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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XV, Issue 52, 1 March 1880, Page 2

Referring to the case of Police v. Eliza Martin, heard at the last sitting: of the Magistrate's Court at Lyell, and in which the accused was committed to the District Court, the Lyell Times moralises thus : — Defendant was charged with stabbing one Rosanna Boyle. The evidence in this case was totally unfit for publication. The prisoner waa in a partial state of intoxication, and the prosecutrix was in a miserable plight, and the evidence disclosed anything but a flattering state of morality at Lyell. There waa, perhaps, to those who like nasty things, a spice of grim humour iv the evidence given, but we confess it, and that without shame, t hat the sight of an abandoned wretched woman, standing in the dock, causes far other feeliDgs iv our mind but pleasure, and could some of those gay young women who throng the streets of Melbourne, Syduey, and Wellington, but see themselves 20 years hence, standing trembling before a a judge, we should have fewer of them outcasts on the outlying goldficlds. The Sydney correspondent of a Hobart Town paper tells the following in all earnestness:—"A gentleman who had a fancy fish pond in his ground wondered how ie happened that though he continually replenished it with gold and silver fish, Irs finny treasures were for ever disappearing. He came to the conclusion that midnight robbers deprived him of his treasures, and he resolved to watch from a secret place of observation. He did sc and wben all was hushed and still, the house cat was seen gliding down to his pond. After scratching up some worms she dangled them over the water, and when the nibblers fastened on them she clawed them up and devoured a very comfortable supper. This ancedote is no traveller's invention, but a real fact." The Dunedin Star says : — The present Government have very wisely availed themselves of the services of Colonel Scratchier, and there is little doubt that his report with legard to the best system of defending the seaports from foreign aggression will prove most valuable. Anything more absolutely imbecile than the conduct of the Grey Ministry in tbis matter can be imagined. They first insulted Sir William Jervois and Lord Normanby over the affair, and then got into a funk and ordered any number of big guns from England, which, on arrival, they had not the remotest idea what to do with. So the guns, fittings, and ammunition were all stowed away " higgiledypiggledy " in sheds and stores, aud would, we suppose, have been returned as assets wben their finance had brought the Colony to bankruptcy. The A». Z. Times says : — " The keenness with which work that does not require much skill is now takf-n up has just received a striking illustration. Mr Gear, of this city, invited tenders for cutting a drain about a mile in length at Otaki, the work including the removal of about 4000 cubic yards. No less thau sixty-five tenders were received, some of them being for tho whole of the contract aud others for sections. The number of men represented by these tenders was 600, or more than would be required to do tbe work in a day. The locality is over I fifty miles from the city.?' {

