Local and General News.

Feilding Star, Volume XVI, Issue 273, 22 May 1895, Page 2

Local and General News.

Austral aud Roscius have beeu scratched for the Wanganui Steeplechase. There is a station in the Masterton district of 18,000 acres and only one man is employed on it. The new election of a school commit tee for Marton is fixed for the second Monday in Juuc. Mr E. Humphrey, of Waituna. has been appointed agent for Mr R. Robinson, mailman. The telephone between Fowlers and Apiti is now in course of construction, and it is cspected the work will be completed in about three weeks time. The manager of the New Zealand Clothing Factory, Mr Trcscdcr, has just received a consignment of most excellent winter hosiery for gentlemen. Owing to the very bad state of the roads in and around Pemberton, the Cricket Club Ball has to be postponed until the beginning of next season. The secretary of the Shooting Committee of the Manchester Rifles desires to acknowledge receipt of a nicely framed picture, " A British Heroine," an incident in the Manipur disaster, from Mr Eade. Tho proprietor of tho Temple of Fashion tailoring establishment, Mr E. Martin, has a good selection of tweeds on hand suitable for winter wear, he having opened up recent importations. The many friends of Mr Bowater, master of the Campbelltown school, who is at present in the Wellington Hospital suffering from an affection of the throat, will be pleased to hear that he is progressing favorably. — N.Z. Times. Mr Miles, secretary of the Manawatu and West Coast A. and P. Association, has written to all similar associations in the colony asking their assistance in inducing the Minister of Agriculture to call a meeting of delegates from the various associations to discuss Mr Nathan's scheme. A couple of Wellington sports were given permission to shoot over a farm in Pohangina. They bagged forty pheasants (cock birds), and departed well satisfied. They forgot, however, to leave a brace behind them at the house where they had been so hospitably treated. A tireless locomotive engine was recently used on the Aix-la-Chapelle railway. The motive power is derived from soda. Tbe inveution is based on the principle that solutions of caustic soda, which have high boiling points, liberate heat while absorbing steam. These engines eject neither smoke nor steam, and work noiselessly. Dr Talmage (says Table Talk) having described the Maoris as a degraded and inferior race, lacking intelligence or dignity, Rawei, the lecturer, in a recent address replied that the educated Maori had a native dignity, consideration, and innate nobility and courtesy which education had failed to impart to Mr Talmage ; at which the audience stamped delighted approval. An advertisement appears iv our wanted column requesting all Temperance friends to meet in the vestry of tho Primitive Methodist Church at 7 o'clock sharp to-morrow (Thursday) evening, to elect delegates to the Temperance Convention to be held in Palmerston North on Friday and Saturday next. Other important business is also to be considered, and it is hoped there will be a large attendance. The frost in Russia in 1812 surpassed in intensencss that of auy winter in that country for many preceding years, and caused the destruction of the French army in its retreat from Moscow at the close of that memorable year. Napoleon commenced his retreat on the 9th of November, when the frost covered tbe ground and the men perished in battalions, and horses fell by hundreds on the road. What with his loss in battle the effects of this awful and calamitous frost, France lost in the campaign of that year 400,000 men. At tlie last meeting of the Palmerston Borough Council the Mayor said he strangle objected to the Council being drawn into any liability for the re instatement of the Gorge bridge. He understood that the Manchester Boad Board had derived considerable revenue from the tolls collected at this bridge, -which had been spout on the roads in tbat district. — The Mayor was authorised to atteud the meeting of delegates and strenuously oppose any attempt to make tho Council responsible for a portion of the ' cost of re-Qonstrvcting this bridge.

