HYDE.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 365, 4 March 1876, Page 3

HYDE.

(From our own correspondent.) Wednesday 23rd. The customary sittings of the Resident Magistrate's, Warden's, and District Lands Courts were held on the 23rd inst. by H. W. liobiuson, Esq.,KesidentMagistrate, Warden, &c. There was no business .before the E.M. or District Land Ccuff. "The cases before the Warden's Court were not of a very important nature, consisting of the hearing of an amended application for head race, &c, by Star of Otago Goldmining Company. Mr. John Laverty, legal manager, appeared in support of the application, which was granted, after hearing some objections of a frivolous nature raised by parties workin tl)e-vicinity *of Company's' claim. An application for tail-race! was held over to next sitting of Warden's Court. An application by same Company for an extension of claim (six acres) was heard and granted. party's application for special claim of 12 acres was also granted. There was no further business before the Court, which then rose. About 4 o'clock, p.m., on Wednesday last Hyde was visited by a very heavy thunderstorm. The clouds during the whole of the afternoon had been massing themselves, pile on pile, glooming the Rock and Pillar, and filling the Strathtaieii Yalley with thick: darkness. At last a loud clap of thunder announced the conflict of the elements,'and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. Down came the rain in torrents for at least half-an-hour, sending the stream foaming and furious down'the main road, but effecting no damage. The violence of the storm then gradually abated, and settled down into a steady drizzle, which lasted all night. The harvest-cutting is, however, through. Price's crop, being about all down. The rain therefore is a much wished for and pleasant relief, to the enervating and monotonous heat which has prevailed for a long time. The atmosphere is now cool and clear, fine weather again being the order of the day.

February 29th. The 29th of February is a date of rather limited, recurrence. I wonder what amount of hearfquakes the ladies have caused in this year of grace 1876? No inconsiderable heaving and scorching, and " busting of ittanly buzzums," as my frit.ad " Artemu's " puts it, ought to be accredited to- their account, as this is the period, world-wide accorded to them, of having a good - time of it. Now should Tennyson's''Female Collegiate idea of Prudes for dears, And fair, girl graduates-m their golden hair. : be realisedj all but, iii a strictly matrimonial sense, all intent in training and lead r ing single-incomplete man, into the way 'twere best for 'him to go—the (take) hjmeaneal (him in ye all) way. Tharefore, still bearing in mind that'this is the 29th of February, and leap year, is it that I have sought to know if earthquakes are noticeable natural phenomena just now,, common to the sterner sex, sterner lopine after all being, a misnomer, as a very un precious ..lot oi softies the most of them are at the very best. However,, whether Keartquakes or not be the order! of events in the "spooning line" par ■parenthese, 2 think my head and not my heart is a little shaky, |one thing certain is, that earthquake has not been an un-; common or an unnoticed phenomenon ini our neighborhood—to'-use the language! of gentlemen of the press. About half-! past three a.m. on Saturday morning the 26th inst. the inhabitants of the uneventful and secluded town of Hyde, sit-' uate at the base of the magnificent towering Rock and Pillar range of mountains were awakened from their customary slumbrous condition by a forceful and startling shock of earthquake which lasted for two or three seconds and causing doors and bedsteads to bank and shake, to the great terror and consternation of the half roused sleepers, who suddenly recalled from the land of dreams, and brought face to face with one of the most dread visitations of an invisible power, were for a moment almost panic stricken. Happily, beyond the temporary fright, it is our* pleasant duty to record- that the mighty forces passed by on their bidden errand without leaving any perceptible trace of their appearance in this quiet yet important quarter of Strathtaieri country ! How is that for.high ! ,jcap ? Seriously two generally felt shocks of earthquake rather startled the folk here on the date indicated. The first took place about two min utes past three just before daylight, darkness and the sudden awakening from sleep adding to its terrors. The second, general report concurs in putting down at twenty minutes to ten a.m. I cannot say either of them was felt by myself, but, as I was sound asleep on the one occasion, and busily employed on the other, my non-observance of them is nothing remarkable. It is a singular fact, that, though during the 15 years I have been in New Zealand, many shocks of earthquakes have been experienced and recorded, it never has been my fate to have personal cognisance of one.. I am insusceptible of these wonderful phenomena, it appears, cleai'ly proving n.y thick skinned origin, and how near akin I am to the horse anc its. congeners. I heard- the story •of the earthquake from several persons, and all agree in stating it shook doors, windows, domestic utensils, &c. Mr. John Laverty's appears to me to be the most concise, yet comprehensive. Here is is- speaking of the second shock —he says he was; writing in the store, sitting down, when-all at once the chair on which he was seated began to sway with the rolling movement of the ground, he heard at the same time a noise and looking up in the direction from which the sound came, saw pannikins, billies &c, which were suspended from the ceiling, swinging to and fro like clock pendulums, and cluttering as they struck each other. The bottles, glasses, &c , on the shelves at the bar, danced and jingled as if they had been involuntarily set on the spree, and the whole house shook and chattered as if a slight attack of delirium tremens had for the nonce usurped its usual habits of steady respectability, a person in the store at the time the shock was in effect, clasped his hands and arms round a post to secure for himself a more vantageful hold of terra firma, than his unaided perpendicularity could have obtained for him. Not a few persons' say jf.he shocks were heralded and accompanied by a low thunderous rumbling sound under foot. Ore gentleman told me that he fancied some horses were pacing loudly and hastily down the road, causing him to leave his house to see whose they were, this sound being the noise attendant on the shocks.. At any rate,two pretty—if such a word can be,applied to un earthquake—-

