PROVINCIAL NEWS

Kumara Times, Issue 2819, 3 October 1885, Page 2

PROVINCIAL NEWS

[united press association.] Dunedin, October 2. A deputation waited on the Premier this afternoon on the question of the expenditure on defence. The Premier stated that before the war scare that he had received confidential dispatches as to what had been the former intentions of Russia when the war had neaily broken out, and it was nonsense to say that the colony would not then have been attacked. He stated that the Government were decreasing the armed constabulary,, which now numbered only 400, whereas when they took office the number was 650. The Government had also increased the expenditure on Volunteers by 50 per cent. Auckland, October 2. For Gillies and Sinclair Scholarships there are two candidates from Dunedin

High School, two from Canterbury (one a lady), and only one from Auckland. Before the Wairarapa sailed to-day, a girl named Ethel Grey, or Rubina, was arrested on a charge of larceny as a bailee of farniture, value £l3O. The goods are stated to be in a house of ill fame. The case was dismissed. Phillip Teagae, while putting out a fire in his house, burst a blood vessel, and expired. A new scale of fares and rates and charges in the New Zealand railways to come into force on October 12th, is gazetted. Private cablegrams received here from India announce there has been a most serious cyclone at Calcutta, and many vessels hare drifted ashore and been wrecked. The New Zealaud Insurance Company has sustained a loss of £SOOO, and the South British is believed to be involved, but to what extent is not known. The South British received a cable from Bombay stating that seven vessels were wrecked off False Point, Calcutta. Their head office at Calcutta, where the risks were taken, has received no detail as to losses.