off repeatedly on some legal pretext or otner." Our contemporary forgets criminal laws were not made for the benefit or protection of honest men. We have to waru our readers against a " consultation" swindler named James Wallace, whose circulars are being scattered broadcast over this part of the colony. ' ' James Wallace" is a myth, and the promoters of the sweep are well known swindlers and sharpers. On Friday afternoon the crank shaft of Chamberlain's flourmill was broken. The necessary repairs will be completed in about a week when work will be resumed. In the mean time Mr Chamberj lam has enough flour on hand to supply i all ordinary wants of the dritiict. The San Francisco mail service costs £30,501 Is Us and the revenue therefore was. for the year ended 31st December 1887, £29,771* 16 4d, making a net cost to the colony of only £729 5$ 7d, If the same work had beon done by direct steamers the cost would be £20,1 55 10s 9d. The average annual contribution of the newspapers of the colony to religious bodies is £129 14s 3d. Some dailies give from £350 to £500. The lowest are the bi-weekly papers which only give about £72 per annum. The religious papers give nothing, of course, as they are absorbent. The protection works placed by Dr Monckton on the banks of the Oroua river at " The Camp" haye proved far more s uccessful than was anticipated. The course of the river has been altered slightly already, and the silt is forming new land behind the groins. Plenty of willows haye been planted to *' make the job a certainty." So far as we (Manawatu Times) can gather the members of the Manawatu Road Board are rather jubilant over the I fact that a Receiver has been appointed. They are now relieved of the work of reorganising the finances which has tried them so long. Lit would be interesting to know what these members thought Ihey were elected for.] Mr Jellicoe, acting on behalf of Gaspanni, the French recideviste, who is being taken to Sydney by the Wakatipu, cabled to Sydney instructing his agents in that city to move for a writ of habeas corpus as soon as Gasparini arrived. The application will be made upon similar grounds to those advanced in the Supreme Court at Wellington, and which the Court refused to uphold. We have received the August number of the Illustrated Australian News — New Zealaud Edition — which contains a comprehensive and interesting account of the history of Victoria since the foundation of the colony. The illustrations are exceptionally good, especially the fac-simile of the first manuscript newspaper issued on Monday January Bth, 1838, and pictureß of early life on the gold fields. Mr W. Carthew is the Feilding agent. The Examiner has discovered that the secret of the large additions to the Woodville station grounds turns out to be that Woodville is to be the central station of the Wellington-Napier line when opened right through. The morning trains for Napier and Wellington will start from Woodville, and passengers by the evening trains from the respective termini will stay in Woodville over night. We wait anxiously to see what Palmerston will say to this. One of the most important sales of property ever held in Wellington is shortly to be conducted by Messrs Baker Bros. We understand that the firm have been instructed to have surveyed and cut up into building allotments, with the view of submitting the same at auction, the block of land in Newtown, owned by Mr Walter Turnbull, and known as Howe's Farm. This property consists of 21 acres, which it is proposed to divide into 249 sectious, having frontages of 8091 feet to Coromandel. Owen, Constable, Daniel, and Mem streets, and to six new streets to be formed through the property. This sale must make a considerable difference to the values of property in that part of the city, as it will allow of settlement upon lands which have for so long been tied up in one block, and the sections should excite keen competition not only among those wishing to pnrchase a home, but with investors and speculators as well. Other particulars will be duly advertised m this journal.

