Untitled

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5391, 8 July 1878, Page 2

A meeting of the Underwriters’ Association was hold on Saturday afternoon in connection with the stranded ship Hydrabad, when it was decided to call for tenders for salving the hull, gear, fittings, and cargo of the ship. An advertisement referring to this will bo found in another column.

The nisi print sittings of the Circuit Court will commence this morning. There are several special jury oases on the list, os will be seen elsewhere - .

The Colonial Museum was opened yesterday afternoon for the first time on Sunday, and the result waa that between the hours of 2 aud 4 p.m. 700 persons visited tho institution. From the moment tho doors were opened there ensued a continuous stream of visitors, and shortly after three o'clock the Museum was so crowded as to render it a matter of some difficulty to get round the various passages. There was a policeman on duty inside tho building, but tho office was quite - a sinecure, as no one attempted to interfere’with any of tho objects on vievri Amongst those present there was a large'proportion of people who had never .been in tho Museum before, and they evinced a great deal of interest in what they saw there. .Wo have been requested to state that in future visitors should not bring dogs or walking sticks with them, and it is very necessary this rule should be strictly observed, in order to prevent damage being -done to anything inside tho building. The attendance yesterday afternoon goes, to prove that the opening of the Museum on Sunday afternoons is appreciated by tho public ; and we have no doubt that during the summer months the hours of closing will have to be fixed at five o’clock instead of four. ' i

Some members of the local committees of the Wellington schools.are arranging to have the Standard prizes won,by scholars during the last three years presented publicly. : It they succeed biis Excellency tho. Governor will be requested to mako. the presentations.

In another column will be found the weights declared for the Melbourne Cup. ■ Miv Lawson, the Commissioner of Railways for the North Island, is expected to arrive in Wellington to-day. It is said that the New Guinea expedition will leave. Wellington on or about the Ist of August.

Mr. Sothern is about to proceed to Auckland, to fulfil, au engagement under Mr. De Lias.

The annual meeting of the parishioners of St, Paul’s, Thorndon, is. called for Tuesday, 16th inst., at 8 o’clock, at the Sjdney-street schoolroom.

Tenders are invited by Mr. Thomas Turnbull, architect, for the erection- of offices on Lambton-quay for the Colonial Bank of New Zealand.

It is probable that one of the next matches at football will be between a team chosen from the past and present pupils of the Wellington College, and one picked from all others.

The second officer of the Firth of Forth, who is suspected of lunacy, was arrested on Saturday night, and will be brought up at the Resident Magistrate’s Court this morning. A meeting of the Teachers’ Association was held in the Thorndon school-house on Saturday, Mr. Mowbray in the chair. No business of any importance was transacted, and the meeting was adjourned to next Saturday.

A Mr. George Gall has left £IOO intrust to the Mayor of Melbourne, the interest of which is to be devoted to the purchase of silver cups to be competed for in swimming by natives of Victoria under fourteen years of age. The Wanganui Education Board have agreed to accept one-third of the grant of £556 7s. made to the Provincial District of Wellington for public libraries. The Wellington Education Board will remit the amount at once.

Mr. Alexander Oliver, lately examiner of titles in New South Wales,’has been appointed Parliamentary draftsman, at a salary of£looo a year. It would be well if such an officer were appointed for this colony. His,Excellency Sir William Jervois returns to South Australia by the s.s. Lusitania. His son, a -lieutenant iu the Royal Engineers, will act as his aide-de-camp; and Mr. Snow, a barrister, as private secretary. It is stated in the Australasian that Mr. Warner, private secretary to the Governor of South Australia, returns to England, having received a requisition to coutest the borough of Leicester iu the. Conservative interest.

