Untitled

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 104, 6 April 1863, Page 2

Local. —Another smart Earthquake was felt on Saturday morning between three and four o'clock. A G-arottek’s Advice.— The Morning Post says : —Andrew Garrott, a returned convict, and the King of Garotters, generously furnishes the public with a hint for avoiding the grip of such murderous scoundrels as he avows himself to have been. His suggestion seems to he one of the simplest and most effective of the many which have been offered to the public. It is as follows: “If you are out late at night walk in the middle of the road, and, if possible, look both sides of the road at’once. If yon see three men gradually but certainly nearing you (sometimes only two) —and you must, if not blind, see them, as they cannot seize on yon from any court or turning, but must, of a necessity, be near you—spring a large rattle (cost Is. 6d.) and it will directly have the effect of startling them. Or, to bo still more safe, have two very sharp spikes attached to your elbows with leather thongs, and one on each heel of your hoot. Thus simply equipped, and thus walking the middle of the road—if you are out late at night—l guarantee that you are safe from- all attacks of garotters.” The Railway. —An average day’s work of the railways of the United Kingdom in 1861 was, to carry 500,000 passengers, 258,000 tons of minerals and merchandise, 35,000 live stock, 1,000 dogs, and 710 horses. The precise number of travellers of the year cannot be stated, because there is no record of the journeys of season ticket-holders; but it must have been more than six times the number of the population of the United Kingdom. The trains, passenger and goods traius added together, travelled 2,807,748 miles more in 1861 than in 1860, which is equivalent to going round the world 116 times more last year than in the year before. 3,881,990 trains ran in the course as the year ; that is to say, upwards of 10,600 a day. If the trains had been equally distributed running night and day without ceasing, they would have travelled among them 200 miles in every minute. The length of the line open increased by 436 miles, and became 10,869 miles; and the gross receipts of the year £28,565,355, considerably exceeded the interest of the national debt, and amounted to about 8 per cent on the capital! ihe total raised by shaves and loans increased from £318,130,127, at the end of 1860, to £362,127 338, an increase of more than £14,000,000 in the year. The working expenditure rose so above 48 per cent., and the net receipts only increased by about £130,000, or less than one per cent on the increase of capital. The net receipts were over four per cent. 284 persons were killed upon railways in the course of the year, aud 883 injured ; but the accidents to passenger trains in which passengers were killed or injured were but 43 in number, causingthe death of 46 passengers and injury to 781 more—one passenger killed or injured in about 220,000. In addition to this 14 accidents were reported to tho Board of trade, in which no passenger: was injured, and 20 passengers were killed through getting into or out of trains in motion, and 12 more through their misconduct or want of caution. The number of passengers killed or injured, not through such rashness, but from causes beyond their own control, was—in 1858, 445: in 1859, 384 ;in 1860, 509 ; in ‘1861, 827. In the latter year the sure of £135,062 was paid as compensation for personal injury. 128 servants of the companies, or of contractors, were killed in the year, 57 trespassers, and 17 persons crossing at level crossing.— Press, March 24.