AUCKLAND.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 69, 28 March 1843, Page 2

AUCKLAND.

(From the Auckland Times.) The Government brig Victoria returned on Saturday last, conveying, to the place which the Colonists hope will never be his official home, the Governor and his suite. The dumb policy is continued, and we at this moment can report nothing more significant than that Captain Nagle cannot agree with Lieutenant Shortland, and that the brig recurs to the mastership of her old and respected commander, Captain Richards. We call the attention of the Police and the Bank Directors to the practice of defacing the coin in circulation, a practice which is increasing daily; every second or third shilling or sixpence one is lucky enough to get hold of in these hard times, has a hole punched through it; but that is not all—a good per centage is taken off the weight by the process. It will no doubt be very readily suggested that the Maories do this, to make for themselves decorations, for their ears and noses. We doubt this very much; we suspect that the practice of Petticoat-lane has more to do with the matter than any blanket fashion. Whether this supposition is well or ill-founded, a remedy ought to be applied to the matter. It would be well for the bank and the public to refuse to take the sweated silver—and we think the editor of the Maori Gazette should apprize his readers of the illegality of the act of defacement.

Serious Accident. —At the Saw-mills of Messrs. Heale and Co., Manukau, at 8 o’clock on Tuesday morning last, one of the natives employed in bringing fire-wood for the engine, was passing through the mill; he had to pass under a revolving shaft, and in doing so he placed his hand, in which he held the corner of his blanket, upon the shaft—his blanket became entangled, his arm was twisted round the shaft, and eventually torn from his body before the engine could be stopped. He was immediately conveyed to Auckland under charge of the superintendent, where medical attendance was promptly procured, and it is thought that he will survive the injury. (From, the Auckland Chronicle.) Unclaimed Letters. —The last Government Gazette contains a list of nearly six hundred unclaimed letters, now lying at the General Post-Office, Auckland. The printed list is posted near the. letter-box, for public inspection. ' Rumored Appointments. —We give it as a rumor that Major Richmond is to be Chief Police Magistrate at Wellington, vice Michael Murphy, Esq., who is to be the Clerk of the

County Court at Russell. The office of Police Magistrate at Nelson, vacant by the, appointment of H. A. Thompson, Esq., to the judgeship of the County Court at that settlement, has not yet been filled up. A dreadful accident occurred at Nelson, on the Bth last, by which a man named Keats lost his life. The party of men engaged on the Haven Road were digging down a portion of the hill near the Custom House, for the purpose of getting material for the surface of this excellent work, when a slip took place, which completely buried Keats, and fell also on two others named Sharman and Mansell. Nearly ten minutes elapsed before Keats could be extricated, when life was found to be extinct. Sharman had the small bone of a leg broken, and Mansell escaped with a sprained ancle. The deceased has left a wife and one child.