The directors of the Theatre Royal contemplate carrying out extensive additions and alterations at an early date. They have, therefore, resolved on issuing 2500 more shares at 30s. each, and it is said no difficulty whatever will be experienced in disposing of them. The trial of Laurence Salmon, for fraudulent bankruptcy, was resumed in the Supreme Court on Saturday, and lasted until a quarter to 11 p.m. The case for. the Crown having closed, Mr. Barton made a most able address to the jury on behalf of the prisoner, and afterwards called several witnesses, who deposed as to the good character borne by the accused. Mr. Izard then replied on the part of the Crown, and his Honor having summed up with great care, the jury retired to consider their verdict. Shortly after ten o’clock his Honor sent for the jury, and informed them that he would remain in Court until midnight, after which hour he could not take a verdict until Monday, and in the meantime the jury would of course have to be looked up. The foreman (Mr. Moule) informed his Honor that when the jury were sent for they were on the point of. coming' to ■ a conclusion, and he did not think they would require many minutes more to arrive at a verdict. The jury then retired to their room, and at sixteen minutes to eleven o’clock returned into Court. On being asked if they had arrived at a verdict, the foreman replied in the affirmative, and when further asked by the DeputyRegistrar if they had found the prisoner guilty or not guilty, Mr. Moule replied “Not guilty.” The prisoner was immediately released from custody, and received the congratulations of several friends on leaving the dock. There was a considerable, number of persons in Court and within its precincts during the retirement of the jury, and those of a sportive turn of mind laid several wagers as to the result of the ,trial. Mr. Franqis Sidey held a sale of freehold properties on Saturday, which was fairly attended. The first lot offered was a property in Leeds-street, 35ft. by 63ft., .with two cottages erected thereon, and was purchased by Mr. Macaulay for £3OO. A six-roomed house in John-street, with a frontage of 50ft. by 120 ft. to Hanson-street, fell to the bidding of Mr. O, Cowan at £5lO for the freehold; and Mr. Iremonger became the purchaser of 53 acres of land in Alfredtown at £2 16s. per acre. A property.in Martin-street, 32ft., by 74ft, was bought in at £7OO, the ground having two sixroomed houses built upon it; and a freehold in Abel Smith-street, 40ft. by 74ft, was knocked down at £9-15s. per foot frontage, but the buyer not being ablß to pay the deposit required, the property is now open for sale by private contract. Williairf O'Connor will be brought up for sentence in the Supreme Court to-day. From inquiries made, we find that the prisoner was very ranch surprised at the result of the trial. He vehemently protests that he is an innocent man, and ever since the verdict he has been terribly downcast, and has eaten and slept but little. His wife and family are at Patea, residing there with an uncle. Witnesses will be called to-day to speak as to the prisoner’s good character, and to prove also that he would have left for Patea on the day before the alleged offence was committed, had the steamer not been detained. A contemporary having miareported what the prisoner said in the dock on Friday morning last, the public have been led to expect some sensational statement from him when he comes up this morning to receive sentence, but in this respect they will probably suffer some little disappointment. O’Condor declares that he did not put the poison in the glass, and does not know how it got there. With regard to the verdict, it should be said that there exists a considerable diversity of opinion as to whether the circumstantial nature of the evidence, and the absence of motive, were not sufficient to create a doubt of which the prisoner should have reaped the advantage and been acquitted, on'the principle .that it is better to allow fifty guilty men to escape than hang an innocent man. The maximum punishment for a crime such as that of which O’Connor has been found guilty is penal servitude for life.

From the balance-sheet of St. Paul’s Church, Thomdon, it appears that during the year end-" ing 30th June satisfactory progress has been made financially, the general offertories being £ll3 in excess of those of last year. It will be necessary, however, for the parishioners to give even more liberally to meet the extra expenditure occasioned by the appointment of Archdeacon Thorpe as assistant curate, which no doubt they will do, seeing it is quite impossible for one clergyman to do' the work of this important parish. The debt upon the church has been reduced from £I4OO to £llOO, a sura of no less than £3OO having been paid off duriug the past year. Archdeacon Thorpe will arrive in Wellington during the coming week, and will at once enter upon his duties. He will ho a great acquisition to the parish of St. Paul’s, 'which is to be congratulated upon the appointment. The amount received for the past year from general offertories was £7BB 15s. 9d.j special offertories, £236 lid.; seat: rents, £420 Is. Id; and sundries,' £2l 3a. 4d. Tile ordinary expenditure was £607 -17 s. 6d.; variable expenditure, £lB5 10s. 6d.; and special expenditure, £702 3s. 2d. The total liahibities were set down as £1132 10a. Id., and the assets, as seat rents in arrears, £95 Iss, 6d., and.cash, £ls 15s. 7d.; total, £lll 11s. Id. The church and other buildings and property do not seem to bo included in the assets.

