The Globe. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 19, 1876. TELEGRAPHIC NEWS.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 572, 19 April 1876, Page 2

The Globe. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 19, 1876. TELEGRAPHIC NEWS.

{Per Press Agency,') LATEST FROM" AUSTRALIA.

| [By Submarine Cable.J Sydney, April 18. | The Torres Straits mail has arrived. Her news is anticipated. Melbourne, April 18. Messrs Stevenson and Son will be prosecuted for defrauding the revenue. A solicitor’s clerk has been summoned for attempting to bribe a juryman in the case of Learmonth v Bailey. INTERPROVINCIAL, , Auckland, April 18. The Barracouta brings six men wounded in the Samoan skirmish. Three were left at Levuka, and three in all have died. Further particulars relate that Captain Stevens and i the sailors were not officially present at the ; meeting on the 13th of March. There was | no hostility expected. Eleven natives were i killed and thirty-five wounded. The eni gagement lasted twenty minutes. Colonel Steinberger preferred being left at Levuka ! instead of coming to Auckland. A civil war in Samoa is expected, Napier, April 18. News from Poverty Bay reports that a vessel was wrecked ou the East Cape on the llth instant. Her name has been ascertained to be Helen. She is the property oi Messrs Watt Bros, and was laden with coals from Newcastle to Napier. She struck on the East Coast Island, and then drifted to Harocka and sunk in deep water. No lives were lost. All on board are at the native settlement, and will be forwarded to Auckland by the first opportunity. The vessel was insured in the New Zealand Company for £ISOO. Wellington, April 18, It is understood that the Colonial Secretary and the Superintendent have received a letter signed “Wm. H, Pearce,” purporting to be from one of the workmen employed upon the Thorndon reclamation. The letter contains exceedingly grave charges against the contractor, amongst which are the following :—“ That the piles had been put in at night, po pb to evade the supervision of the inspector, and not driven in the proper length, the ends being cut off and buried, or taken home for firewood.” The writer mentions the names of several men on the works, who he says will corroborate all the I statements, and show where the pile ends are

buried, and point out the faulty work. He also says one of the inspectors was offered £SO as hush money. The writer calls upon the Government to institute enquiry so as to prevent the probable loss of life at a future time by the embankment falling in with a train. The letter is supposed to be a malicious plot to injure the contractor. It is understood that the Government have been for some time considering the whole question relating to the prohibition of importing cattle. When last the matter was brought before the House of Representatives, it was decided that prohibition was not necessary, and that a system of quarantine would suffice. The question is virtually reopened by the decision (after much deliberate consideration) ot all the other Australian colonies, to continue the prohibition for an indefinite period. Under these circumstances the Government have decided to invite the consideration of both Houses to the matter by delegating it to the deliberation of a joint Select Committee. This intention is thus early notified in order that all who are interested in the question may endeavor to make their views known.

Dunedin, April 18. The nominations for the Dunedin Derby for 1877 and 1878 close at eight o’clock on Wednesday evening. Arthur Robert Maule, a lawyer’s clerk belonging to Melbourne, was committed for trial to-day on a charge of aiding, abetting, and assisting Edward Kellett to forge a signature to a conveyance of land at Woodstock, in Victoria. Kellett is a child eleven years old, and his signature was apparently obtained to represent that of one Edward Kellett who was alive in 1858.