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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume IX, Issue 461, 14 March 1867, Page 3

A. Tape op a Shape. —-The Launceston Examiner is respensibie for the following. It is as good as any snake story : —“ The master of one of the coaster says that whilst sailing it Emu Bay in a small dingy, in company with a two-ton boat, the Waterlily, the following adventure occurred : —The Waterlily was gliding along the smooth waters of the bay when suddenly she struck on some resisting substance. Immediately a commotion took place in the water—a monster shark, about twenty feet long and of great cercumference made his appearance. It was evident that he had been basking in the sun in a semi- slumber and the saucy little Waterlily had interrupted his sublime reverie. He was, perhaps, dreaming of soma memoriable feast or some feast in anticipation. Perhaps he was a statesman shark, and was reflecting how he might meet his Parliament. Whatever may have been the laboring of his subtle intellect, he by no means »eemed disposed to sufier with impunity the inceremonious kick the insignificant Lily had administered to his latter extremity, so ho turned round in a paroxysm of fury and seized the * nose ’ of the boat and shook it as a dog would a rat, and in his madness drove the boat backwards at a rate as fast as a tug would draw it through the water. The master of the boat became as pale as death, and evidently thought his end was near j but not giving up in despair, he advanced to the head of the boat and struck the animal several times on the head with a largo oar. This did not appear to have the least effect on the monster, for he did not let the boat go until he was tired. He then sailed majestically round the Lily in a threatening manner, as if undetermined as to whether he would let the offender off At length his wrath was appeased, and be kept at a greater distance ; but he had left his mark, by driving his great teeth through the boat, so that it began to leak, though not to a dangerous extent.” Cricket.— A match of this favorite English sport took place at Green Meadows, on Saturday, the 9th inst., between eleven of the military and eleven civilians. The military carried off the honors in one innings—scoring 129—against 24 in the Ist and 66 in the 2nd innings of the civil list, —total, 100.

The Last op the Leichardt Exploring Party. —Tlie Australian News, of January 19, says:—“The Leichardt Exploring Expedition seems to hare no end of misfortunes. Just a year after poor Duncan MTntyre was placed in his hush-grave, near the Gilliot, his successor, Mr. Slomau, died of apoplexy, at the Landsborough river; and three other members of the party have since perished of fever, at the Gulf, Now and then, trees are still occasionally discovered bearing traces of Leichhardt, and the 1 two white men and a guide,’ said to have been

killed seven years ago by the natives of Western Australia, may have been the remnant of his party. The information concerning them is given in Mr Hunt’s account of his exploration upon the Hampton plains, Western Australia. This was the gist of it, as elicited from one of the most intelligent of the natives: — “ That a long time ago two white men and a native were killed by the natives on the shore of a large lake; and, on Mr Roe 1 asking why they killed them, they stated j that the natives first speared a horse, and j then the white fellows went out to shoot j some natives for doing so; and when | coming upon a camp close by, one white j man fired at them, but the ball missing, the other man fired and killed two. The natives afterwards, following to their camp, speared them while one was in the act of making a damper. They then killed the native belonging to the white men. These natives gave the names of three of the murderers—Yercimah, Cunyallie, and Walgbedee. This information fully coincidas with that gained from some oiher najives on a previous occasion; it was obtained through one ot the explorer’s party, who had been found trustworthy and truthful.”

New and Variable Stars. —At last week’s sitting of the Academy of Sciences, M. Fay spoke at some length on tbs question of new stsrs end vsriable ones. After adverting to the irariry of the former, and stating that Mr Birmingham in Ireland was the first to perceive, on the 12th May last, the star which appeared in Corona and is not a new one, but merely No. 2765 of Argelsnders catalogue, and which, being only of the ninth magnitude, and hence invisible to the naked eye, suddenly burst forth on that date with CUUOIUCiaUIP Bj.UCUUV( } XIX. x ajb Ditties that it attained its maximum brilliancy almost immediately, and that it has now gradually dwindled down again to its original si* , M , Faye holds

ths oninion that ths stars hithertoi 1 mentioned as new are merely old ones, which suddenly increase in brightness owing to some volcanic convulsion. We beg to illustrate this to our readers by an example. Most geologists imagine (erroneously, we nciicvcj cur earth te be a hollow shell enclosing a vast quantity of mineral matter in a state of igneous fusion, the shell itself being nothing but the cooled crusty on the surface of this fiery liquid. This crust occasionally cracks at some place rtT spd sfiroft o? ths liauid f Is.vsj issues forth, as in the case of volcanoes, which, by the partizans of this view of the case, are considered as a strong argument in favour. Let us now suppose the shell of our earth suddenly to burst in consequence of the violent action of the ingneous matter, which would then rush out and cover nearly the whole surface. To an observer situated on some other celestial body our earth, in its ordinary state, would either not be visible at all, or scarcely so; but this convulsion we have described would at once bring it conspicuously into view by the glare of the fiery fluid. But the latter would gradually cool down in time, like a red hot iron, which ultimately becomes black, and so, to our observer, the earth would soon relapse into its former lustreless state.! This is the explanation given of stars | that suddenly appear and then fade away. Returning to M. Faye, he proceeded to adduce several arguments in favour of his own view, which is that variable stars, and those which are called new, belong to one and the same class of phenomena. From 1596 to 1800 not more than 12 or 13 variable stars were observed; but since then the heavens have been subject to such a searching and unremitting ex ploration that since 1846 nearly 100 of them have been observed. The same is the case with new stars, three of which have been observed since 1848, while hardly 20 are mentioned in history previous to that time. M. Faye rejects the various explanations attempted by the earlier astronomers, simply on the ground that, as Schwabt has shown, the sun itself is but a variable star, the period of which is 11 ! years, and the variations of whose brilliancy which are the characteristic of variable stars. The case of new ones is the same. Formerly only such stars were known as might be seen with the naked eye; now we have catalagued upwards of 300,000 stars, and our chances are much greater of finding in our catalogues some small star thot may suddenly blaze forth in unwonted lustre. Thus Janson’s star, which appeared in 1600 as a star of the third magnitude, disappeared in 1621, and reappeared in 1665, is now catalogued as P. Cygni, according to Argelmmler. M. Faye promises to continue the subject on a future occasion.—Galignani.