LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1646, 27 February 1886, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A number of riflemen and navals arrived by coach' and buggy last even \ng\ en route for Wanganni, to take part in the Rifle Association Meeting there. Two Salvation Army lasses have arrived to tale charge of the Palmerston district. A nmnher of additions have been made to the catalogue for Messrs . FR. Jackson arid Co's - stock sale for next Wednesday at Wanganui. The bush fires in the Fitzherberfc district preßouted a gorgeous spectacle in the darkness lest night. Vast dense volumes of smoke rolled upward?, ilium ioatee by, the flames, giving a grand, though weird appearance to the hills. The fires quite lighted up the surrounding! country. We should imagine a good burn should be tho result. A " Scotch mist " set in tbis-f orenoon, which promises to last and to develop into heavy rain, as Captain Edwin predicted. A meeting of the Palmerston North School Committee will be held at the I Central r School-house, on Monday, the Ist day of March, at 7.30 p.m. f, r ; The Lyttleton Times states that a naive suggestion was made to the Education Board by a country school poinmittae. They cannot raise, sufficient children to form the minimum attendance for a district school presided over by a masfer, and suggested to the Board that if a master .with- a large family' were appointed, they perhaps might be able to muster the score of children required. Ihe members of the ppard laughed, but they unfeelingly depided to instruct the committee to advertise for a mistress instead of a roaster, , An exchange tells the following story : —iln the'early dnys a Jgentlemnn was visiting the Hot Springs, accompanied tiy several Maoris' ; all at once, one of them seized him and carried him rapidly away : of course my friend thought that he was going to be robbed, and prepared to give up his valuables, when the Maori set hyn down and explained with many gesticulation?, that the thin crust oh which the visitor had been standing, had just cracked and. was about to precipitate him into the boiling; fluid; below. ■, Some recent' jtourists hare made light' of this danger, but' there can be no doubt that it is a very pea} oneas recent events-prove. >:■"■■■'■ jFour Waferbupy ppker players sat down for a quiet game the other night ? i After an Hour or two one man got six cards by accident. He liked the looks of his cards, and. was unwilling to throw jthein up, just then a plate of «sandwicbes was brought in, The man ' with six cards picked up a sandwich, slid his extra card between f,he slices of bread, and. ate fhe bread, meat, and card. He took the pot, ana his companions did not notice the stratagem. A day or two ago he confessed his trick, and in consequence there was a champagne supper tor the whole party.— Exchange. Pattie and Jenny Lind, says the Wiener Zeitung, recently had a little tiff at a private party. Patti had been singing with great brilliancy, and amongst other pieces an air of Mozart. Jennie Lind, at the conclusion ventured to express her opinion that Patti had rather hurried % the time in. Mozart's music. *' And lVst yQUjmay think," she added, " that I am like a blind man speaking of colour, I may tell you that I am Jennie Lind Goldschmidt." Palti, 'somewhat nettled, is said to have retorted t^ug—" Ob, yes, I know you were a famous singer'once— \ have heard nay grandfather speak of you. 1 ' In the course of an address in Wellington, Mrs Ward stated that from Canterbury to Inveroargill she -saw paddocks as bare as the floor of St John's schoolroom in consequence of the long drought. In many places the sheep had to be boiled down, because there was no feed for them. The Rev. J. C. Dbdwell has been appointed temporarily to a post at the Mount Cook Boys' School;' ' The ancient whaling barque George and Susan, recently lost in the Arctic Ocean, was built in 1810. and during her 67 years of activity had taken to New Hebrides in round numbers 45,000 barrels of oil, and 126,0001b of whalebone. A municipal edict has been issued in Weimar to the effect that persons in the act of playing on the piano must not leave their windows open ; and that every person who wishes to give a private musical party must pay a tax of 50 marks. '; ; ■ * ,' " : '.. : ; '' '