LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Standard, Volume X, Issue 1567, 27 November 1885, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Tenders received for Mr H. McNeil's residence are as follows : — Munro Bros., £394 18s ; Edwards?, £389 ; Powell and Daniels, i'3Bs ; Ewing- & Co., £374 ; Stubbsi £373, 12s 6d ; Smith & Marsh, £338 : SimmoHds & Fegden, £329, accepted. Tbe tender of Messrs Rabone and Holder, of Woodville, was accepted yesr terday for the new Theatre, Woodvillo. Tli» amount being £944. St. Leon's Circus took £85 at Foxfcon. And yet we hear there is no money m the place ! Several oi the relatives of the late well-known native " Governor Hunia," who died a few months ago at Bulls, excited by the visions of a native prophet have conceived the idea that Hunia's death was due to the withcraft of a maori residing m the Wainirapa, and we are reliably informed that a party of natives, including several prominent chiefs, have left on a visit to the other coast, to diso cuss the matter with their friends resid. ins: m that district, and also to interview the supposed author of the mischief. If such be the case, the latter is likely thave a" warm " time of it. Attention has been called (says an English paper) to two races of men that must soon become extinct. At present rate of decrease the Maoris of Now Zealapd — now reduced to less than 45,000 men from 100,000 m Captain Cook's days — must have disappeared by the year §2000. The Laplanders are estimated not to exceed 8.0,000 m nuinbgr, ao4 * r 9 gradually beoowing fewer,

Thfi Mi-lhoiirno Arg intuit i\w. 12thin9t. contains tho cable message which rerorded tlis sentences passed upon Mr j Su-ml and tho otlmr p -rsons concerned m the Pall Mall Ga~e,tto affair. Tho telegr.iiu which is onu of Mentor's runs a* follows :— '' London November 10. Tho trinl of tho prisoners clunked with I abduction and indecent assault u(.>on Kiizi Armstrong took pl.icv to-day, when the following sentences weru pfisstM 1 for t/ii.' ahdiictiiiii and :iss>iult : — William Thomas Stead wus sentenced to three months' iinprisoninunt, Sampson j Jacqm-8 to one month, Rebecca Jarrett | and Mndiinm Muurez each to six months, j the last tuiiiud with hard labor." This j seems plain enough. It is notified m the Gazette that tho distribution of the sum of £4000, voted by Paihament for public libraries, will take place on February Bth, and that claims must be aunt to the Secretary for Education by January 31st. j A man of; unblemished charactor was candidate for a large constituency m Ireland, and the following uunns were ÜB':d to got rid ot him. At a lar^e public meeting, an elector got up find said, " I demand tho exercise of my ri^ht to usk tint candidate a question. Will he anawL-r me ' Yos 'or ' No 1 like an honest man ? " " Undoubtedly I will I " — A most incautious promise, as the reader will guess. " Will, thtn, said the elector, ' I ask that gentleman, who killed his washerwoman?'" Wlmt was the poor man to say? What yes or wo could answer that question. He hesitated, he stammered — the meeting was against Jii/n ; uu was hustler} out of the room, and to thin day he labours und: r the grave imputation, m many people's minds, of having feloniously accelerated the death of some unfortunate, and perhaps illused washerwoman t 15 ranee has just had one of its periodical spy scares. A Bel fort journal stales that two elderly and two younjj geitleinen, vrho were walking" on the fortifications, were challenged by a sentry mid asked what they wanted. They asked the way to Saint Maurice, but tho sentry observed that instead of going m that direction they closely inspected the fortifications ; and he, who understood Gorman, heard one of them say, " Here wonld be a good spot for an assault." Elo communicated with the commandant of the fort, who sent orders to arrest them. They turned out to be a Prussian General from Mnlhouse, his aid-de-camp and his two sons. They were searched, and maps found upon them. In a short time a telegram from a superior authority came m these words: — "Conduct the prisoners to the frontier." Once when visiting a small town m one of the smallest German States, the sovereign Prince wus received at tho gate by 20 young damsels m white. As a piece of cunning strategy the teu prettiest maidens were placed m the front rank and ten less pretty ones m the second. Charmed with tho attractive appearance of tho vanguard, His Si-rene Highness did what comforted well his sixty years and hift piincely dignity — he kissed everyone of them on their boantiful foreheads, At the cud of the front rank he made a sudden pause — only for a couple of seconds, however, then lie beckoned to his adjutant. " Spurrenholz, here — go on with the rent." The discovery has been made that the world does not revolve with the same momentum it did a thousand years ago, but it still swings round fast enough to satisfy tho man with a heavy bill coming due. A young man was about to make his first appearance m society was instructed that it would bo polite to say, when being helped at tablo, " Half that, please. It so happened that at his first dinner a roast pig was the centre dish, and he carried consternation to the heart of his host, upon being asked if he would partake of the porker, by repeating his father's polito reply. A young couple In their honeymoon are dallying languidly with tho grapes at the dessert. She (archly) — "And you dou't find it tiresome, dear, all alone with me ? You are quite sure that you do not wish to go back to your bachelor life agaiu ?" He (earnestly) — " Quite, my dear. Indeed, married life is so awtully jolly that', you know, if you were (o die to-niglit, I'd get married again to morrow." Neluon declared that he never knew what fear was ; and Mariborou.h said he was generally afraid m the beginning of an action. Washington, once, aad once only, swore, and that was m battle when one of his officers seimed not very anxious to fight the enemy. Conde always become more and more el.tbor ntely politaia his manner as the danger thickened. Near Astoria, Oregon, may be seen a deposit of clam shells, which covers an area of four acres, and m places thoy are ten feet deep. A thousand loads