Manawatu Herald. [Established Aug. 27, 1878.] SATURDAY, JAN. 14, 1905.

Manawatu Herald, 14 January 1905, Page 2

Manawatu Herald. [Established Aug. 27, 1878.] SATURDAY, JAN. 14, 1905.

A five-roomed house, with scullery and outhouse, is advertised to let in Avenue. Accommodation is wanted for six ladies and twelve gentlemen for the 23rd and 24th January. We beg to remind farmers and others of the Himatangi stock sale which takes place on Monday next.

We are informed that a scutcher named Hatton, in the employ of Messrs Austin Bros., has had the sum of £3OOO bequeathed to him by the death of a relative.

The trial of McKenzie, alias Ellis, charged with the murder of Collinson, at Te Awaite, in February last, will open in the Magistrate’s Court next Friday.

Two men are wanted for cutting Fescue seed at i£d per lb. Mr Spiers, our local builder and contractor, has secured the contract for the re building of the Wellington* Manawatu Club Hotel at Shannon. We understand that the contract price is close on £ aooo. The T. E. Taylor testimonial is not doing so well as was expected. The crowd who cheered, etc., on the night of the verdict, aren’t good at parting when it comes to the pinch.—Spectator.

Those in search of New Year snips in the line of drapery could not do better than inspect Mr G. Stiles’ establishment, where he is offering ladies lace collars and embroidered aprons at sacrifice prices. Just look up his new advertisement and satisfy yourselves. Annie Summersley was charged with having suffered a girl under the age of thirteen years to be criminally as saulted in a house at Foxton of which she (defendant) was at_ the time occupier. The defendant, in answer to His Worship, said she desired to be tried hy a jury, and the case was accordingly adjourned.—Hawke’s Bay Herald* Bohemia is the country of long courtships. In no other part of the world are they so abnormally drawn out. It is not rare to hear of engagements which have extended from 15 to 20 years. An old man died recently in Prague, at the age of 99, who had been courting a sweetheart for 6a years,

The Government Biologist slates that the spraying of potatoes in the -Auckland district has been effective in every case where prompt steps were taken and his directions carried out. He states that as the result of spraying 75 per cent of a crop in a paddock at Otahuhu taken over by the Govern merit for experimental purposes has been saved.

The Russian newspaper Russ, publishes the following remarkable paragraph “ Our ideas about Japan were all wrong; so were probably those ot our enemy about tls» Among the horrors of war, we have leatnt to understand one another, and it is reasonable to hope that the heavy price which both our country and Japan are called upon to pay for this mutual under standing will form the foundation of our peaceful relation in future years.” Speaking to a Daily News reporter at New Plymouth, Mr Kinsclla highly praised the factory managers in this colony fof the excellent rfiaililer in which they get up their butter. He added : I have travelled all round the world, including Denmark, and I make the statement without fear of contradictipn, that New Zealand ships to England a package which would not be outclassed by any country in (he world.

Th,e correspondent of an Edinburgh paper vouches for the truth of the following:—The other morning a small boy, tvho had on the previous evening been looking over the pages of “ Darwin's Descent of Man,” put this question to his mother at the breaktast table: “ Ma, is it true that I am descended from an ape ?" “ Yes,” answered the mother, jokingly. Then this young hopeful, added : “ Was it your papa or papa’s papa who was the ape ?” The mother’s reply has not been placed on record. A New Zealander, who has just returned from a trip to the Old Country, says that he was dining at a restaurant in London, and getting into conversation with another man at the table, the latter remarked, “You are not a Londoner.” “ No,” was the reply. “ I come from Christchurch.” “Christ church ! where is that ? “In New Zealand,” was the answer. “ How long have you been in England ?” was the next query. “ A fortnight.” “ Well,” came the astonishing remark, “it has not taken you long to pick up the English language.”

When the Panama Canal is completed—as there is a prospect of its being in American hands—it will shorten the journey to Great Britain by something over 2000 miles, indeed from Port Chalmers the line of travel will be almost straight, and with few of the islands of Oceania to endanger navigation, in addition to which the the dreary journey round Cape Horn ■will be avoided, and though the tropics have to be negotiated, there is a minium of ocean currents till Panama is reached. Wit turbine steamers in use, as they no doubt will be, we may anticipate doing the run home in the year 1915 in from 30 to 25 days. This story of a canny Scot is told in To-Day. The incident occurred in a remote fishing village on the north-east coast, where,the Scotchman lived until his wife died. After this sad event he left, and was not heard of again for several months. One day a friend re ceived a letter from him stating that he was going to be married again, and would spend his honeymoon down in the village where he had buried bis first love. In due course he arrived with his bride and put up at a hotel. He called on his friend, and daring a walk they turned into a village cemetery and made directly for the first wife’s grave. There lying on the grass, was a brand-new tombstone, waiting to be put up. “ I’d been thinking o’ it for a long time,” explained the Scot, ” an’ I thought I might as well save the price 0’ anither journey, so I brought it wi’ me in the train. It’s a bonnie stone.”

