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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 81, 6 April 1874, Page 2

Canada is making a great bid for population. A passage across the Atlantic for 40a, a 100 acre farm free (eight acres of whic'i are to be cleared free of coBt), and a comfortable log hut. Such an offer my appear to a hardworked English laborer, a glimpse of foreshadowing of Paradise. Says a correspondent in the Westland Register: — " I have experience 1 a new sensation lately: I tried to go through the Court. I did not succeed. The operation is not ensy. First, I went to a lawyer's office, and, in a roundabout way, said I did not want to pay my creditors. The amount of cash demanded by the lawyer's clerk was heavy. I decclined to sling, and, with a sad farewell, I rose and sought the advice of an outsider, whose charges were more moderate. This bush lawyer asked only five shillings, and about a half-crown's worth of drinks. I paid him, and went to the clerk of the District Court, rtjoiciog. But, oh ! the fees 1 1 couldn't look at this official without paying a bob. I had to file my papers myself, and everything I did cost money. The sole object of this most amusing Court is fees. I stood this game for some time, and concluded it was better to pay my debts. If the Court adjourns itself for a week everyone pays six bob, and if it don't aijourn it has to be paid all the same. If you appear before his Honor you have to pay; if you ask the clerk a question you hive to pay; if you make out your accounts you hnve to pay; and the Court will do nothing whatever out being well lubricated with fees," The Chinese National Drama, of a strictly legitimate character, has long been established in Australia, although it has to wander about under a large circus tent. There is no painted scene, but chnirs, tables, imitation bedsteads, and other articles of furniture are brought on as required. The members of the orchestra are ranged along the back of the stage, and keep up an almost incessant din with gongs and tomtoms. The characters of the drama wear very gorgeous spangled dresses, the warriors looking like monster dragoon flies, with long feathers sticking out of their headgear, and sometimes their faces painted blue or red. Terrible fights goon with wooden swords or spears ; the combatants screeching or leaping. All the characters make their entrances and exits through slits in an arras, or tapestry, at. the bank. The fighting men after dropping down killed en regie, get up and walk out, no curtain being used. Two dramas can be performed in an evening, between halfpast seven and midnight, and scarcely for an instant do the tomtoms cease for all that time. The actors recite in a wholly unnatural tone, much like Mr Punch. Violent passion is expressed by rolling the eyes and blowing with distended cheeks, everything being done with much dignity. The actors are all men, but some makiug up for ladies in bewitching Btyle, having magnificent black tresses, which they toss about wildiy in displaying the anguish with which Chinese dramas abound. The audience do not applaude a bit, and look ' on with gravity, smoking their pipes. There is not much comedy introduced. It is usually bestowed upon the old woman, and the actor wbo takes the role can rase much hilarity among the European visitors, although the Chinamen hardly relax into a smile at. the most grotesque efforts. Frozen to Death— The Detroit Free Press states that recently, on a Sunday morning in December, two farmers driving home from Maiden with their families after attending at church, saw, about eight miles below, or east of that town, a ship's yawl, which, while they were at church, had been driven hard on the beach of the lake, with a man sitting stiff and motionless in the stern. Leaving their waggons, they discovered that the man was lifeless and frozen as hard as a rock. He sat bolt upright on the seat, the. oar out behind, and both hands clasping the handle, and it required hard work to wrench it from his death-grip. There was about a foot of water in the boat, but the craft did not show rough usage. The man's legs were almost covered with ice as far up as his knees,, and the spray had dashed over his back and shoulders and frozen there. There was no name on the boat, nor anything on the man by which he could be identified.