MISCELLANEOUS.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 278, 3 July 1874, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

■ Northern, political, road votes are.::not altogether unlike southern ones. A correspondent to a northern paper has. the following:—-"I ;have been very much pressed by a resident here to say how de - lighted he is that the Provincial Council have passed a vote for a road through this place to Waikato. I am sorry to isav, however' that it is not on account of the road he is delighted,, but, according to his own account in this wise. Being at that time verdant and confiding, he did, about two years ago, accept the promise of Mr. Sheehan and, his then colleague that if he could obtain the consent of the natives to erect a bridge over a bad crossing on the main road through here to Tauranga, he (the verdant and confiding) should have the money recouped out of Provincial funds The bridge . was erected; the man' who 1 was fool enough to have it done had to pay for it; and he is now simpleton enough to think that he" may get his money back out of this vote. Some people are awfully green I-know Johnny better.than he does I tell this gentleman that two years ago Mr. James Mackay and .Mr. Gr. • F. Mitchell' got a vote of £3OOO passed the Council for a similar purpose, but did the Super and his Executive spend it on a road? No; not one shilling of it. Will they spend this vote on a road ? Not, if they know it, and I guess they do! There have only been seven persons drowned since the opening of the Goldfield for the want of a bridge over the Kauaeranga, and it will be time enough to think of a bridge when there are half-a-dozen more drownings. An approximate estimate of a publi-' can's profits was given in the course of an examination in the Bankruptcy . Court. The witness, a well-known city brewer, and an equally well-knowh wholesale wine merchant, had set up in business the bankrupt, who was now applying for his final discharge. The brewer was asked what profit might reasonably be expected from the retailing of a publican's stock which had cost and he replied a 100 per cent, would be a good average to cover expenses and pay the publican. The profit on beer alone was of course larger—-the witness calculating that what the publican «old for sixpence cost him about l|d. About 50,000 persons witnessed the landing of the remains of the late Dr. Livingstone at Southampton. On- arriving at London, on April J5, the hearse was followed" by a line of carriages, and the remains were taken to the Geographical Society's rooms to await the funeral, which took place on April 18th, at Westminster Abbey, attended by a large crowd, including a full representation from the Royal Geographical Society. The Queen and Prince of Wales sent their carriages as marks of - respect, and Baroness Burdett Ooutts' sent some beautiful 'flowers. Sir William Fergusson, one of her Majesty's physicians, identified-the remains as those of the late traveller, Livingstone,, whose grave is in the centre of the nave of Westminster Abbey, near that of Robert Stevenson.