Local and General News.

Marlborough Express, Volume IV, Issue 152, 9 January 1869, Page 3

Local and General News.

A pretty smart shock of earthquake was experienced here on Sunday morning last, at about half-past ten o’clock. Messrs. Paterson and Hepburn, (Staffordites) Ota»o members of the House of Representatives, have resigned their seats.

A great Fire occurred in Fort Street, Auckland on the 28th December, when £3,000 worth of property was destroyed. N. Edwards, Esq was elected without opposition on Monday last, member of the Provincial Council for the City of Nelson.

The Wild Duck arrived in Wellington on Tuesday last from London.

Mr- A. Sclanders was elected one of the governors of Nelson College, without opposition.

The attention of the Government is called to a very large and dangerous hole which exists in the flooring of the Blenheim wharf. The Falcon, with a valuable freight on board, crossed the bar inwards from Wellington on Wednesday last. She leaves again this afternoon. /•''Mr. Lawrence, of Chatham, Kent, (brother [of Mr. P. Lawrence, of Blenheim), has recently unade a munificent donation of £7,ODD'towards the erection of a now synagogue at that place. fA. new local industry has been commenced in (this town, in the manufacture of boiled sugar,, and other sweets, commonly called “lollies,” by Bythell and Tait. We have no need to hope it twill be successful; nothing could be more certain. \ Upper Wairau —The nomination of a member of the Provincial Council for this district is to take place on Monday next. In accordance with a pretty extensively expressed desire of the electors, we learn that Mr. Collie has consented to stand for the seat.

Mails will leave Blenheim this day as follows ;—For Nelson, West Coast, and Australian Colonies, per Lyttelton, at 11 a. in. For Nelson, (from Ferry), per Charles Edward, at 5 p. m ; and for Wellington, Southern Provinces, and United Kingdom, via Suez, per Falcon, at 2 p m.

Municipal Corporations Act.— A Gazette, of the 24th ult - , states that a petition under the provisions of this Act has been received, and* a copysent to the Superintendent for further action required by law in respect thereof. We learn further that His Honor the Superintendent, having given his assent, the Governor has been advised to take the petition (which is signed by 93 resident householders of Blenheim) into consideration on the 6th March next. Mend Your Ways. —We notice that Mr. Wall has laid down a capital footway along the front of his property in Market-street, to the same level as the bridge at Collie’s, for which the public will have especial reason to be thankful should we ever again be visited with a flood like that of February last. The other end of the bridge still presents the trap-like aspect which has existed for nearly a year. Surely means might be found to All in and level this short length before some serious accident occurs.

The Blenheim Post Office Savings Bank, which may be tru’y said to be a very unostentatious institution scarcely known to any, has been showing a degree of prosperity, shared by few business concerns during the last year. We learn that at the close of 18S7, there were 45 depositors, having to their credit the sum of £747 17s. At the close of IBGB, the number had increased to 93 depositors, having to their credit the respectable sum of £2,281 17s. Id., including interest. We may add that up to 200/, the rate of interest paid is 5 per cent.

r Appointments.— W.Whitehorn, Esq., is duly gazetted as Warden of all Warden’s Courts now or hereafter to be constituted within the Marlborough Gold Fields, and to exercise all or any of the powers vested in Judges of Wardens Courts. Also, as Resident Magistrate for the i Resident Magistrates’ District of Marlborough.

I —Walter Hippolite Pillietfc, Esq., to be Resident Magistrate at Kaikoura, for the same district. Also to be Returning and Registration Officer for the Cheviot district for members of the House of Representatives. '/ The fine new barque Hera, Capt. Terkelson, the first wool-ship of the "season From Pbft'XJnderwood, having now completed her loading of 1,755 bales of wool, she will sail to-morrow. The only passengers this season willbeMrs. Russelland her young and numerous family, in whose favor Mr. Henderson has kindly givenuphisberth, as being more suitable for them than the John Banyan. Mr. and Mrs. Henderson will therefore not leave us for another month We shall be enabled to publish a statement of the Russell Fund probably in our next.

/■--Our police report contains this week an unusual amount of crime. Early on Tuesday mornin<r a stranger was discovered breaking into the Rainbow Hotel, and although he managed to gain possession of some loose silver in the till, he was caught and handed to the police. He has since been rewarded with six months’ quarters in Picton gaol for his dexterity. At Havelock, a man named Pope threw an adze at another man who was at work on a house-top, and nearly severed three of his fingers, besides inflicting a wound about seven inches long in his thigh. The Bench very properly committed him to Nelson. The injured man lies in a very precarious state from the injuries received. We hear too of a man at the Grove who, it is alleged, deliberately shot his wife in the breast with a gun. When our informant left, he had not yet been taken into custody, and the neighbors were picking out the shot from the poor woman’s breast. The same man some time ago nearly bit off three fingers from another person’s hand. The following pertinent remarks from the Nelson Exeaminer of Saturday last (2nd inst.) might be read with advantage by some of the “Anti-Colony grumblers” in the Mother Country. After speaking of the losses by flood and storm, and the great commercial depression suffered by New Zealand generally, our contemporary says:— “Verifying the old adage that ‘disasters never come single,’ the , year leaves the Colony engaged in another Maori war, which it has to fitrht out with its own means, crippled as these now are. Great Britain, whose armies have fought and conquered in every part of the world ; who has spent money without end on the wars of foreign States, no way affecting the interests of its own people ; who recently, to liberate three or four Englishmen and a few German missionaries. fitted out an army, for Abyssinia, at an expense of six or seven millions sterling. Great Britain, one of the most powerful and wealthy nations of the world, found the labor and cost of bringing the rebellious Maoris into subjugation too great for her; and after having tried and failed, retired from the contest, and left the work as a legacy to her New Zealand Colonists. A war which frightened the forty million tax payers in Great Britain, may well be regarded as serious by a body numbering less than a quarter of a million ! But there is no help for us, and we must battle through it as best we may.”

Blenheim Dramatic Society. —A general meeting of the members of the above society was held on Wednesday evening, the (ith hist., at Ewart’s Hotel. Letters were read from His Honor W. H. Eyes, and J. Kissling, Esqr., consenting to act as President-and Treasurer respectively. The Secretary (Mr W Syms) stated that the gentlemen who had been requested to act as Vice-Presidents had not yet favored him with an answer to his communication. At a subsequent meeting of the Committee, on the same evening, Mr. Syms was appointed General Manager. The general meetings of, the Society will, be held on the first Wednesday in every month.