If Parliament will not introduce the cl6ture rules the country should demand it. A private telegram received in Wellington on Saturday, dated August 10. quotes .\evr Zealand mutton at 6|d per lb., and beef (hind quarters; at 5d per Ib, The voice of our fire-bell may be hnsky, but when it was run? out tke ' other nit»ht, it was heard quite distinctly j at Swainson's old residence, four miles away. The Cantata is in full rehearsal, and additional attractions to the performance j nre promised in the form of aopgs by well ' known popular amateurs from Palmers* ton and Bulls. ' The Auckland branch of the New Zealand Educational Institute hare made a public statement rejecting as unworthy of credence the recent charges of immorality in schools. Under the new traffic arrangements on j the Palmersfcon-Foxton Railway there . will be no trams run on Wednesdays and Fridays, and the present mid-day train on Mondays is to be discontinued. The Westport Ooal Company are in creasing their staff by 90 men. and intend doubling their output by means of double i shifts. It is reported that the Company's property in about to be sold to a powerful syndicate. The Manawatu Road Board has been ; served with another writ from Mr Grant, • claiming £800 damages for alleged neg- ! ligence of the Board since March last. . The Board will defend the action, and the ratepayers will pay the piper. i The manufacture of "furs" (making - ■ up and dying rabbit skins) has been started in Wellington. The product is . said to be better than the imported i article, as tho skins used have not been injured by a long voyage. Thirty thousand acres of land are about to be opened for settlement on this side of the Manawatu. Of this area 20,000 acres are in the Tiraumea Block, ■ 700 acres on the Mangatainoko (off the mam road), 3000 acres near Hawera, and I 9000 acres in the Mangaone. The price is to be from 15s to 25s per acre. ' Bakers should understand that if they sue for money owing for bread supplied, 1 account must show the number of pounds of bread, not the number of loaves. A baker at Waimate recently sued for 40 ' loaves, and the Resident Magistrate in* ' formed him that there was a penalty for selling bread except by weight. The penalty was £2 for each offence, and if ' enforced in this case would amount to £80. He, however, gave the baker an I opportunity of altering his bill of par« l tieulars.— Waipawa Mail. [ A meeting of the Pemberton selectors was held on Saturday, when a quantity \ of correspondence was read from the Government with reference to the amount due by the Association to the > Government. From these letters it api pears that the defaulter has not more than about £404 of the Association's 1 money. It was decided that Mr H. C. Field should go to Wellington to present a petition, requesting the Government should forego the amount embezzled by ': Eyre, the late Secretary to the Association We understand that Mr Field left for Wellington yesterJay:— Chronicle. By the recent decision of the Judges in tho case of Charles Henry, who was discharged because the name of the prison in which he was to be confined was not given on the warrant, a most dangerous precedent has been established. We can ' imagine the following case occurring : • A murderer is sentenced to be " taken < from the place you now are to the prison, and thence to the place of execution, and there hanged by the neck until you are dead." This has answered very well for , some years, but now, as no mention is , ever made of the rope, the Fentence can- , not be carried into effect, and the mur- , derer mu9t be discharged. ■ Any indication of an upward movement 1 in frozen meat in the Home market may justly be regarded as highly important to the colonies, and therefore it is with pleasure that we learn that dealers in meat in London are making enquiries in New Zealand »s to quotations, with a view to providing orders for somewhat extensive shipments from this colony. Hitherto the freezing companies hare had to forward meat as a speculation to Eng« land ; bnt should the enquiries instituted on behalf of the Home market eventuate in an increased business being effected, the gain to the freezing compauies will at once be apparent.— Post. We learn from the Chronicle that a compositor named John Ellis, temporarily employed on that paper, was arrested on Saturday night charged with having assaulted Mrs McLennan, the landlady of the Custom House Hotel, and Mr John Cooper, a boardinghouse-keeper, with a fire shovel. Both persons were severely cut on the head. On the same night a , Maori jumped through the window of Mr Nichols grocery, smashing glass, crockery, and fixtures, and scattering the. articles displayed in the window in all directions. He took five men to overpower him. The whiskey must be bad or the water from the Wanganui river is unwholesome. On speculative actions for libel against newspapers the Wanganui Herald says : — We notice by the Bankruptcy Gazette that John Martin, formerly hoteikeeper , of Wellington, and now a bankrupt, has two libel actions going against the Post. He filled because he was pressed for the costs in the last libel case. -yet he gave his solicitor a mortgage on some properties six weeks ago, before he filed, to 1 enable him to carry on these two suits. Surely there is something utterly wrong . here. It is hard enough that newspapers j should be liable to b« .«ued for libel by ; every penniless individual who fancies himself libelled, and who knows well if ; he loses he has nothing to pay, but thai I a bankrupt should be allowed to carry on ! libel caßes is simply outrageous — apart ' altogether from the question as to 1 whether the estate should be deprived of the money that has been provided to fight the paper with. A good deal of the trouble with children might be saved if the little ones were ( kept warmly clad in the cold, damp . weather. This can now be done at a very Bmall expense as Cobhe and Darragh are . selling (we might almost say giving away) , little girls ulsters from 1/6 each, and lttle boys warm overcoats from 4/6.