Summary from Home.

Manawatu Herald, Volume III, Issue III, 29 December 1891, Page 2

Summary from Home.

The English butchers recall to mind Bret Harte's Truthful James when he says to me ' Truthful, how goes it?' I replied, "It is far far from gay." These unfortunate men feel the competition of our prime mutton to too much, and though not so celebrated " for ways that are dark, and for tricks that are vain, as the heathen Chinee is peculiar," yet have struck out a line both novel and as dishonest, as they are freezing old Kentish ewes for the purpose « of fraudulently imitating colonial mutton. A lady, Mrs Osborne, sued Major and Mrs Hargreaves, of Torquay, for slander, in alleging that she had stolen, and sold to Spinks, the diamond merchant, Mrs Hargreaves' pearls during a visit. She evidently made a great mistake, as though the details were complex, a letter to the Judge, and handed to counsel, led to the discovery that Mrs Osborne had negotiated Spinks' bank note, whereupon her solicitor retired from the case. The case created quite a sensation. Not only are the details complex, as given in the cablegrams, but the particulars about the letter to the Judge are also a little sensational. The letter would not have been received as evidence alone. The passenger steamer Abyssinian, belonging to Guion & Co., of Liver pool, was burnt to the water's edge in the Atlantic. No lives were lost. Some sensational tales of murder have come to hand. From St. Petersburg it is reported that eight soldiers of the Imperial Guards have been sentenced to death for decoying citizens into the barracks and murdering them. More particulars are wanting for the reasons that actuated such fearful conduct. The Rome correspondent evidently does not want to be thought sensational, as only " some sensation " has been caused by the trial at Naples of two dukes on the charge of a treacherous murder of a young officer, who was the suitor to the sister of one of them. One of the accused was acquitted, and the other received a sentence of five years' imprisonment. In other parts the occurrence would have caused considerable sensation, but they manage these matters different in Naples.