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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIII, Issue 115, 15 May 1878, Page 2

ecu— >.i'.ti *.*»ii>i^wJKX!jasin-K<r^*-.r&stTj^v?Bvasajtte<zixaraA!% On April 8, General Schnerigieff was ordered to St. Petersburgh for a Conference with the Emperor and Military Council. On the following day he wa3 despatched to Central Asia by forced conveyance. He is understood to have received a commission to go to the Cossacks, raise a large body of cavalry, and obtain recruits from the vnrious branches of the army, as he advanced towards the borders of British ludia, for the purpose of invading it as soon as. war would be declared. He i« reported to be well acquainted with Asia, and is expected to enter Northern India by way of the Panni Plateau. The information is obtained from a telegram sent from St. Petersburg to the New York Herald. The following intelligence, brought by the Torres Strait mail, is published by the Sydney Eveving News :— " Great alarm was created on board one of the Eastern mail boats running between Singapore and China. She had 300 passengers. One of the passengers designedly poisoned a quantity of rice, and several who partook of ifc died in great agony.— Captain Pettersen, of the German steamer Pacific, reports a tidal wave sweeping over Blanche Bay, in the South Seas, on the 10th March. Soon after a fsw islands rose from the bottom of the sea to a height of 70 feet. For two days the weather in the bay was scalding hot, and an immenie quantity of boiled flsh and turtle was {thrown on shore, and eagerly devoured by the starving native*. — In consequence of the drynesi of the Beason cannibalism is very rife, and traffic in human bodies is going on. Late accounts from Chefoo, with respect to the famine, are full of horror. The inhabitants of Luman Foo were reduced to such a position that shops were opened for the iale of human flesh for two days. The mandarins closed the shops eventually, and beheaded the proprietors, The death rate is 7() per cent. — Trade is at a standstill in Batavia. Immense floods have occurred in several parts of the country. Rice is dear, and the health of the people is bad. — The Batavian Dagblat states that serious complaints have been made to the Netherlands authorities regarding the messages passing by way of Banjoewangie. Specimens of messages produced show that the English language wao [ utterly unrecognisable."^

The were 114 male and 27 female prisoners in the Dunedin goal last weok. Mr Liehtschiendl, of the Empire Hotel, Wellington, has sold the freehold property adjoining the hotel (lately occupied by Messrs Turnbull and Co ss their grocery store), tcr the Northern Land, Loan, and Investment Society. The price is £7500, or about £123 per foot. The Ashburton Matt state's iltst while Mrs Scott-Siddon3 was in ChristchurGb 1 , ette was induced by favorable reports to invest id Ihe purchase of landed estate in the County of Ashburton. She has since been offered, and has refused, £4000 advance on her bargain. Insectivorous bifds are to be protected in Victorica by statute. All the schools are to be supplied with charts, containing coloured illustrations of 36 species. The experiences of a Fiji official with a native cook are thus related by the Fiji Times : " This gentleman's weakness is pancakes, and he ordered them accordingly, but as they seemed to be heavy is conaistency, he directed the sable Soyer to put in more soda. Still they grew heavier, aud the unhappy partaker began to feel the baneful effects of their undue specific gravity in the failing of his' liSual robust health. More soda was ! demanded, and 3tiH those pancakes grew heavier, and still the dflvonrer grew sicker, till a serious disturbance efefltuated, the j master vowing that the instructions relative to the soda had been neglected, the cook swearing he had put it in in handsf ul. ' Then the soda is no good,' roared the disappainted and ailing lover of fritters ; bring it here!' It was brought, and turned out to be a 561 b tin of excellent plaster-of-paris. There are no pancakes made in that establishment now, and a good plain cook is open for an engagement." Professor Huxley said lately, in a lecture on education : —Tho talents of youth of real genius should be fostered for the benefit of mankind at large, irrespective of any monetary cost. The writer of " London Town Talk" in the Melbourne Argut says :— " A remarkable woman, even in a country which produces nothing but ' remarkable' personages, has just died in Pennsylvania. She was the wife of Mr Pitman, the famous phonographist and could not only read her husband's hand writing (which is not tbe case with all wives, let me tell you), but even his shorthand. When he had any important speech to report she would engage a room near the hall in which it was to be delivered, and dictate his notes to six or seven young ladies belonging to his classes, that so half the speech was in type before the speaker had done. Her body was cremated at Washington, and her husband intends to put the remains at the root of a rose bush, that the fragrant flower may remind him of her memory. Like ' the actions of the just' she will thus ' smell sweet and blossom in her dust.' What is not so poetical is the information is that Mrs P. was • put in the retort at 2 o'clock, and the temperature being brought to 230deg., that her pelvic bones gave way at 3.45.' The cremation was then considered ' satisfactory,' and \ the fire drawn from the furnace 1 " ' The wedding cake which stood on the breakfast table at tbe marriage party of Lord Roseberry was built in three tiers, and weighed about 1 cwt. The lowest tier was wreathed with flowers and adorned with birds beautifully modelled. The second was decorated with medallions of silkpainted with orange blossoms and cornucopias. The third tier was festooned with flowers. Each tier had an ornamental gallery of sugar-work, and the top was surmounted with a vasa of flowers. A man has been killed by a mail train while attempting to cross the railway line at Sydney. The train was travelling very fast, and the man was literally cufc to pieces, the trunk being deprived of arm 3, the legs unclothed, and a shapeless mas 3 ; the head wa3 found fifty yards away. Three men were ridiDg along the other day, a few miles from Braidwood, when a brown snake was observed to glide from the side of the road to shelter under a log. The reptile gained its haven of fancied seenrity, but its tail stuck out from beneath the log, whereupon one of the party dismounted, and dragging the venomous creature from. its hiding place, put his foot on it, and deliberately drew its fangs. This was not all, for he next took up the snake, and putting his head into his mouth, bit it off. The old legend says that St. Dunstau seized his Satauic majesty by the nose, a feat which is almost eclipsed by tho one in question. This kind of thing (says the Braidwood Despatch) looks very much like tempting Providence.