There, was a very good attendance at.the Theatre Royal on Saturday night on the occasion of the re-appearance of tho Royal Marionettes. The performances commenced with songs, dances, &0., by the Christy Minstrels, which pleased the audience greatly, much of the nigger business being exceedingly well done by the figures, or, more correctly speaking, by tho wire pullers behind the scenes. The “Animated Skeleton,” a novelty, is a cleverly contrived automaton, and the tricks played with it, as a whole, and piece-meal, made most of the spectators exceedingly puzzled to know how it was all done. Several of the other figures danced and performed skilfully. The fairy pantomine, “Little Bed Riding Hood, or the Wicked Wolf aud the Good Grandmother,” always takes well, and on Saturday night both old and young folks were astonished at .the tricks played by the clown and pantaloon, the constable, tho dog,the bull, the double-headed horse, and above all by the balloon ascent and the descent of .the clown and his partner, while the children were delighted with Little Red Riding Hood and the good fairy. The way the. wolf wagged his tail always caused a burst of, laughter. The Marionettes appear to-night.

A special telegram to the Melbourne Argus, dated London, June 26, says :—“ The colossal statue of Captain Cook, by Foley, ordered for Sydney, was erected on a temporary pedestal to-night in front of the Athenaeum Club House iu Pall Mall.” , , . A meeting of civil servants will he held at the Royal Hotel this afternoon at half-past 4 o’clock, to consider what steps should be taken with respect to recent cases of misconduct on the part of some clerks employed in the Government Buildings. From 1873* to 1877 inclusive about forty million feet of timber have been cut by sawmillers out of the Southland forests, while but £4878 lias been returned to the State. The royalty (says the Dunedin Star ) charged is unquestionably too light.

At the examination for teachers held at Greytown by the Rev. Mr. Knell on behalf of the Wellington Education Board; there were six candidates for third class certificates, and sixteen who were either pupil teachers or candidates for that appointment. Mr. Frederick Jagerhorn has written to the Wellington Education Board, stating-that he was chairman of a meeting held at Maurioeville, at which the following members of the local school committee were elected:—Messrs. Henry Aulin, Jons Jepsen, Gander Gunderson, Nicolai Jensen, Ole Mortensen, Hans Larsen, and Jens Peter Peterson.

Shortly before 9 o’clock last evening au alarm of fire was raised at. Moore's diningroom, Willis-street. Au immediate rush was made up-stairs, and, it was found that »ne'of riie bedrooms was on fire. Several buckets of water were procured, and the flames were quenched before any very considerable damage was done. Had the discovery of fire been a few minutes later, there is no knowing what serious consequences would have ensued. In the case of Regina v. Salmon, tried on Saturday, a witness named William Bowden, employed in some capacity in the Resident Magistrate’s Court, was called, and stated that he had prepared a deed of dissolution of partnership between prisoner and bis partners. It appeared witness had received 80s., which he swore was for his time, not payment for set - vices in drawing the deed. When the witness was leaving the box the Chief Justice said; “I do not think ! should be doing my duty unless I expressed publicly my surprise on the one hand that members of the community should entrust to persons like this witness or to any person other than a skilled conveyancer the drawing of an instrument such as a dissolution of partnership ; on the other hand, I must express my astonishment that persons like this witness should venture, in defiance of the law, to prepare documents which the Legislature has declared shall be drawn only by properly qualified and . skilled conveyancers. I should add that the object of the Legislature is to ensure that persons employed by the public iu such matters shall be not only skilled but trustworthy.” Mr. Bartou said Mr.’Kennedy Macdonald seemed to take a different view from that expressed by his Honor. The Legislature* allowed anybody, whether skilled or not, to get a license to do conveyancing under the Land Transfer Act, which will be ultimately the whole conveyancing of the country. Ho didn’t see the diffei-eno between those agents and the present instance.' At a committee meeting of the Ballarat Juvenile Industrial Exhibition, held recently, it was stated that the balance at thebank was £2466 accounts amounting to £IOO or £l5O had to be paid, and about £IOO was due to the committee. It had been proposed to apply the money in hand to founding an Industrial Museum. During the exhibition . season 50,000 persons travelled by rail to Ballarat, and a like number from it. The distance travelled by excursion trains was 19,000 miles, and the gross receipts amounted to £4300, an average of ss. lOd. per train mile. The railway authorities are confident that this sum paid expenses, and left a sufficient balance to cover all wear and tear, a result that is somewhat astonishing when it is known that the charge per ’ head for children was only one shilling each, for which fare juveniles were carried from the most distant parts of the colony. This exhibition has been a most complete success in every, particular ; it is sure to be followed by others on a similar plan, held in some of the other principal cities of Australia, and why not iu New Zealand ? Shortly after seven o'clock on Thursday night the police received notice that a man was lying dead on the railway near the Lyttelton- Itunuel. A constable was at once dispatched to the, spot, when he found that John O’Conuell, master of the schooner Josephine, was the unfortunate man. Deceased had his .skull broken on the left side, and his left arm very much crushed. He had been seen attempting to get into the 5.45 train while it was in motion, at the Heathcote, Valley station, at a distance of about 150 yards from where his body was found on the arrival of the 6.20 train. The body was brought into town by the 8.30 train, and conveyed to the morgue at the hospital. Deceased, who was apparently between fifty and sixty years of age, is believed to have a wife and family at the Thames.

