The Nelson Evening Mail. TUESDAY, JULY 31, 1866.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume I, Issue 126, 31 July 1866, Page 2

The Nelson Evening Mail. TUESDAY, JULY 31, 1866.

The information is welcome, if correct, that an armstrong 12-pounder, and a number of rifled aud smooth-bored carbines, may be expected to arrive in Nelson in a few days, the gun for the use of the Wakapuaka artillery corps, and the carbines for the juvenile cadet corps. The arrival of arms should stimulate the various corps for whom they are intended to exert themselves to become worthy defenders of the colony to which they belong. The means of defence possessed by the colouy are small, but there is no reasonable cause why they should not increase to such an extent as to enable, it to present a formidable appearance to an attacking party. A correspondent states that a man named Chapman, has been missed from the district of Waimea-west, for the past month, and that fears are entertained by his family arid friends that he has been drowned in one of tbe swamps at the mouth of the Wairoa River. The greatest exertions are being made by the people of the district to discover the individual in question. Post-office Savings Banks, which have proved so great a success iu the old country, aud are on their trial in Australia, are about to be introduced into this colony. An Act was passed during the last session of the General Assembly, authorising their establishment. The experiment is to be tried with a few of the more important Post-offices, before extending the system to smaller and moredistant districts. Possibly Post-office Savings Banks are better adapted to large populations than to a colony so sparsely people as this. An opportunity will be afforded, however, to persons desirous of investing small savings, to pay their money into oue office and draw it out from any other they may select. Miners and persons travelling will be benefitted by the new arrangement, which is under the superintendence of Dr. Knight who was the organiser of the money order system. It appears from a recent report on the postal service that in 1864- the letters sent through the New Zealand post offices were 2, 120,849; in 1860, 2,235,188. Iu 1864 the letters received Avere 2,112,771 ; in 1865, 2,208,285. In 1864, the newspapers sent were 2,546,846; in 1865, 2,897,409. In 1864, the newspapers received were 1,781,482 ; in 1865, 1,809,583. The total length of inland postal service is 3,360 iniles. The expense incurred in allowances to sub-postmasters and licensed sellers of postage stamps for 1865 is as follows :— Auckland, £372 45.; Taranaki, £:,2; Wellington, £125 2s. 3d.; Hawke's Bay, £27 17s. 3d.; Nelson, £51 2s. 4d.; Marlborough, £16 125.; Canterbury, £295 15s. 6d.; Otago, £292; Southland, £44 Bs.: total, £1,257 2s. Id. The Government will thus save little more than £1000 by the refusal to allow a per centage on the sale of stamps, an advantage very trilling considering the great inconvenience to which the public are subjected. The Postmaster-General intends to do the work of a new broom, and make a clean sweep of the loafers in his department. He proposes to abolish the franking system, or to so far restrict it as to have official documents franked by official stamps. The franked letters of last year were 187,222 ; weight, 413,112 ounces; postage value, £8678 Is. 2d. The House of Representatives has refused to vote the sum of £1,500, to the Wellington papers, the amount they require for reporting and publishing the debates in Parliament. The newspaper proprietors say their income does not justify tliem in incurring the expense of publishing extended reports, and that last session they were considerable losers by the reports they published. In Victoria where the leading papers have a colonial circulation, the Government have always paid a large sum to one of the papers to furnish an extended report of the debates. Not lonfj afjo the Victorian Government made an engagement with the three most 'experienced reporters on the Argus newspaper, to report the Parliamentary debates. The smallness of the sum required by the proprietors of the Wellington papers ought

to have secured a unanimous vote in favor of the proposal. The' Government supported the vote for £1,500, but not in a very spirited manner. A great number of self-conceited members, who grumble at the way in which their essays on the wrongs of their respective provinces are obscured by the Wellington papers, voted against any subsidy, and so the offer of the newspaper proprietors was rejected. The Government is, exceedingly faulty' in the matter. It is the old story of " spoiling a ship for a haporth. of tar." The greatest efforts ought to be made to secure an accurate and extended report of the Parliamentary proceedings. In the absence of this the colonists are imperfectly acquainted with the acts of the "Parliament, and the colony loses caste in the estimation of surrounding colonies. Had the Government placed a sum on the estimates for the purpose, or announced their intention to do so, they would have carried the house with them, secured a, valuable record of the Parliamentary proceedings, and prevented the colony from presenting the poverty struck appearance it does to its Australian neighbors and the world. It is a paltry saving at the spigot, aud a letting out at the bung hole, which will show the folly of the false economy which the Government adopt before the session is brought to a close. It is not intended to insinuate by these remarks, that the reports of the Parliamentary proceedings in the Wellington papers, are not good of their kind. They appear to be admirably condensed reports. It is to the question of extension only, that our remarks apply. The short summary of Parliamentary intelligence which we occasionally furnish our readers with, is condensed from the columns of the New Zealand Advertiser. The resolutions proposed by Mr. Whitaker, and wliich are iutended to test the feeling of the present parliament, on the question of separation, are as follow : — That temporary provision should be made for the better government of the Province of Auckland. That with a view to that object the office of Superintendent should be abolished, and the whole administration of the government conducted by a Lieutenant-Governor, with the advice of an executive council; That the Provincial Council should be abolished, aud a Provincial Assembly established. That such Provincial Assembly should have exclusive power of legislation on all subjects, except such as shall be reserved for the General Assembly. The fate which the first resolution met with in the new parliament., ought to conviuce Mr. Whitaker that he has little chance of forcing his nostrums on the colony generally. The Memorial Committee have now issued their subscription lists for funds for the erection of a monument to Mr George Dobson, and Messrs Whitcombe, Townsend, aud Howitt. It is proposed to place it in some central position in Hokitika, probably at an intersection of two of the principal streets, from which a view of it cau be commanded from most of the public parts of the town. Ou the Bth inst. a man was unfortunately drowned in attempting to cross the Mikanui, aud the day after a body was picked up on the beach near the Waita River, which, by its fresh appearance, had evidently not been in the water longer than a day or two. There is a probability, therefore, that it belonged--to the party who was drowned the preceding day. A boatman plying on the Waita picked it up and buried it. He describes it as that of a fresh-complexioned young man with light hair, denuded of all clothing save the remains of a pair of navy duck trousers. On the 12th instaut a digger, whose name has not transpired, narrowly .escaped drowning whilst attempting to cross Cook's River. The stream was not flooded at the time, but it appears he mistook the fording place, and the current being very rapid and intensely cold, he lost his footing and was swept a considerable distau'ce downward. We learn from the Okarita Times that between the Wai ho and Cook's River there is a stream called the Watkupupa, where one party at least, have got excellent prospects of payable ground, to work which they have made an application to the Warden for leave to construct a head-race. They are said to