well pronounced shocks roused up this district, and I daresay the country generally. The shocks were felt by the road party working near Hamilton, by another party of roadmen at Pigroot, and also at Mains homestead —information having come to hand from all these places. And are we not slumbering on a concealed political as well as physical volcano? Have not the utterances of Sir Julius as much of terror in them as the rumbling of the earthquake? and are they not portends of some political calamity, which shall be tangibly fraught with danger and disaster to Otagoand the Middle Island generally. What means this? Sir Julius at the Yogelian banquet thus : —" Another important question was the land administration. The General Government were not at all unmindful of the great responsibilities thrown upon them in dealing with the administration of land, which was a question quite apart from, and of far more importance than, the discussion about the land revenue." My certes, that's putting it very nonchalantly indeed. Gobbling up, appropriating the land revenue is a mere bagattelle —" The wise it call convey," my friend "Ancient Pistol" has it—to Sir Julius and his tail. The taking of the Provincial lands, depend ou it, will be the next political eart7i-quci7ce. whose near approach these banquet rumblings announce. "He thought no Government could fail to see that the .financial question alone made abolition necessary. Indubitably, my masters ; indubitably ! The fatted ox of the long-suffering South must be killed to gorge the prodigal impecunious North. For the avoidance ol so dire a catastrophe Separation is the only remedy. Failing this, the land and revenue will be swept into the General Governmental maelstrom, from whence they will never beneficially emerge. Then, and then only, will be the last act in the political earthquake drama, for then the country, violently laboring in the throes of internal destruction, will vomit forth—craterwise, fronv its lacerated bosom—such lava jets of wide-spreading ruin as will irretrievable overwhelm and destroy the land and the sojourners therein. From so dreadful a doom manumitting Separation fairly and tiruly deliver us. Amen! Owing to a "tpomless" Treasury pouch all the Government, road way men, from Palmerston to the Manuherikia are knocked off, so I am credibly told. It may not be for a long time, perhaps a fortnight \ but it is contemplated those re-employed- will be so at a shilling a day reduction in the current rate of wages. If such be done, the act will be a loss to the country, instead of a gain, as none but incapables—men not worth half the reduced amount—willVo on again. Reduced wages, and the great success of the Yogelian Immigration Policy are not exactly en accord, ah! A few years will tell strange takes anent the loan, the labor absorbing capacities of, the Colon}', and other whited sepulchral matters, which look : 'ae gay and pleasant the .noo, ye ken, my braw South Islanders. The Government road parties at work hereabouts are not yet discharged, there being some " tin " yet unexpended, but it will not carry tlieni on great pity, as many very necessary works of much pecuniary consequence to settlers and the district will be thereby damaged and left undone till God knows when under the incoming regime.