NEW ZEALAND.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2714, 20 December 1882, Page 3

NEW ZEALAND.

PER PRESS ASSOCIATION. AUCKLAND, December 19. Permission having been obtained from the Colonial Secretary, Superintendent Thomson will exhume thelbodies of the late Hugh Hamilton and his child to-morrow. Several incendiary fires have taken place at Cambridge of a most serious character. Robert Wilson was arrested for larceny of jewellery, &c., of the value of £7O, at the Carpenters’ Arms. The body of a German, Franz Tanner, drowned at Tuakau, was recovered seven miles down the River Waikato.

A billiard match between Weston and Lyons, bookmakers, for ASO to AlO, was won by the former by twenty-seven points in 500 up. One hundred and fourteen candidates have entered for the district scholarship. NAPIER, December 19. The Bishop of Waipu informs the “ Herald,” with reference to Mr Sheehan’s letter which was a few days ago telegraphed from Auckland, that his Lordship accompanied Mr Mills on the only occasion of his visiting Rotomahana, and that Mr Sheehan must be mistaken in his recollections of what then occurred. ' GISBORNE, December 19.

At a meeting last night of the Southern Cross Petroleum Company 34,000 shares were represented. Mr Wilson, Christchurch, and Mr Motley, Napier, held proxies for 25,000 shares. The ' meeting met to consider the offers made by two local gentlemen to lease sections of fifty acres each of the company’s ground on tribute, giving the company 10 per cent. Mr Wilson moved, Mr Motley seconded, a resolution, which was carried by a large majority—- “ That shareholders are decidedly adverse to leasing any portion of the 2000 acres of the company’s ground on tribute until such time as the property has been more effectually prospected, and that it is undesirable to bring this question up at the annual meeting of shareholders.” There was a lively discussion, nearly all the local shareholders advocating the principle of tribute. An amendment, calling on the directors to draw up a scheme for letting the ground on tribute was reject; d, only 1300 votes being recorded for it. The directors had prepared no resolution, as they heard a block vote would be given against the tribute proposals by Messrs Motley and Wilson. Some shareholders present could not vote, not having paid their last call. WELLINGTON, December 19. To-morrow is the last day for sending in the property tax statements. It is understood that all posted to-morrow will be received, and penalties be strictly enforced hereafter.

At the Education Board to-day a communication was received from the Teachers’ Association regarding the bonus system. The Association had passed a resolution in which extreme regret was expressed at the re-introduction of the system of payment by results in the case of bonuses to pupil teachers, and urging the Board to reconsider the matter in support of this resolution. The Association represented that the principle of payment by results had been tried, and led to endless dissatisfaction without doing justice. After discussion it was decided to inform the Association that the Board saw no reason for altering their previous determination on the subject. Owing to there only being two Ministers here and no acting Governor the usual weekly meeting of the Executive Council could not be held.

Mr H. C. Wilmer, formerly deputy registrar of the Supreme Court, and lately acting aide-de-camp to Sir James Prendergast, has died from heart disease, from which he had long been suffering. TIMARU, December 19.

The poll in connection with the raising of .£IOO,OOO loan for the extension of the Timaru Harbor works was taken to-day at a large number of polling places throughout South Canterbury. All the returns but five small ones are in, and give the following result For the loan, 1211; against, 29. Of the latter, 18 came from Waimate. DUNEDIN, December 19.

At the Police Court to-day a man named Hensburgh was sentenced to six mouths’ for larceny. He pleaded guilty to two charges, each of an impudent character. In one case he walked away with a portmanteau loft by the owner on the railway platform for a few minutes, and in the other he went into an auction room, and taking up a gun, walked off with it with the utmost composure and assurance. The Hon. Captain Fraser writes to the “ Herald ” correcting the statement that he had been commissioned by the Government to makecertain communications to the Maoris at Mooraki. He writes: —“ What took place was this : I happened to be passing a few days at Moeraki, and paid my long-promised visit to the kaik. All the Maoris met me, and I told them of the generous offer which was made to them on the part of a former Government and which, to my great regret, was insolently rejected by their fanatical leader Solomon. I said that I was grieved to find that they were bringing their children up in ignorance, and asked them why they had no school in the kaik. They replied that their old assessor Mathew had always opposed the erection of a school in the kaik until such time as the Government had fulfilled their “broken promises” to them, and that before Mathew’s death he

had exacted a pledge from them to that effect and that they would not break it. I then offered to purchase at my own expense a section in the Government township, which adjoins the kaik, if they would erect a school upon it. They said they could not give me an answer then, but would have another meeting and let me know the result.”

INVERCARGILL, December 19.

In the Compensation Court to-day, before Mr Justice Williams and Messrs T. Denniston and W. Nichol, as assessors, Mr Blakio claimed .£BB3 for lands taken for railway purposes, for injuries and damage done by sub-division of paddocks, &c. The Court awarded £125, and costs to be divided. Crown Solicitor reserved the right to raise the point that the claim was barred by the lapse of statutory time provided by the Act of 1876, the lands being taken in 1874.