ST. BATHANS.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 57, 4 March 1870, Page 3

ST. BATHANS.

Feb. 21,1867. Bird, Blow and Cd.'s circus arrived here last night. This is the best news I can send you, as it will also be the greatest treat to us to witness the promised extraordinary feats of horsemanship, and ladies and gentlemen showing their agility by dancing on nothing, for I always regard a rope as " worse than nothing " when it is used to place a man between the sky and the ground. As other, news is very scarce at present I enclose a fragment of a love letter which I happened to pick up on ;fche coach road, within a mile of Hill's Creek, the other day :—" My dearest Salma, —I want to tell you that my heart is so burthened with love that it is fast sinking under the load, and unless you come quickly, and bear a hand to raise it up it will be down in the leg of my left boot in another day, and you wont be able to find - it either for yourself or me." [That should draw her.] " You have only to say the word, and 111 attempt nothing that any other man would attempt to' - ' make you happy. Should you like to be a farmer, having cows and pigs, and all that sort of thing, or a great tail- race flowing over with gold, or a hotel or would yon like to be a butcher, a storekeeper, or a draper, having plenty of blankets and other finery; you can be one" or all of 'em just as you like. Then, for the dresses you £an have as many as you like to ask for. Por alt the others you might have to wait till my granddad dies, and leaves me his money, that is if he has got any to leave me. Now I have told you all, and more than I am ready to do for, you, and as the temptation is great I hope you will at once consent to—" This was the last word on the scrap which I picked up, but it requires no great stretch of imagination to guess the rest. If ladies areso fond of gold as some malicious people say they are, the invitation to Salina to-be converted into a tail race; flowing over with the precious metal, should be simply irresistible. But this being Yalentine month, and the whole document admits of such dubious import that she has very likely declined giving afdecided answer for the present.A.B.C. [The above reached us too late for insertion in our last week's issue.]

(From a Correspondent.)

Feb. 28, 1870. People meeting each other here say, "How are you to-day ? "—a useless question seeing that we are still alive andkickhigj unless indeed like the Ethiopian gentleman in Melbourne who was met in the street by a fellow brother of color and accosted " How's yer gittin on, Pomp ?" pfts answer was—" Don't git on at all now chile, I J se. married." Such, I fancy, is the case with our diggers on St. Bathans —when single they cannot save money, and when married they cannot get 'it to save.

During the past week water has been rather short for mining purposes, but a slight alteration in the weather yester day and to-day looks promising for the miners, water companies, &c. The St. Bathans Nigger Troupe and other amateur performers gave an entertainment in the school room last Monday evening, which, I am happy to say was well attended. They are to give on entertainment, I believe, at Drybread next week for the benefit of the school at that place. It is reported that another break has taken place in the Scandinavian Water Eace here, but to what extent I have not been informed.

I think the public of St. Bathans will, for the future, find that they have a good friend, who is inclined to study the interests of the people before his own. The gentleman I refer to is Mr. Hill of the Montezuma Hotel, who, in addition to the said hotel and a general store, report says intends keeping, for the benefit of the diggers (not business men) a drapers's, chemist's, timber merchant's, and boot and shoe warehouse, &c, of the Van Sluice brand, all of which is to be sold twenty-five per cent, less than cost price, i. e., about twopence-halfeenny per bushel, and a shpvelfulin for measure. O! St. Bathans, rise and salute the architect of thy future wealth. —Little John".

Resident Magistrate's Court.—Mae. 2. (Before H.W. Robinson, Esq., R.M.) Margaret Fahey v. Patrick Talty.— The complainant in this case was a married woman, who stated that, as she

was going home late on the previous evening, the defendant had assaulted her by laying his hand on her shoulder. The only evidence was that of the complamant herself, who deposed that at about half-past ten o'clock on the night of March Ist, as she was going up the track leading towards her residence, and carrying a lanthorn, the defendant suddenly came on to the track, saying, "I have been waiting for you a long time." She said she would give him in charge, and turned to run away, when he laid his hand on her shoulder* .sayinothat she need not be frightened. 'The accused explained that he had been' a up the hill to see, Mr. Purton, the manager of the Scandinavian "Water Race, about a supply of water, and, in down m the dark, he waited for the lignt* which he saw approaching. He did not know it was Mrs. - Fahey, and had no intention * of assaulting her. Case dismissed, the Court, remarking that it was eviden't that Mrs. Fahey had been much frightened, but that the whole matter was clearly a mistake.