The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1881.

Kumara Times, Issue 1357, 5 February 1881, Page 2

The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1881.

The first coach of Rugg’s new line from Christchurch, via Springfield, left the Bealey early this morning, and should arrive in Kumara this afternoon. A billiard tournament, for which several 'good pecuniary prizes are offered, is now ■open at the club rooms, Seddon street. The handicap, has been declared, and, as there is no entrance fee, the number “of acceptances, should be lar;?e. The handicap can be seen at Mr Seebeck’s billiard

club-room, where the ' drawing of pairs prior to the tonrhaU’ieht commencing will take place this evening, at nine o’clock. A summoned meeting of the Loyal Albert Lodge of Oddfellows Is convened for Monday evening next. The attention of carpenters is drawn to tenders Called for some Work by Mr O’Hagad of this town. There was a crowded house last evening at Hokitika at the Duke of Edinburgh Theatre on the occasion Of the Comedy and Burlesque Company giving a benefit in aid of the local Hospital. A prologue expressly written for the occasion and delivered by Mr John Sevan* was received with hearty and prolonged applause. The company make their fare-, well appearance in Hokitika this evening, and then proceed to Greymouth. We have the authority of the Patea Mail for stating that an action for alleged breach of promise of marriage by Mr J, B. Fisher, M.H.R., is soon to afford fun for those ladies whose hearts haven’t been broken, and for those swains who have hot had the courage to make a promise yet. The jilted plaintiff in this case lays her damages at £2OOO. Her heart must have been riven beyond the power of love’s medicine to heal, when nothing less than £2OOO will compensate for a husband who had not the virtue of constancy. Actions of this sort are a mistake. If a man cannot or will not perform his pledge, or if a woman is equally insincere, it is better for both parties that a bad bargain has fallen through in time to prevent lifelong misery. A lady in .a boarding establishment situate not far from the shores of the upper bay, Dunedin, found something wrong with the household piano the other day (says the Morning Herald). Two or three of the keys would not sound, yet nothing was known to have broken. When the tuner was called in, it was found that a rat or perhaps a pair of them, visitors from the beach, had got into the piano at the back, and had gnawed away the cloth, making out of the pieces a nest in which Mrs Rat had deposited a young brood. The nest prevented the keys from sounding, and when it was removed the piano was in good order again. The water supplied to the residents of Melbourne must be nice drinking, as the following clipped from a late number of the Age will show “ Another instance ■of a centipede coming through the Yan Yean water pipes was witnessed on Saturday afternoon in a cottage in Stationstreet, North Carlton. The insect was small compared with the one reported at Coburg, npt being more than three and a half inches in length.” A remarkable spectacle was witnessed on the Hudson River, America, is being nothing more nor less than a heavy storm of Hies, similar to the one recorded in the London Telegraph as having been witnessed at Havre a week or two ago. The steamer Martin, bound south, encountered the fly storm between New Hamburgh and Newburgh. As described by the London Telegraph, it was, like the Havre storm, seemingly, “ a great drift of black snow,” and it reached southward from shore to shore, as far as the eye could reach and as high up. There were millions upon millions of the flies, and they hurried northward as thick a snow-flakes driven by a strong wind. They lodged upon the clothing of the passengers on the steamer, and were minutely examined. They were long and black, and had white wings, and the cloud mvst have been miles in length. The steamer Mary PoWell ran into the fly-storm off Haverstraw, and first mate Bishop says he never witnessed such a sight.

The Chicago Daily News of December 20 says : —The doctors are puzzled and interested by a peculiar ease on the West Side. A fourteen-year-old son of Wm. Crawford, captain of a tug boat, has for seven years been sweating blood at times, and lately has had severe attacks which alarmed his parents. His infirmity cornea on him immediately after taking cold. Great black patches appear on his body, from which blood drops, the size of a pinhead, exude. Blood flows from his mouth, nose, ears, stomach, and even from his bladder and kidneys. No pain accompanies these discharges, but they make his blood thin and weaken him. Sudden fright or excitement will easily check the flow. He is mentally bright, and his father, mother, brothers and sisters are strong and healthy. The physicians, who have taken an interest in his case, propose sending him to Edinburgh and London, for examination by the Academy of Surgeons.

A most useful invention for nursery use, called a “ baby-washer,” is announced by a paper ; and the inventor describes

his infafit machine as follows:—“You simply’insert the begrimed and molassescoated infant in an orifice, which can be made any Required size by turning for four minutes a cog-wheel With electric attachments. The .child glides down a highly polished incline plane. His lips are met at Its terminence by an India rubber tube, from which the infant can draw actual nourishment of the purest and most invigorating character, secured for the special purpose at great expense from a choice breed of the Alderney kind raised on the estate of her Majesty the Queen in the Isle of Wight. While in this compartment, which has plate-glass mirrors, the perturbed spirits of the infant are soothed .by its frantic efforts to demolish its Own image reflected in the glass, with a nicely-plated combined tooth-cutter, nail-knife, rattle, and tack-hammer, which is thrust into baby’s hand by an automaton monkey; , Fatigued by its destructive efforts, the infant falls asleep; while the organ attachment plays softly the ravishing melody of ‘ Put me in my little bed.’ Then it slips into the third compartment. Here the body is washed.. Another small tube administers a dose of soothing syrup, and the infant glides from the machine, its nails pared and its hair combed, if it has any, ready for the habiliments rendered necessary by the fall of our first parents.”