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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIII, Issue 155, 28 June 1878, Page 2

A German shephard at Moonta, has iust inherited £20,000 through the death of a relative.

It is rumored that Captain Kenny is likely to resign his seat for Pieton, prior to the meeting of Parliament.

Captain M'Gee, of the s.s. Wellington (says the Post) has brought over from Durville Island some large samples of copper ore from the reef on that island. The stove is a bright green throughout, and when a little vinegar is pouied upon it, and the blade of a knife is rubbed on the place, the blade is completely covered with copper, thus indisputably evidencing the richness of the ore The reef from which the ore was taken is Bft; thick, and it has been uucovered for over 200 yards, and traced for nearly a mile by the outcrop. It was at first intended to float the mine as a public company with a capital of £30,000, but a few large capitalists stepped in and purchased all the shares before the genera! public had applied for many. Those applied for were alotted, but the sharelist was immediately closed. So far as at present tested, the ore has yielded nearly 40 per cent of copper on an average. It is not propssed to erect smelting works on the island, as it will be much cheaper to ship the stone to Newcastle and smelt it there. To make quite certain before incurring any great expenditure, the reef has been cut at various places, and an experimental shinment of stone taken from ditferent parts of" the lode will be shortly sent to Newcastle. Should this experiment turn out as satisfactorily as is expected, not only with the proprietors of the mine reap fortunes, but a new industry will be opened up, and our copper exports may, in a few years, figure as largely as our gold exports. Hitherto the race for gold has caused the "baser metals" to be neglected, but if the experiment in copper mining now being made proves it to be a remunerative undertaking, other copper reefs would be sought out and worked.

A triple shock of earthquake (says the New _Tea.ant.er of Monday) occurred at 7.38 a.m. yesterddy, startling the citizens considably. The direction as near as we can ascertain was a south-easterly cine. Most people who felt it are of opinion that the shock was a most severe one, and old residents state that it was the heaviest experienced here for many years past. Opinions however differ, for Dr. Hector informs us that the shock was very slight. Perhaps to satisfy public curiosity the shock will be analysed at the Colonial Laboratory, when its exact force may be ascertained, and Dr. Hector could then " report" upon it. Since writing tbe above a gentleman called at this office to state that the earthquake shook the pocket-hankerchief out of the pocket of a poor but honest and hard working mechanic, and parted the hair of a bauk clerk down the middle.

The Drainage Board (says the Lyttelton Times) have given instructions for the preparation of an ominous map of Christchurch. A large plan of the city is to be obtained, and ©n the ppot on the map indicating the exact part of the city where a case of fever occurs a dot is to be placed. As time runs on the dots iVill show at a glance the unhealthy parts of the town. It was mentioned that the map. might, as-fat as the information could be reliably i obtained, be marked for cases which had already- occurred. The inhabitants of Inrercargill have invited the Mayor to call a public meeting of the citizens, for the purpose of considering the advisability of asking fche General Government to cablegram to the Agent-General to make such arrangements as" will ensure the despaitch' of 'twelve hundred suitable emigrants to the district of Southland, direct to Bluff Harbor for the forthcoming spring. People summoned, as jurorshad better take care that they.attehd. The Lyttelton Times tells the following story of what . may happen to them it they dontt •— « Two wellknown, residents in Lyttelton have been called upon by the (government to pay very dearly, for not having attended as jurors at a coroner's inquest held tbereiecently. The Coroner inflicted a fine of 20s each, and on Monday each of the individuals received a notice from the Crown Law Office, Wellington, demanding payment of £6, being £1 amount of fine inflicted, and costs amounting to no less than £5. This is the first demand of the kind that has been made for payment."

