The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1879.

Kumara Times, Issue 913, 3 September 1879, Page 2

The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1879.

We are requested by Mr Peter Dungan to give liia most unqualified denial to a rumor that has been circulated that he intends to retire from the contest for a seat, as one of the members of the electorate, in the House of Representatives: Mails for the Australian Colonies, per steamer Albion, close at- the Blutt' on Friday next t'.ie sth i:i«L, at 11 a.m. Telegrams will be received at the Kumara Telegraph Station up till 10 a.m. of that lay. The Ciiristchurch coach with a small mail passed the J>eaiey at the usual hour c.as li-oriiiug, and wiii arrive here about

5 o'clock this afternoon. There are 'no passengers for Kumara-.

From n notificatio'n that appears in another column it will be seen that Mr D. Williams has secured the services of a first-class shoeing Smith, and that after Monday next he intends to carry on this branch of the trade, in 'conjunction with the various others, at his establishment in Seddon street.

Chas. Craddock, pilot, was drowned at Charleston yesterday by the swamping of a boat which was towing in the schooner Shepherdess. Bailie, mate of the schooner, who was in the boat with him, was rescued. Craddock leaves a wife and three children.

At the termination of Mr Reid's meeting last everting, a Mr Dniry, one of the candidates nominated for the representation of the Grey Valley Electorate, addressed the large .audience present. In a speech of over a:l hour's duration, which although energetically delivered, abounded with the most amusing vituperation, he clearly demonstrated that in this instance he, in his opinion, " was the man for Galway." To prevent any misconception, we are requested to state that Mr Drury has not the least intention of resigning his candidature for a seat in the House of Representatives.

A week or two ago a young gentleman whose friends live near Chislehurst arrived from the Cape. It was intimated to the Empress that if she cared to see him he would wait upon her. She was delighted and listened with rapt attention to all he had to tell. When he described the assegai used by all the Kaffir and Zulu tribes she expressed a wish to see one. They were in the hall, and were forthwith produced. The Empress all but fainted at the sight of them, and .then burst into a flood of tears. " Do not think me weak,' she said ; '" but until I saw these terrible weapons I- never realised the danger my son ran." At that very moment he had been killed by assegai wounds, seventeen in number.

The appointment of a, British resident in Zululand is already spoken of. No doubt the Imperial Government will be only too glad to conclude a peace, but the colonists generally are of opinion that the power of the Zulu king for toil has not been broken, and that although for a year or two, he may not be guilty of aggressive acts, still by that time the Zulu army will have been reorganised ; their desire to ev'nce their superiority renewed ; and in the absence of a sufficient body of troops to guard the frontier, the old encroachments will be renewed and the condition of the Natal and Transvaal be quite as unsatisfactory as before the commencement of the war.

In one of the California mines a ball has been given a thousand feet below the surface. About fifty couples were invited The ladies were dressed in calico costumes, and together with th-ejr escorts, were lowered into the mine at nine o'clock They danced to or three hours.." Mammas with daughters on their hands will do a good deal, even this country (says London Figaro), to catch a coal Croesus, or owner of a big Bonanza, in any form ; butactually to pursue him into this subterranean treasury is a Yankee notion as yet unimported. Our fortune-fishers will do their level best to draw out the Leviathan with a hook, but they draw the line at diving after him. They willdecend to anything except the bowels of the earth, and will lower themselves to any extent in spirit so long as they are not required to lower themselves in the flesh in a basket.

Certain teetotallers at Wells, Wisconsin, have made a sad mistake. Selecting the largest barn in the place, they announced a grand ball, and invited to it their lieighbours and friends. No champagne°or claret cup excited the dancers, but from great jars, expressly filled, lemonade was liberally served out to the guests of the evening. Suddenly the drinkers of this apparently harmless liquor began to rush from the room. A general stampede tok place, the lawn outside being strewn with people who were so violently sick that they could proceed no further. On inquiry it was found that the gentleman who made the lemonade had, by some blunder or other, put tartar emetic instead of tartaric acid into the beverage. The people of Wells will probably be shy of temperance drinks at their dancing parties in future.