MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

Inangahua Times, Volume IV, Issue 7, 25 April 1877, Page 2

MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

The Argus saya that " Bannerman was* taught his cricket in Sydney by Caffyn." Mr Fitchett, a student at the Canterbury* College, is the winner of the Bowen prise, this year j the subject of the essay was. " The Wars of the Roses." That the fondness of snakes for eachother partakes of a cannibalistic character has been proved at Albury, Victoria*,, where a brown snake was recently killed) just as it had all but swallowed up a fully, developed black snake, which had been, destroyed the day previous. The "Brnnner Coal Mining and Steam, Shipping Company" advertise in tha Wellington papers that they can supply at Greymouth 2000 tons of coaly weekly. Mr Martin Kennedy has applied to the* Wellington City Council for the grant of a site as a coal depot, and the matter haa, been referred to the Wharf Committee. An Australian, telegram saya that " Hipe" bas bea'en Selby in the 100 yards race easily. We do not know who Hipe. is, but possibly the telegram, is correct, although we bad not previously heard of' a runner of the name. It was understood that Selby wss matched against Sharpe,, of Ballarat, but Hipe we don't knpw. A few weeks % since, as a Maori named Wai tai waa riding a young horse on the, margin of a cliff overhanging tbe Waitanga, Kiver (says tbe Hawke's Bay Herald) theanimal suddenly started and plunged oves the precipice. The cliff is somewhat shelving, and after a succession, of leaps or rather jumps from one projection to. another, both horse and rider reached tbe. base without sustaining the slightest injury. This irs considered a very* wonderfnl esc ipe, ai the cliff is abuti 6G» feet in height. W« shonld think it, was, The novelty of a cemetery on fire w*s ; ; witnessed at Creswick, Victoria, on Sun-, day April 1. The. Advertiser says, some. Chinese visited the old cemetery, situated near tiie Back Lead, it might be for the. purposes of paying tbeir devotions to the. ashes of tbeir ancestors y at any rate they left behind tbem some rice and some* lighted candles, which in doe course, set the grass on fire, and quickly burnt some dozen or so of the guards placed around the graven. But for the timelyarrival of the town clerk and a few others, who carried water to extinguish it, the. whole of the guirds, and the fencing a-i, well, would have beeu consumed. It ia stated, says the writer of theatrical gossip in N!Z.L.V. Gazette, that, advices have been, sent to. America, recommending the departure for New* Zealand of another large menagerie, with, or without circus. It seems that Messra Barnum, Montgomery, Qneen, and* Forepaugh, all rival menagerie proprietors, have for some years been thinking or Australia, but Cooper and Bailey were, the fi*fst to take decisive action. The idea now is to start another American., menagerie in New Zealand, which Cooper and Bailey have reserved for the last of their programme. Letters were sent to, American showmen, per last mail, from, various quarters in Melbourne,, detailing the extraordinary and unexpected profit* realised by Cooper and Bailey, especially in the Victorian country districts.. The ' Whitehall Gazette* informs us that another stud company, with* capital of -8100,000 paid up, will shortly be. started on a very large scale. The object, horses for riding and driving, as well aa, for the English and Anglo- Indian cavalry. The head-quarters and alt tbe breeding farms will be in Egypt, where the climate, is exceedingly well adapted for an under* taking of this kind. One of the chief objects for which the company has been got up is. to breed a horse wnich will have tbe size and stamina, of the English thoroughbred, combined with the pluck. If the undertaking can be carried out we shall soon have a cavalry troop borse far* superior to anything of the. kind that has. yet been seen. The following extraordinary scene took place at a recent sitting of the Geraldine (Canterbury) Council. One of the coun* cillors addressing another said— " You, contemptible would-be informer, you, thought to lead the sergeant on to me and to my house." The councillor to whom, this was addressed replied—' It is an infernal lie; I never didanythmg of the. sort. I dont go near your house, and I dont want to know whether yon sell liquor or not on. Sunday." Tbe firstnamed councillor, wlo, it msy be stated, is a publican, then rushed orer to his brother councillor, and striking an attitude that is sometimes described as "shaping," he shouted at the top of his voice—" It's not a lie. Ton'didit. You gave tbe sergeant;

%Wk9 Hames of the persons who went in and * Mme* o.at of my house on Sunday, and I ?k c 8 miml t0 — "" At this point tba plner teouncillors and some ratepayer Wterfered, and the »• gcene" ended. t* Star speaks thus of Lord mnry Pbipps, the third *on of the , Marquis of Normanby, who has returned to the colony » after an ab-enfeofsome months in England, "We believe be went home with tbe object of making arrangements for the purchase of % «*«»«»•;!* "Hon Property in Queensland . or New Zealand. Lord Henry Phipps is a fine specimen of the English gentle man, manly, frank, and endowed with a larfif# share of enterprise and shrewdness. x During his stay in Qoeensland he waa ) not above lieihg thoroughly colonised. 1 J ?« * ecmQ J e arned in the mysteries of ; Jttllock driving, acquired a knowledge of ' arming, cattle and sheep, raising, and generally "roughed it " in the bush. On one occasion he voluntarily worked for several days on a pablic road, which was much needed in order to open a way for cattle r J *\ " Snyder " says :— " A newspaper cor- , J respondent of the Lyttelton Times complains that a Government appointment to the Solicitor-Generals office has been given to a young sbn of Mr Batkin, the seoretary to the Treasury. His claim to the appointment lay in the faot of his father being one of tbe heads of departments. Now I ask tbe correspondent if such a reason is not all-sufficient. What is the use of being the head of a depart* ment witbont it enables a man to get ap« pointments for bis sons, husbands for his daughters, billets for his poor relations, and something good for himself. Why, tbat is tbe true meaning of being at the head of a department. If that correspondent only knew what a man had td go through before be got into tbe armchair of a Government office — the toadying to bis supporters, the bowing down to Ministers, the beseeching to mea.bets oi Parliament, the too freqnent loss of all manly self-respect for himself— he would think tbe bead of a department should possess the power of conferring appoint* ments upon his sons, and his sons' sons to the third and fourth generation, besides a rise of salary at frequent and irregular intervals." Referring to the new member for tbe city ofWellington, Mr Travers, the Timaru Herald says:— -He has lived almost all over the colony in his time, and has been almost everything. A soldier, a lawyer, fl/ brewer, a judge, a naturalist, a politician, he is at all times prepared, like Lord John Russell, " to take command of tbe Channel fleet, or perform an opera* tion for the stone ;" and we are bound to say that whatever he undertakes, he goes through witb in the ablest and most energetic manner. He is understood, moreover, to hold very marked yiews with respect to several oi tbe leading publio questions of the day ; and, should those yiews not undergo in the interval any serious disturbance, he will probably prove a thorn in the side of the Ministry. He is a fluent, forcible, and most enterf taining speaker, and possessed of a voice I like Boanerges, the son of thunder, never fails to gain a bearing. Mr Travers is not troubled with any nervousness or .excess of modesty, but, on the contrary, enjoys all the advantages to be derived from a rich endowment pf ac triplet, and cares no more for bis political opponents than for the winds whistling over the roof.