taken away seemed to make no impression on the heap. A clam-opener made of the tooth of a whale was recently found among them. Over these shells there are sixteen inches of soil, m which fir trees 400 j'ears old are growing. The Lyttleton Times complaining of the delay m publishing the statistics, 8U3 r 8 — " At present Parliament annually passes a hundred statutes, more or less penal, and the Government Printer leaves the public to tho exercise of a more or less living imagination to dis cover the length of its tothor. We have no hesitation m declaring: that all convictions under theso laws before their provisions become known, will be so many cases of gross outrage and hiehhauded tyranny." The present whereabouts of P. J. Tynan the notorious " number one "of the Irish lnvincibles, who superintended •the arrangements of the Phoenix . Park assassinations, when Lord F. Cavendish and Mr Burke were murdered, and who subsequently escaped, was pu tho Bth ultimo revealed m an obituary notfpe, which appeared m a Dublin nationalist paper, announcing the death ot Lizzie, the second daughter of P. J. Tynan, at his residence at Haarlem, New York, at the age of 18. " Who's the new boarder over the way ?" asked Mrs Bluff of her husband. " I don't know," he replied. " tie's a nice looking man," she continued. " Yes yory nice looking." "Is he married ?" ! "No." "How do you know?" "Oh, I know." •♦ I thought you said you didn't know him." " I don't." "Then how do you know he isn't married ?" " I heard him singing 1 , * Heaven ia iuv homo,' as I came by last uic;ht." A slight antiquarian interest attaches to the collapse ot the liosphore Egyntien. The real cause of its disappearance fr<un the Bcene appears to bo impecuniosity, but true to itself to the last, it has only grown more abusive an it grew more impecunious, and has thus courted a forcible ilenth to es'japo tho humiliation of oValh from atrophy. The French' Consul appears to have enured into tho spirit of its efforts, and to havo assisted his compatriot, the editor, by mercifully administering the coupe de grace. Yet it was this miserable and obscure little print, which even by unmitigated scurillity'has been unable to f-scapa insolvency, that once threatened to embroil Fiance and England. Imagine Town Talk imperillm? the peace of Europe. Advertisers m the Standard 1886 Almanac would materially assist us by forwarding their advertisements to the office as early as possible next week. The following was the pulling for the Wellington mayoialty :— A. W, Brown, 600 ; S. Brow», 563 ; T. W. Mcfieuzie, 435 ; J, DransfieU, 90 ;

The correspondent of a Nap'er paper: is responsible for the following : — I cannot resist tolling you a story which you can print or not as you like. A certain someone, Mr Blank, wjjs greatly <le ; lighted with tiie Columbines m the gar den ot a certain bachelor. Whereon, to tlio Mjxt young lady lie met, hearing the owner of the e-u'deu rlHeu^o:l, ho remarked loudly, "Oli, you should just see his coii.;ul»i:i f js ;ho has any quantity of white onus, and several black ones, and one beautiful yellow one. You will bo over next week, and I will show you them." Mr Blank remains unable to understand the " sensation that followed, or why his friends still ask him whether the Chinese Immigration Act is strictly enforced. The village of Shoebeck is known throughout the whole of Germany as the chess-playing village. • For centuries every native of the village, from the prosperous freeholder, down to the poer village shepherd, has been an enthusiastic and a- more or less efficient chessplayer. The following ruling of His Honor Judtre Gillies m the anpeal case, Fairweather v. Fulton — dngshooting case, will be interesting to dog owners and instructive to farmers. His. Honor ruled that the Act gave a person no right to destroy a dog after it had escaped from his premises v . The only person who could destroy it on the public road would be the person appointed by the local body. His Honor pointed out, however, that the local body could not authorise anyone to trespass upon private i property to find unregistered dogs." A gentleman who was blessed with a musicial son-in-law, hearing a joke that " the musician, like the cook, makes his bread out ot doh" remarked — " That may be m some instances, but m my case the musician makes his bread out of me.'' It has lately been rumoured, both m Hawko's Bay and Wellington, that ten • ders would shortly ho called for the Manawatu Gorge Eailway. The Minister of Public Works, while strongly convinced of the importance of the line, as the connecting link between the East and West Coast Railway, has been debarred through the action of Parliament from calling for tenders, and caunofc possibly do so before next session. Some of the Maori chiefs m the Mokau Country are anxious to have their lands prospected by goldminers, whilst others are totally a versa to anything- of thiit kind. Permits have been granted by the Native Minister to a few prospecting parties m the Thames and Waikato, but subject to the approval of. the Maoris interested. The chief difficulties m the way are the intertribal jealousies of the Maori chiefs and people. ' Negotiations are progressing favorably for the purchase of the land on either side of the North Island Trunk Railway, but of course nothing definite can be done till the lands shall have passed through the Natives Lands Courts, auil the titles have been ascertained. The Maoris are anxious to have the sittings of the Court fixed. One will shortly sit at Taupo, and afterwards at some place m the Waikato. The minister was struggling to put on a new four-ply collar and the perspiration was starting from every pore. " Bless the collar," he ejaculated, " Oh, yes, bless it. Bless the blessed collar." " My dear," said his wife, " what is your text for this morning's sermon ?" '•T-twonty-first verse, f -fifty-fifth Psalm," ho replied m short gasps, " ' Tho w-words of his m-mouth were a moother than b-utter, but w-war was m his h-heart." It is stated that a writ for £500 for slander is about to be issued against a well-known gentleman m Gisborne The slander consists m trying to deprive, by certain statements a solicitor of a client.