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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume III, Issue 151, 4 December 1863, Page 3

An Eternal Benefactor of Mankind. —The following appears in the Canterbury Press of Oct. 2Gth, under the heading of “ important new invention.” It is rather difficult to say whether the writer is in jest or in earnest. “ Y e are able to congratulate our readers upon a new invention, for the purpose of cutting grass with the smallest expenditure of labour on the part of the labourer ; we believe that this invention is an entirely new one, and that it will reflect immortal honor upon this settlement. America has been as yet foremost in the race for labour-saving improvements. Yankee notions have obtained world-wide celebrity, and the conveniences of life have been multiplied by their instrumentality beyond all that the most sanguine believer in the future of America could have dreamt of in the beginning of the century, but we confess that we cannot imagine how so simple and so obvious an improvement as the invention which we are about to dsscribe should so long have escaped their keen and sagacious intelligence. The machine as at present constructed can be nsed by a child, and the cost price is so small as to render it accessible to the poorest labourer; it is very portable, and by its use the grass can he cut as close to the ground as the most fastidious farmer can require ; no inequalities of surface prevent the use of this admirable contrivance, and we venture to predict that all who use it will find it less liable to get out of order than any other moving machine as yet discovered. The discovery was made by a sailor, who arrived in Port Lyttelton by one of the recent ships. Owing to some difference of opinion between himself and one of the officers of the ship, the poor fellow had found himself compelled to violate the engagements which he had entered into, and he accordingly ran away. We are not going to defend this step, but on the other hand we shall refrain from censuring too severely an indiscretion which most probably was but one of the effects of that “humour which sometimes had its hour with every man.” Whatever may have been the moral nature of his guilt, the arm of the law seized him, and he was sentenced to three months 3 imprisonment with hard labor in the Christchurch gaol. On Saturday morning we saw the ingenious fellow under the superintendence of the*warder occupied in using his invention, which may be most briefly described as a pair of common scissors. He was clipping the grass in front of the Police Barracks, and the roguish twinkle of the eye with which he greeted us when he perceived our admiration of his as-

tutoness, gave unniistakeable evidence of the serene approval of his own conscience, and ot the knowledge fhat he, too, deserved to be enrolled among the eternal benefactors of mankind. We proceeded musing homewards and plaintively reflected that if this was hard labor we should be uncommonly glad of a billet.”

House of Representatives. —On the 20th ult., the following motion of Mr. Ormond’s led to a somewhat interesting discussion, and was ultimately agreed to; the Colonial Secretary expressing his general accordance with it, “That in order to prevent the spread of active rebellion among those tribes the majority of which are known to sympathise with, and who might under a misconception of the terms of the New Zealand Settlements Act, at any moment join the natives now engaged in actual warfare with us, it is necessary that the Government should at once distinctly declare and publish whether or not it now holds the lands of such tribes forfeited, or considers them liable to seizure in accordance with the provisions of the ‘ New Zealand Settlements Act, 1863.’” A man in California, who had a brother hung, informed his friends in Ireland that his “ brother on a recent occasion addressed a large public meeting, and just as he finished the platform gave way, and he fell and broke his neck.”

Cricket. —The Pride of the Village. —“ Good match, old fellow ?” “0, yes, awfully jolly !” “ What did you do ?” “ I ’ad a hover of Jackson : the first ball ’it me on the ’and, the second ’ad me on the knee, the third was in my eye, and the fourth bowled me out!” —[Jolly game].— Punch.