By Electric Telegraph

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 395, 7 October 1876, Page 3

By Electric Telegraph

(From oui* own correspondent.) Dunedin, Thursday Evening. The criminal sessions concluded this afternoon :—George Anderson, larceny, and Robert Dutton Lee, forgery, Robert Butler, burglax-y,. four "years; Charles Henry Hal], forgery, three year-s; James Robertson, attempted bestiality, two years ; .John Lewis Home, forgery, three years; Ah Younk, burglary, two years; Frederick Walters, larceny, six months; Charles Burke, nine months; William Marshall, rape, seven years. • At the Wellington assizes Haughton was acquitted. In answer to the Superintendent's request that the Governor should allow a plebiscitum in Gtago on the Abolitiou question, and convening of the Provincial Council, Ministers point out that if the General Assembly's action to amend the Constitution is ultra vires, it is open for Macaudrew, if he can, to convince the courts of law that the advice he relies on is sounder than that of the law officers of the Crown in London and New Zealand. As to a plebiscitum, Ministers need hardly remark that a plebiscitum is a mode of expressing popular opinion unknown to an'y Constitution based upon representative institutions, and the vote of one Province coaid not be allowed to have weight against the decision of the whole Colony. Macaudrew again replies, threatening to appeal to the Imperial Government. Notwithstanding the disparaging accounts, the exodus of miners to the Kumara rush continues. The Wakatip.u yesterday took 135 passengers, several being refused a passage. The ' Kumara Times ' warns miners not to go unless they have the means to remain there till summer.

PARLIAMENTARY. , In the" Assembly Ministers, la reply to questions, stated— (I) That the (xovernment would take into consideration the recommendations) of the Committee, as set forth in the report on the Otago Central Miners' Association, correspondence, to appoint a Commission to enquire, during the recess, into the question of the validity 'of water licenses granted under GoldfieLla Acts, and the relations between the licenses so granted, and ordinary riparian" rights of landowners and others, but without committing themselves to carry out any of them, and during the recess would consider" whether it was necessary to appoinc the Commission suggested. At any rate they would take stfeps to ensure a proper bill dealing with Goldh'elds being intioduced next sessida. (2\ Public Works Estimates would pro'bably be brought down on Monday. At the Waste Lands Board meeting the application by the Macraies Progress Committee to have land at Macraes sold there, in-' stead of at.Naseby, was refused. It is rumored that Moran intends filing another indictment against thd ' S4ftr.'

(From a correspondent.) Wellington, Thursday. The Premier etated to-day that the *G<*i vernrnent had no legal opinion from law ady via era in Loudoii that the Abolition Act was not ultra vires. Grey, Stout, tiees, and Sheehan charged Ministers with attempting, in replying to Macandrew, through the Governor, to deceive the country on this point. Grey stated thn.t he and Maca-Ddrew would probably telegraph to the Colonial Secretary; asking disallowance of the Abolition Act...

Stout and others state that the Queen's prerogative of disallowance" runs for two years, and that the Queen has no power t<7 divest herself of a right created for the benefit of her subjects. It is absolute; also; that 1 the Queen has not assented to the Act, as 1 represented by Ministers.

The County Bill has practically passed the" Lower House. Beid's amendment to divide Otago into two Counties, Otago and Southland was rejected. Mariiototo slightly altered to Btrath Taieri boundary. Dunstan is to ba sailed "Vincent,"' and Wakatipu "The Lakes. ' The Q-OTerment hate made no concession to Otto's demand.