A correspondent, writing to a contemporary, says, a, residence at White Island ••tires rheumatism, one dip in the lake curing in acute attack. The air of tbe crater relieves asthma, and tha lake water has rapidly healed cuts, sores, scalds, &c. A among the □ew resident on the Island, the English <parrow must ba included, also the night bird. The pohutakawa grows thickly like very close ti tree, and flax and grass »»rve to complete the flora of the Island. The only living things in the crater are rats but the sea birds frequently resort to the lake, to inhale the i umes perhaps. They stand on its shores, but never venture fo swim upon it. We (Lyttettott Times') have received froifi Messrs Walker^ SraMh/ and Go. a specimen of a pocket handkerchief, tipoil which is a large woodcut illustrative of Lord UeaCohsfield's Ministry. At first sight the woodcut appears simply to be a portrait of the Premier himself, but on a closer examination the picture is found to include a number of semi-concealed faces, some of them beiog excellent likenesses of the statesmen included io the Beaconsfield Ministry. We have not been informed if tbis cluster of political celebrities will stand hot water, accustomed as they should be to it. From Birmingham comes a report which shows a chaDge from the past years of steady and increasing demand from the Australian colonies for English goods (writes the Statist"). It runs as follows : — " The United States markets are taking now many classes of goods which were till lately excluded ; but in other respects our export trade must be reported dull, mainly owing to the depression of the Australian markets. For the nine months ending last September, we exported to those colonies goods valued at only £11,695,000, or If millions sterling less than in the corresponding period last year. Victoria is the chief delinquent, next New South Wales and South Australia. Failures and difficulties among large import houses in Melbourne seem to have been the immediate cause for this check. We have before referred to the reduced supplies of gold sent from Australia this year, ascribing the reduction to tbe tightness of money on that side. Wool and produce on the other hand have come forward as freely as ever, and the recent rise in wool will no doubt have a beneficial effect." DrMaccahe, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin has issued a pastoral upon tbe Irish land agitation to the clergy of the Dublin diocese, in which he says: — •' Unfortunately, men proclaiming their sympathy for the people in their deep distress are going i through the country disseminating doctrines which, pushed to their logical conclusion, must strike at the root of that good faith and mutual confidence which ate the foundations of social life. These doctrines have already produced their evils results. The enemies of our people employ them _as arguments against our ju9t demands for aid , naif-hearted frieuds are driven away in despair; and the real friends of the people are weakened in their advocacy of the rights of the country. If just debts, fairly demanded, be not honestly discharged, a principle fatal to the prosperity of the country will be established, and, sooner or later, it will recoil on the heads of those who to-day may seem to be the gainers by its adoption. In consequence of the poisoning of four men in Melbourne by beer from an unclean bottle, the brewers, as well aa the public, took alarm, and at the invitation of the Brewers' Club, Messrs Blackett, Johnson, Newbery, and Mclvor, chemists, agreed to consult together, with the view of devising the most effectual means of cleansing bottles preparatory to their being used by brewers. Ttie four gentlemen decided on making the following recommendations to tha brewers: — That the bottles should be washed with Ace brushes driven hy steam; that the tv,)ttlra should be washed with a weak soluiiou of muriatic acid and warm water; and that all black aud opaque -bottles— tbat is to my, bottles whose substance is such that no one can tell by visual observation whether or not they are clean— should be rejected. The chemists say that the muriatic acid is quite harmless when used as they suggest. "A Mayo landlord" sends an English contemporary some examples of the secret mtiaiidation which prevails in his country just now. "Every man," he writes, "is afraid of his neighbor : rich and poor, landlord and tenant, priest and people. My rent day came last week, and two tenants paid their rent who had been working for me during the year. A stack of hay belonging to one of them was burned down the same night ; and since then a threatening notice has been stuck up on the chapel door naming each individual, about ten in all, who had paid their rents this year. The general cry is that the people have the money and are ! ready and willing to pay, but that they dare not. Every man of any position has to go armed, and neither landlords nor farmers are happy at being out after nightfall Within seveu miles from where I write there have been one murder and three attempts of murder, and I do not think I am wrong in stating that every landlord and large farmer in the barony has received one or more threatening letters within the last few months." A Melbourne correspondent of the Otago Timet gives the following illustrations of how Protection works in Victoria : — " The absurdities of the system would be amusing vf ere it not so expensive — it is no laughing matter being robbed At every change of the tariff (always to increase duties) there is a rush of manufacturers with petitions for increased protection, and the complications are somewhat very peculiar. Every industry must have its raw material admitted free, of course ; but, as the raw material of one trade is the product of another, there are always fierce objectors. For instance, the curriers applied for a duty on calfskins, and the bootmakers objected, as it was their raw material, and the trade could not stand it ; the coachbuilders applied for a duty of 50 per cent — they got 25 percent — but strongly objected to a solitary axlemaker being protected ; they stated they dii not see why they should carry them on their backs. Again, the saddlers said their duty would be of n v> use were a duty granted to a treeinakei. Aud so the game goes on, and no one thinks of the consumer, who carries them all on his back." The Grey River Argus is responsible for the following : — The Lady-mayoress at Duckpuddle had first seen the light in tbe great turf district of Ballybogfir. When her worthy husband became a Borough Councillor she held her ample chin an inch higher; when he reached the mayoral chair, she cut the hucher's wife, and took a high tone with the maidof:all-work; but when the admirable law officers of the Crown gazetted him to the magistracy her cup was full. To mark ber advance in the social »tatus she resolved to pay a ceremonial visit io the lady who presided over the domestic concerns of the archdeacon. Barricaded in stiff silk, she sallied forth upon her enterprise. The day was in temperature like any day this week, and the mayoress had placed her new visiting card for safety inside the glove which encased her plump hand. When she arrived at the archdeacon's door, she released with difficulty the varnished pasteboard. Alas ! tbe dye of a green glove had hopelessly disfigured it. The mayoress made one effort to remove the smear with hersleeves and then said to the parlour maid on the doorstep, "You'll just have to take it as it is, bad luck to it.. Shure, after all, it's only a little clean perspiration," Only the Jast word was shorter,

Jim Smith was a noted auctioneer. One da_Lbe was. selling* farm stock. Among the articles he sold was a heifer, very attractive in her appearance, and consequently Jim dwelt extensively on her many excellences, winding up with the eloquent flourish that she was " gentle as a dove." Thereupon a long, slab-sided countryman, whose legs were some inches longer than his trousers, approached the heifer, and, stooping down, commenced handling her teats. Bes y, uot relishing so much familiarity, lifu-a her hoofs, and laid " Greeny " sprawling some ten feet off. " There," said Jim, " that shows one of her best traits ; she'll never allow a strange calf to come near her." " Greeny " meanwhile picked himself up, and giving his busy pate a harrowing scratch, exclaimed — " No wonder when her owu calf has been bleating around her all day '*" An article in the Lyttelton Titles on .domestic life in America thus describes our American Cousin : — The American is singularly good natured. He keeps bis temper under very trying circumstances. He suffers without complaint, delays and inconveniences tbat would put an Englishman first into a towering passion and subsequently, as he grew calmer, into the notion of writing down his grievances to the Editor of the Times. The American stands unruffled amidst many petty annoyances, or he sets to work as vigorously as he can to remove them. If an evil cannot be avoided, he grins and bears it without troubling his neighbours with his sentiments thereon. It must be something exceptionally startling that will take him by surprise. He is by no means of a serious temperament. The spirit of unrest is strong within him, but his strivings are mainly after the attainable and they are often successful, the influences upon his nature are in the direction of calmness and cheerfulness. It is a difficult matter to throw him into a passion, but he has the faculty of saying biting things which are very apt to kindle a great blaze of wrath in the man he bandies words with, unless that man be of the same peculiar character as himself, in which case what both say is not half so severe in spirit as it apparently sounds. The cause of the success of the American in business is no secret. It is brought about by meeting every possible demand ; and then by watchfulness, or ingenuity, or importunity, creating a demand where none before existed. If the public will not come to him to buy, he will go to the public, and he will strive as best as he may to furnish what the public are likely to be tempted to purchase. J m.\ • 'i, ii i in i i i.i „ j . ...j.. ■■.!-