GENERAL NEWS.

Kumara Times, Issue 2791, 1 September 1885, Page 2

GENERAL NEWS.

The mud volcano under Mr John Duncan's house again came into active play on August 3. Attracted by a spluttering sound (writes a correspondent of the Anckland Herald), I proceeded to the spot, and found the proprietor in no way disconcerted, calmly viewing the weird-like spectacle by candlelight. It continued to belch Dp boiling liquid mud for about ten minutes and after raising the temperature of the cottage to a comfortable sleeping degree it quietly subsided, aud John retired to rest. News of the murder of a Russian Finn named Matterson in the vicinity of Coff's Harbour, has reached Grafton. N.S.W. The facts are that the murdered man and his mate, Ma the w Friske, a fellow country-man, were residing in a hut together. About a week previously to the discovery of the morder Friske reported that his mate was missing. Ultimately the police fiom Fernmount were communicated with when a rigorous search was made, and to their horror they found, at a distance of little over a quarter of a mile from the hut occupied by Matterson and Friske, what seemed to be human remains smouldering in a fire in a hollow log, and all but consumed. Friske was questioued, but could not give satisfactory replies. The police watched his movements. The upshot was that the police arrested him on suspicion. The result is that Friske has confessed to the commission of the crime—first by striking Matterson down with an axe, and then finishing by the attempted burning of the body of his victim. Freemasonry is progressing rapidly in Tasmania. A very handsome hall devoted to the craft has been opened in Launceston and on the 12th inat. the ceremony of inauguration of a District Lodge under the Scottish Constitution and the installation of P.M. Bro. Peter Barrett as the first D.G.M. took place with due ceremouy, the visitors including members of sister constitutions in Launceston, Hobart, Deloraine, Campbell Town, Evandale, Lefroy, Latrobe, Form by, Victoria, and New Zealand. The proceedings were admirably arranged, and at the banquet the usual loyal and Masonic toasts were given and responded to. The editor of the Pall Mall Gazette alleges that the ghastly details respecting the traffic in young children are unexaggeraied, and courts the fullest inquiry. It threatens that disclosures may be made which will shake the very foundation of our social order. It will he necessary, the paper says, to subpoena Princes of the Blood, prominent public men, and Cabinet Ministers. The Pall Mali Gazette impugns the integrity of the police, alleging that numbers of them countenance the traffic. Eleven newsvendors were brought before the Lord Mayor at the Mansion House on a charge of selling copies of the Pall Mall Gazette alleged bv the police to contain improper matter ; the Lord Mayor, pending the decision of the Home Secretary, who is considering the question, declined to interfere, but remanded the defendants on their own recognizances for a week. The Jewish papers comment with interest on the claim made by the Ameer of Afghanistan to be regarded as the ruler of the descendants of the Jews. But it is pointed out the Afghan pretensions ate based not on their descent from the lost ten tribes, but from the two tribes which were carried off to Babylon, whereas the ten tribes went into captivity in Assyria. This gives hope to an A n<*lo-Israe,lite (says the Pall Mall Budget) who writes to point out that the Ameer's proclaraa-

tion still leaves the ten tribes unaccounted for, and to assert his conviction that we Britishers are the only genuine children ef the long missing tribes. In that case we are brothers of the Afghans, and our alliance beomes a family compact, a reunion of Israel on the slopes of the Hindoo Koosh.