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Manawatu Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1633, 12 February 1886, Page 2

For thirty-one years (says JEglea m the Australasian) the good brig Mercury has traded between ; Melbourne .and Launceston, making m that time 600 trips without serious accident or casualty —and .it blows big guns some times m Bass'a .Straits. iln all that lime: the Mercury .-has had only, two skippers-r-Captain James Tullock, succeeded by his iinate, Captain James Todd.; One seaman (Griffith Williams, now mate) signed the ship's .articles more than 23 years ago, and, when a change m the crew took place, the wharf humorist wanted to know when the funeral had taken place. The crew always loaded and discharged the ship's .cargo. The little Mercury is one of the few sailing vessels now lett with single topsails. She has long held , her own as a carrier of cargo against the steamers, and is, I hear, about to retire from active service. She will presently lie a sheer hulk, but— shade of Jack Bunsby !-r-I am proud to write her epitaph. A gentleman m Auckland received by last mail a description of a, new light, invented and patented by Messrs Hannay & Co., Glasgow. It consists of a lamp fed by coarse oil and worked by steam or water power. Flame three feet high, and one light makes 300 feet square light as daylight, and only cost 2d per .hour.. It burns best m a gale of wind, and cannot be blown out. The contractors for. the . Forth Arigade, near Edinburgh, have recently tried six of these lamps, and they arc- so well satisfied that they have ordered other six. This newr light is fully expected to supersede eiiher gas or electric lighting.: ; , In Melbourne recently a, man shot himself m the forehead m the 'street with ; a revolver. He was immediately taken to the Melbourne Hospital, where after; a -short time he died. JEJis name: was ascertained to be \Villiam Yuille, 30 years; of a«e, a photographer. From . a document m his possession, and bearing his signature, it appears that the deceased! was tho perpetrator of the recent high-* way robberies at Camberwell, and that he committed suicide through the momentary dread ef being foun^ out,