Untitled

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XI, Issue 42, 15 February 1876, Page 2

A Wellington telegram of the 3rd iuvstant says :— A host who was in the habit of getting. up public dinners made a serious mistake. He had been asked by a boating man, a member of a committee, what he would provide a. dinner per head for, sixty beiog guaranteed. On learning the price the committeeman said he would see. . The other looked upon, tho matter as settled, and had dinner prepared and laid out on Monday night, with half a dozen waiters in their places, but not a soul came, and about ten the waiters, had a jollification on their own account. The Daily Telegraph gives the following account of an Asiatic shot who has been astonishing Hyihe and Alderahot: — "A lion on the ground this year will be the Jopnneso officer who has been astonishing Hythe and Aldershot by making bull's-eyes from the shoulder at a thousand yard?. Some say he is an Englishman \vho was naturalised at a tender age in Japan; others' again declare that he can speak not a word of any European language. He is at all events a marvel of marksmanship; and when at tbeChiswick garden party a distinguished person said to the .Japanese ambassador, '1 hear you have a wonderfully good shot in this country,' his Excellency replied, in the modest and dignified terseness of a Japanese gentleman, *He is. a good shot,' which answer meant ..more than a whole string of superlatives. The same journal records the following anecdote about the said gentleman from a vast number which rre going the rounds of. the camp as substantially true. At Hythe, Major . Muretta was . pitted against one of the most celebrated musketry instructors in the camp, an officer who; can, to use a familiar phrase, * face the target, that is, can say where he is going to place his shots, and then do. it. Tbe Japanese major saw everything that the English lieutenant was able to perform, and then proceeded to cut him out in a manner that amazed ail beholders. At Asa, near Aldershot, he was purposely misinformed as to tbe distance of a range, the number of yards as given him being 800, whereas in. leality it was 1000. Major Muretta said nothing but calmly sighted his rifle, and firing hit the bull's-eye. This he did again and again, and when he was told he b^d been deceived in the distance he said he had not been decoived at all.'- ■