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Kumara Times, Issue 1097, 6 April 1880, Page 2

The Hospital Committee meet at the Secretary’s office this evening. The Rev. E. A. Scott was a passenger by the coach for Christchurch this morning, where he will stay probably for about a month, his duties meanwhile being performed by the Rev. R. A. Mortimer, curate of St. Matthew’s Christchurch.

The winning ticket numbers in Singer’s art-union, which was drawn for the full amount at the Public Hall last evening, will be found in another column. The 50 sovereigns prize was won by Miss Singer and Mr Fell, who held the lucky number between them. The second prize went to Dillman’s Town, and the third to Hokitika.

Tonks’s twenty-fifth consultation, which in this instance is on the Adelaide Cup, is announced in another column. Interest in the same can be secured on application to Mr Gilbert Stewart, of this town' br to either Mr Peters (Connelly’s Hotel), or Mr Elders (National Hotel), DOlman!** Town.

At a meeting of the Building Comrnitte of the Board of . Education held last evening, at Hokitik^-tenders were opened for additions to the JKnmara School. All the tenders far exceeded the estimate, and it was resolved that no tender be accepted, blit that the specifications be altered with the view of reducing the cost of the work.

A gentleman in Auckland, not extremely given to piety, was dismayed by being asked to say grace at a strange table. To refuse and explain would be embarrassing ; to comply Would be equally so. He chose the latter, and started off briskly enough with “0 Lord, bless this table”—Just here, being unused to the business, he nearly broke down, but, by a gigantic effort, pulled through with “World without end. Yours respectfully, Amen.” A correspondent in the Auckland Star writes :—“ I for one enter my emphatic protest against a Bishop of the English Church giving a political and partizatt lecture on Afghanistan. Men like Lord Northbrook, Lord Lawrence, and others, who have spent the best part of their lives in India, hold entirely different views to the Bishop, and possibly there are some here who could controvert his views entirely. Anyhow, it is a curious fact that a representative of a Church which is constantly repeating the beautiful prayer, ‘ Give peace in our time, O Lord,’ should be standing up in favor of the ‘gunpowder and glory business.’ We have now a pair of New Zealand celebrities, advocates of the Beacbnsfield policy—Sir Julius Vogel and the;Bishop.” His Honor Judge Johnston and Colonel Scratchley must have been mightily pleased when they saw a paragraph -in a late issue of a Wellington paper, that “ The s.s. Rotomahana brought to Wellington recently a great number of persons of distinction and fame,- amongst whom we may mention his Honor Judge Johnston, Colonel Scratchly, the Hon. ‘ Ready Money 5 Robinson, Captain Johnson (Marine Department), young Scott (the pedestrian) and his trainer, Mr Austin, and last—but in many persona' estimation, not least—Abe Hicken, the renowned pugilist.” A goodly company, truly. A servant girl at Jersey has been fined 10s for playing a foolish trick with the train. She stood between the rails while the train was approaching at a rapid rate, and calmnly watched it draw near. The driver whistled, shut off steam, arid reversed the engine, and thus succeeded in stopping the locomotive within two yards of the girl, who merely laughed in his face and ran away. The invention of Mr Fleuss bids fair to be of astounding interest. He is now exhibiting at the Royal Polytechnic Institution, London. Mr Fleuss puts on a helmet covering the entire head, and shuts off all communication with the outer air. He then descends into the water, in which, he remains immersed for an hour or more. During this time he is seen to move, pick up coins, and assume a partially recumbent posture. No bubbles of air are given off from the apparatus, and no communication is made with the surface. On emerging from his submersion, Mr Fleuss is slightly pale, but otherwise not seriously disturbed. Mr Fleuss is an Englishman, formerly an officer in the P. O. Steamship Company, and he has been a year in completing his remarkable experiments. His invention is at present a profound mystery, but he says nothing is more curious than its simplicity.

A late number of the Solicitors’ Journal states that a quiant piece of criminal law was disinterred at the recent Maidstone Assizes. A man and his wife, after drinking heavily for eight days, threw themselves into a river, no doubt intending, so far as they were capable of forming an. intention, to commit suicide together. The husband was drowned, but the wife escaped, and she was thereupon charged with the murder of her husband. Pollowing authorities in the recent case, the Lord Chief Justice, in summing up, told the jury that they must take the law to be tha.t if two persons agreed together to commit self-murder, and one of them survived, the survivor was guilty of murder. Happily, however, it was not

necessary to put this doctrine into - practical application, as the jury seem to have thought that the parties were not in a condition to form a definate intention to commit suicide, and consequently found the woman not guilty