A Parisian paragrapher suggests the following as unpleasant situations.-— -To awake in the middle of the night a prey to a burning thirst; to get up, find a bottle in the dark, and swallow hurriedly a glassful of— castor oil. To be - sick to that degree that you cannot put one foot before tbe other, and to hear at midnight a cry of "Fire!" in the house. To hear some one bawling •' Stop thief 5" to set out in pursuit, and to be arrested as the thief and marched off to the station house. To have a millionaire uncle, rich and paralyzed}; and: to die before he does, To have & creditor whom you have long avoided; and to find hiifl With the father of the young lady whom you have Come to askin marriage. -

No schoolboy playing truant could have done a more stupid thing to excuse his absence from duty, than did a young man named Dicker, a commercial traveller' or collector f or the liquidators -of the Albion Brewery Company, in Dunedin. He was told to go to Lawrence to Collect accounts, but he did not go, aud to prevent his neglect becoming apparent, he made entries for the payment of several of the accounts in question, but of course did not hand over the money. A short time after the deficiency was discovered. Dicker was not at the ofllce, but there was proof in his own hand-writing that he had received the money, and it had not been paid over as it ought to have been. An information for embezzlement was at once laid, and Dicker was arrested. The truth then came out, and wheu the persons whom he had credited with payment were communicated with, they at once said they had never even been asked to pay him. . When the case came on in the Police Court the information was withdrawn. Dicker has his own almost inconceivable folly to thank for any inconvenience he suffered.— New Zealander

Four or five ton 3of salted schuapper have been sent from Auckland to Melbourne, in order to test the market.

The Auckland Star of Monday says : — I The stormy weather experienced yesterday had the effect of blowing down a thirty-three-year-old willow tree, which has long graced one of the main streets of Onehunga, namely, Queen-street. Traffic was blocked by the event, as the tree had not lived in Onehnnga thirty odd years for nothing, and had attained to a most prodigious size, having a corpulent trunk, huge limbsy a large head, and was altogether a credit to the borough, at least so our informant has it, and we do not see any reason for doubting his statement. We clip the following paragraph from the New Zealand of yesterday:— Mrs George Brown, an old lady 63 years of age, whose mysterious disappearance from home we were enabled to announce yesterday morning, was, after several hours' search, found in the Church of Eugland cemetery about 7 o'clock a.m. It appears that on the previous evening she had walked up to the cemetery to visit her brother's grave, aud she was too weak to return. Night came on and a search was instituted. The cemetery was gone through, as it was known she was in the habit of going there, and she said that she heard the people passing close by, but was too feeble to make her presence known. She, however, managed to crawl down to near the monument erected by; Captain Stafford to the memory of Captain Tucker, and there she was found yesterday morning in a dreadfully exhausted condition. She was at once taken into the house of the sexton, Mr Carr, and carefully attended to, the medical aid of Dr Diver being quickly procured. The exposure during a dreadfully cold night was, however, too great a shock to be got over by an old lady like Mrs Brown, Dr* Diver at once pronounced recovery to be hopeless, and last night she expired at Mr Carr's houae in the cemetery. A New Zealand lady, at present visiting, England, thus writes to a lady friend in Auckland :—" The dress at home ia most extraordinary. High art is the rage, and everyone wears dresses a sort of cross between dressing-gowns and riding habits — most of them a sort of bronze or dirty green, with streams of curry yellow, like saladdressing, meandering down the back and front— hats, jackets, and gloves to match-— high choky long-sleeved dresses. At night with long mittens; hair scraped off the face I in a tight knot at the back; poke-bonnets, brlmless chimney-pot hats— and everybody j looks just like everybody else." The following is a version of the Crimean War taken from a leading Moscow newspaper :— " Have the bloated shopkeepers of the North Sea Sand Bank forgotten the time when the Russian sea heroes drove their porter-drinking Admiral ' Charley* from the shores of fortgirt Cronstadt ? Have the purse-proud aristocracy of the foggy, smoky London forgotten the day when the serried ranks o£ Russian ateel a wept down the slopes of Alma and Inkermann, and carried mourning into half the houses of England ?"

A little child has been killed by accidentally swallowing a squeaking air-badder. It appears, from information kindly furnished us by Mr G. A. Johnston, that the toy slipped through the glottis, with the bladder downwards, so that with every inspiration the bladder became more or less inflated, and thus prevented that entrance of air to the lungs, and, produced death by suffocation. A verdict of accidentally suffocated was returned by the jury. The case must be unique.