Captain Edwin wired at noon to-day : —Strong west to south and south-east winds, with glass rising, and weather cold. The Loudon Times, alluding to DrW. G. Grace's continued success with the bat, declares that it assumes the proportion of a national event. In a recent Sydney Morning Herald, a wife advertises that she Avill not bo responsible for any debts contracted by her husband. The new woman ! Louisa Dawes, a resident of Alexandria, New South Wales, her niece, her daughter and her sou. were poisoned a few days ago, though not fatally, it is supposed by sonic bad porridge aud milk. Jabe/. Balfour's son, who went to America after the revelations concerning the Liberator Companies, has been working there, it is stated, as a farm labourer, aud his wife, who occupied a high social position, has taken .employment as a domestic servant. Since Mr Richardson lias had charge of the Post office at Bunnythorpe the settlers have appreciated the improved mail service inaugurated by him ; tbey now have four inward and four outward mails daily. From the South at 12 noon, and 5 p.m., aud from the North at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. A sou of Mr Watts, a farmer in the Hunterville district, met with a nasty accident on Saturday last. He went out shooting and as he went along the trigger of his gun touched a log, with the result that the weapon went off and blew away a portion of his haud and wrist. The Colyton school was closed this afternoon but of rcsppct to the memory of Robert Wilfred Laukshcar, and to cuable his school fellows to attend the funeral, whicli took place this afternoon aud was largely attended. A burial service was held in St John's church before proceeding to the cemetery. It has beeu known for the last six months that several settlers at Apiti have each lost over 100 sheep, to recover which no steps were taken. In one case a missing sheep returned with its ear mark cut out. Various suspicions were excited, but they were not strong enough to act on. Recent events should rtmlvc flock-owners more vigilant. Says the Marton Mercury: — Yesterday a quiet wedding took place at the residence of the bride's father, when Mi Herbert Balfour, eldest sou of Majoi General Balfour, London, England, wa' united iv the bonds of holy matrimony, to Miss Dinah Hartley, eldest daughtei of Mr G. Hartley, Rangitikei Valle*, road. The Rev Innes Jones, of Feildiug officiated. The sawmilling industry is almost the most valuable in New Zcalaud at the present time. There are 243 mills in the colony, employing a total of 3,26' i hands who for the year 1894 received a total iv wages of £271,814. The approximate value of the laud, buildings machinery aud plant employed is set down in the statistics supplied by Government at £.">00,272, aud the value ol the manufactures as £832,959. The following handicaps have been declared for the bicycle races to be held at Marton on the Queen's Birtliday :—Onemile maiden— Hughes and Ross scratch, Bell 20yds, Taylor 80yds, Parker and Dommett 50yds. Open race's — 1, 2, and 5 miles — Hunt, scratch ; Mingins, 30yds, 60yds, 20secs ; "Watson, 70yds, 140 yds, 50sees; Gifkins, 100 yds, 200 yds, Imin 15secs ; Hughes and Trevena, 200 yds, 400 yds, 2min l.sees ; Ross, 400 yds (2miles), 2min losecs; Dommett, 2mm .Osecs (5 miles). It appears from what transpired at the last meeting of the Auckland Acclimatisation Society that many country settlers are under the impression that they can invite their friends to shoot on their lauds without first providing themselves with a license. This is a misapprehension. Clause 7 of the Animals Protection Act, 1880, is as follows :— " Any person owning or in bona fide occupation of any lands not being Crown lands maj* shoot imported game without a liceusc upon such lands, or if ho does not shoot himself, may appoint some one person to shoot on his behalf." With the above exception any person shooting imported game without a license is liable to a penalty not exceeding £20. The European Mail has the following : " It will be remembered that a short time ago Louis Bertram!, the man who was convicted many years ago, before the late Sir Alfred Stephen, for the murder of Kinder in Sydney, was liberated from prison on condition that he left the Colony. It seems that his exile was only to be limited to the life of the late Chief Justice, who of course, had a great voice in the conyict's liberation. Bertrand came to London, and it is said has come into a competency through the death of some relatives since his incarceration, and it is also said that he now proposes to return to Sydney. This is hardly likely, however, notwithstanding that he maintains his innocence of the charge for which he suffered 29 years' imprisonment and that a good many people still believe in his innocence. He is now in Paris living comfortably under an assumed name, and among people who have no idea whatever of his past."