OTARIA.

Mataura Ensign, Volume V, Issue 225, 30 January 1883, Page 2

OTARIA.

_*, From otjb own Correspondent, i Our insignificant quarter seems very sel dom to see daylight as regards news from here in your valuable paper so I decide to! sit down this evening and drive my quill for the purpose of giving a little information: to whom it may interest. The country news generally seems to be of such similarity that I will begin with births, deaths and marriages. The first-named of course: is always an interesting topic among the ladies and, as Sir Julius Vogel calculates that every person is worth .£3OO to the colony, Otaria has subscribed £1500 worth this last 12 mouths. They come, but they don't go> so, thank Providence 1 a grave-digger would thrive as little here as an Aberdonian Jew. Marriages are made in Heaven, so they say, and I was only remarking the same to my gude wife last night when she retaliated by telling me she would like to know where Paradise was then? bo I thought I would change the subject, in case she might tell me Mrs Brown's parlour looked better than our own. We have had but one marriage lam grieved to say. Is it that the country chaps don't know the art of wooing, or do they go too clumsily about it ? I think the latter. I actually saw three farmers' sons mount their horses the other night to run after a girl whom they termed "a fresh piece," and when they got to the fair damsel's side none of them had a word to say, but sat with their eye-balls half out of their heads?. The Otaria lads had better go down and pick " a piece " out of the 1000 domestics shortly to arrive. They are bound to be right if they can screw up courage to speak of their broad acres (if they are only Crown lands) and fine houses (if only sod huts). Our distriot road is being improved vastly this summer, but the County road towards Pukerau appears not to have had the attention due to it. We hope Mr MacGibbon will no' forget us before the grain season sets in. As a Lincolnshire farmer once remarked, put a farmer in one sty and a pig in another and it is very doubtful from which sty the loudest grunt will come. I thought I would try it and fo r the life of me could not help beating the pig, so I thought I would jump out and take a stroll among my neighbors to see if they were in the same humor, but I found that their orops were all that could be desired, though the turnips are still suffering very much from drought. Mr H. Templeton, our 42nd Highlander, intends cutting in nine days. Our '* dominie " informs me the sohool ia in creasing steadily and the roll now numbers 43 with good attendance. The most characteristic feature of this school is the thorough indifference the committee and parents hold towards getting up any entertainment or amusement, or providing prizes for the children. It seems that all they think of is to trudge them about

with pigs and cows— quite different ro. other districts, or farm life at home. Cricket has been at a standstill since Xmas We are anxious to play our return match with Pukerau, but they seem ; to think a bird in hand is worth two in the bash, to cannot play us. However, the ball may remain where it js.if it be any satisfaction for them to keep it. We hope to have another slap -at Mataura before long. / Obaria, Jan. 25, 1883. ~ "