have got a pound weight in a fortnight, and the quality which they produced and sold to the banks was a pretty sample of gold— flat and shotty pieces, such as have usually been obtained in the creeks along this part of the coast. The party on Cook's River, reported as having obtained several pounds weight after a few weeks', work, fifty ounces of which were sold to the Bank of New Zealand, are understood to be about seventeen miles up the stream, and not far from the glacier which forms its source, They had been further up, and during their visit had witnessed some stupendous avalanches and landslips from the sides of Mount Cook and its spurs, which made a stay in- the neighborhood anything but desirable. Where they have obtained the best gold is on a bar in the river, the great difficulty to contend with being the sudden and high floods which occasionally occur, the water rising sometimes fourteen feet, and rendering ail their work futile. The Otago News Letter learns that Pollock and party have been prospecting for nearly a fortnight upon the Chain Hills, Green Island, and think that they have hit on a payable reef. The ground is private property, the party having leased over 60 acres. The shaft is down 20 feet, and the party are driving. In a week or two a few tons will be sent to Waipori to crush as a trial. Meantime the party are sanguine, and ah enginering firm in town has thought so well of the prospect opening as to tender for supplying the requisite nachiuery. A rumour was current, says the Tasmanian Morning Herald of the 4th iustant, that some extraordinary discoveries of petroleum oil had taken place in the district lying to the north-east of Jericho. Great secrecy is at present maintained on the subject, but we have heard that samplesjiave beeu experimented upon'at the gasworks, aud the results were most satisfactory. No doubt the full particulars will shortly be made known. The last voyage of the Souchays, on the Torres Straits route, was marked by au incident of a more than usually interesting nature, which is reported by the Port Denison Times as follows : — On her outward trip the Souchays, when off an island about fifty miles from Cape York, picked up five natives whose canoe had been capsized. They were excellent swimmers, but having to swim against tide they could not reach the shore. From the appearance of the hard skin ou their hands aud feet they must have been a long time in the water. They were kept on board, and received all necessary medical attendance. They expressed the greatest astonishment at everything they saw. At Macassar they went ashore, and seemed to enjoy themselves much. At the first sight of the Malays they exhibited great fright, lest they should be eaten. On the voyage back they were evidently home sick, crying at sight of their island, which they recognised when the people on board could scarcely dis.- . tinguish laud at all. "When lauded they were received with the greatest demonstrations of joy by their countrymen, who by signs invited the boat's crew on shore. Captain Blick kindly gave the natives some coacoa- . nuts and other plauts, and instructed them ; how to plant them. A singular instance of somnambulism is reported by the Launceston Examiner, which ; says : — On Sunday night last a case occurred : to the son of a widow, residing in the vicinity : of the cataract. Some hours after the family ! had retired to rest, the lad, about 14 years "\ of age, arose from his bed, and without awakening anyone, and in his night dress : only, left the house, ' He walked to a neigh- ,! hour's house in Margaret-street, and went ■ into the yard, calling out at the top of his j voice. The inmates were soon aroused, but '] were unable to distinguish any object iu the \ yard. The lad then ran some 200 or SOO \ yards further down the street until he came %to a house occupied by his aunt. Here he ■ J sang out lustily, - " Fire ! Fire! " When his | aunt had got over the fright of seeing the boy Jiiu that plight, he told her that his mother's •jjhouse was oa fire, and that there was a man ' |in the balcony setting it alight. This v/as, lof course, found to be incorrect, the position |pf the house being plainly observable. How-

ever, the boy, was still clinging to his assertion a,nd repeating hid tale,, .when he suddenly awoke, dreadfully terrified. The following is a list of the crew of the William Watson, wrecked off Newcastle, shipped in Melbourne, 19th January last : — . Robert Patrick, Samuel Bunkhead, William Meadows, William Levarty, William Haggup, Matthew Kelly, George Dickinson, David Brown, George Howard, William Hunter, Evan Griffiths.