During a recent visit to the Mackenzie River, about 200 miles northwest ot Rockhampton, Queensland, a Sydney gentleman obtained a quantity of what he regarded as rather pretty pebbles, which, he thought, might possess some commercial value. He submitted them to a firm of jewellers in Sydney, who were not long in pronouncing' them to be two different species of chalcedony and agate. The stones, to the number of 52 have been polished, and an inspection proves them to be extremely beautiful. Among the. agates is a “ moss,” which is not only peculiarly attractive, but very uncommon, and the specimens of chalcedony include several that will doubtless command the attention of connoisseurs. Similar gems have recently been ur.wavered at

The Foxton branch of the Bank of New Zealand will be closed on the 23rd and from noon on the 24th inst. Pete Gruber, known throughout the United States as the “ rattlesnake king,” has just celebrated the killing of his four-thousandth rattlesnake by giving a dinner to his friends at Williamsport. He wore a suit of clothes for the occasion made entirely of snake skins.

The French army appears to be on the eve of an important advance in field gunnery. The new powder effectually does away with the smoke which formerly betrayed the presence of a battery, but there still remains the flash, which rises to a height of 13ft from the mouth of the gun. Major Froissart, of the 27th Artillery, has perfected an apparatus for obviating this disadvantage, and thereby rendering a battery invisible. We are in receipt of a pamphlet from the author, A. H. Maude, Oamaru, dealing with the Tariff Question, ‘‘ Chamberlain Anpcals Unto Caesar.” The price of the issiie is sixpence) and as it contains some 55 pages of readable matter, it should have a large sale. We understand the agent will canvass the town shortly with a view to circulating opinions on this much discussed question of tariff reform. An instance of grit is recorded in Australian papers. Recently an 11-year-old "boy riatried Robert Shute started with an old man named James Kinsley, who was seventy-two years old, to travel with a cart from Mnttahurra, Queensland, to iTower Hill. They awoke in camp one morning and found their horse missing, so started back towards Muttabnrra. The old man collapsed on the track and sent young Shiite off with 5s and the last remaining mouthful of water for help. The boy threw off his boots and plunged stolidly into the 40-mile stretch of sunblaxe that lay between Hint arid his life. He turned np at Mutlahurra (he same night, fresh as paint, and reported the afiair. The relief party found the old man just in time to deprive the Out-Back Track of another victim.

Principal Firth, of Wellington College,, does not think the New Zealand youth compare with their British confreres in the matter Of enthusiasm in gaining understanding. The colonial boy does not appear to be roused to a sense of the desirableness of knovyledge, the joy of hard work. “It is here (says Mr Firth) that our New Zealartd bdys, o'rt the whole, fall behind those of England, aild are certainly quite outpaced by those of the United States of America. They are too otten satisfied with the minimum effort that will enable them to obtain the all-too-modest goal which they have set before them, or, rather—for many of them have no goal—to keep pace with the slowest on the road. No one will dare say that we are permeated through and through with the spirit of keenness for education claimed for the Americans. Our boys, like the Americans, wish to get on, but comparatively few of them are in earnest over the necessary effort, are willing to give up the fancied pleasure of idleness for the real joy of hard work. It is because we as a people lack the American education spirit that so many New Zealand boys work only under compulsion.”

In conversation with Mr Robt. Cobb we learn that the district to which he is going is as little known to the average colonial as New Zealand is to the average Englishman. Were it not so, he tells ns, then settlers in these so called civilized districts would not bo climbing over each others shoulders to grasp land at a few pounds under 30, when they can get equal country in every respect, and for all purposes, with equal facilities for disposing of their produce around the line of railway eclipt “ the Main Trunk ! ” that will winter three sheep at from £6 to £8 per acre, together with all suitable buildings. Again, the country being ot lime-stone or papa formation, holds grass in such a manner that the longer and heavier it is stocked, within reason, the better the sward becomes, which we all know is just the opposite with nine-tenths of the bush land in the Manawatu —to wit, theHeatherleaLevin country, where in light years moss begins to take the place of grass, and each succeeding year, unless ploughed and re-sown, it’s carrying capacity undergoes a gradual reduction until at length the proverbial mosquito would have difficulty in finding enough vegetation to support its matiated frame. Again, instead of feasting the eye for ever and a day on (what he, Mr Cobb, calls) infernal coxfoot, you are greeted with a sight that even Mr Gower, sen., himself (our late authority on pasture grasses) could not take exception to. For the most part, the country has been laid down with rye, clovei', foxtail and a few of the finer sorts of fescues and crested dogstail, which the condition and bloom upon the sheep alone speaks quite sufficiently for its fattening properties. We are pleased to find that our fellow settler and erstwhile neighbour should at last have succeeded in finding a piece of country to his own heart and to the future welfare of his Romney Marsh Stud flock, and the only harm we wish him is that his geese which lay the golden eggs may all turn out swans, and that he may continue to produce animals which will remain throughout history as a credit to New Zealand and a pattern for the future guidance of colonial sheepbreeders hereafter. We regret, however, that his name go long (some 27 years) associated with the breeders of the Manawatu, will in a month’s time remain only a memory of the past.

CHRONIC) CONSTIPATION CURED. Fred. Gillet, Esq,, Walgett, N. S. W., writes : “ For years I had been a sufferer from chronic constipation due to my sedentary occupation, tutor. I sent for a free sample if Chamberlain’s Stomach and Liver Tablets, and the results were so satisfactory that I have since used half-a-dozeh bott'es. The Tablets have certainly done me a great deal of good, for when I first began to use them 1 had to take four Tablets twice a w ek to produce the desired effect but now two Tab ets s month keeps the bowels in good order.” For sale by E. Ueaioy, Foston,