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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 252, 20 October 1873, Page 2

Wfl learn that a chief from Raglan went to Kawhia recently; he saw Tapihana there, who was armed with n number of pistols and warlike implements. The following dialouge is said to have takeu place. Tapihana, standing up Baid : — " You see that I am armed ; the reason is that I am going to war." I'he Raglan chief said: — " If war is to toke place, why did Tawhiao visit a European settlement ? " Tapihana: — '•'• He visited it privately; had he done so officially, it would have been a sign of peace." The above conveys to the mind of any man who has watched the fnrce that has been playing for years, that there is a demand of some sort to be shortly made on the Government. To threaten is certain to secure anything asked. When will this wearj' came of imposition on the one side, and politic yielding on the other cease? — Waikato Times. The Wellington correspondent of the Auckland Star in describing the appearance of the House on the last day of the session, writes as follows: — Mr Yogel walks about and chats pltasamly with members, friends, and foes alike; and, viewed from the diaiiince, it appears as if ho is pleasantly rubbing off the point of many a barbed and poisoned arrow that has been shot during the debate. Mr McLean's face bears a radiant expression of internal satisfaction, and ho lightly trips to ami fro, talkiug in a paternal and benignant way, and I could fancy him saying " Oh it's all right, no matter about what has passed, we're all friends together." Mr Reynolds bears the same peculiar smile, half pleasant, half vicious, which characteri&eß him in the House; perhaps there is v little eoupc/on of satisfaction that the wicked have now ceased from troubling, and the weary are at rest. Mr O'Rorke has the same air of Irish jauntiaeas and easy mind which attends him in all circumstances, favorable or adverse. Frank, and ready, and off-handed at all times, there is yet more buoyancy in his laugh and movements now that he sniffs the air of freedom. Mr Richardson receives the quiet congratulations of members with that quiet smile and geDtle manner that have saved him from many a rude knock wherewith his colleagues were from time to time being. buffeted. i*erhaps of all the Ministry the genial circumstance? of the breaking up have been least mirrored in his manner. But whht shall I say of Mr Bathgate ? or what pen could adequately pourtray that portentous solemnity with which the Minister of Justice seems oppressed. He appears as if he had all the Acts of the session in his stomach, and their digestion sorely distressed him. His form is bent forward. His spectacles are on his brow, which appears laden with heavy care, and silently and Solemnly he moves, the only Minister on whom the burden of the cares of State seems to have settled. Of course it is all put on. But it is none the less to be gnzed upon with awe. Mr Yogel, who was the lion in the fight is now as frisky as a kitten when the trouble is past, but, Mr Bathgate, who was not a hero in the fight, realises, the dignity of the occasion, and is ludicrously solemn. Thirty-two years ago the French laid claim to the south island of New Zealand, to which, however, they had no rightful title. They landed immigrants at Akaroa, and dispatched a war frigate to wait ou the Governor, at the Bay of Islands in order to prefer their claim. The French corvette lay one evening in the harbor near an old English 10-gun brig. In the night, however, the commander of the brig put to sea, and in the morning, the Frenchman, guesstDg his rival's purpose, followed in pursuit in a race of 700 miles. It was too late. " The French corvette was in every respect superior to the English ship, hut Captain Owen Stanley, in the old Britomart, like a true and gallant British sailor when the welfare of his country was at stake, did his duty in such good style that he reached Akaroa harbor, at Banks' Peninsula, in the South Island, landed, ■ took formal possession of it in the Queen's fnarae, hoisted the red cross of St. George, i'and the Union Jack on n flagstaff, and 'fired a salute of 21 guns in honor of the event, before the French corvette, although fin sight, could come to anohor." We may |add that Captain Stanley, who thus gallantly pocured to his country "one of the ffinest islands ever annexed to the Crown jjjof England," was the eldest son of Bishop I Stanley, and brother to the Dean of West- | minster. Unhappily be died at an early iage.— Pall Mall Gazette on " New Zsa--1 and," by Alex. Kennedy.

A touching story is told iu:lifi&.American papers of a lady in Kentucky who was stiicken with a sudden failing bf the optic nerve, and was told that she. t could not retain her sight lor more than a few days at the most, nnd was liable to be totally deprived of it at any moment. She retired to her home, quietly made such arrangements as would occur to anyone about to commence ,so dark a journey for life, and then had her two little cnilde'h attiied in their brightest costumes brought before her; aud so, with their little faces lifted to hers, and tears gathering for the great raisfortuue that they hardly realised, the light faded out of the mother's eyes. For remainder of news see fourth page.