Mr. 0. Reid, the Secretary of the Melbourne Cricket Club, has received a letter from Mr. I. D. Walker, to the effect that he would be able to bring out to Australia twelve gentlemen players by. the October mail, to .play a series of matches in the colonies. It is proposed to play the first match on Boxing Hay, on the Melbourne Cricket Club ground. The following is a probable list of the team Messrs. B. O. Walker, I. D. Walker, Lord Harris, A. N. Hornby, A. P. Lucas, 0. A. Absolom, F. Penn, T. S. Pearson, G. H. Longman, A. J. Webbe. Two places are kept open, as Mr. Walker is anxious to secure two fast bowlers. It does not appear that any of the Graces will bo included, and this will of course be greatly regretted. Some time ago the constituency of Clare elected Sir Bryan O’Loghlen to represent them, the seat having been rendered vacant by the death of his father. The electors seem to have taken it for granted that Sir Bryan, who was a barrister in Melbourne, would at once return to the old coontry and take his seat ;■ but instead of doing that, he went into Victorian politics, and is now Attorney-General of that colony. The Australasian publishes the following extract from a letter from London, referring to the strange condition of things which has arisen ;—“ There is considerable difficulty about -declaring Sir Bryan O’Loghlen's election void or voidable. He is not a member of Parliament, never having taken ‘ the oath and his seat,' and the House even by a ‘ call' has no control over him. He cannot resign a membership for which ha never qualified, and therefore never possessed. He cannot vacate his seat by the fiction of taking office as 1 Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds,’ for he has no seat to vacate. The’high sheriff, as returning officer of Clare, has no authority to recall his certificate of election, aud the electors are wholly powerless in the premises. It is the opinion in well-iniormed quarters here that nothing can ' cook the fish' but a general election—and that we shall have probably ere long. There are wise . heads, however, in council, and some means may be devised by the time of Parliament re-assembling to restore to Clare the constitutional rights of fall representation." “A recent Alsatian journal,” observes the Globe, “ contains an account of somo ironplated defences which are about to he installed at Strasburg by the German commandant. If the opinion which the Prussian military authorities have formed of the constructions is well founded, it may ho expected that they will come much into fashion in many parts of the world, os .indeed they have already done in some of the more important modern German strongholds. The idea is to carry into the fortification of towns that principle which* has been worked out with such important results at sea, and to erect, in point of fact, ironclad “ turrets ” exactly similar to those with which ships of war are fitted. The new scheme has not, of course, been yet tested in actual warfare, but experiments are said to have been made with the most successful results at jponje of the German military centres, aud at Metz and other places the new forts have been permanently erected. They can be made either on a stationary plan, with embrasures an-augod in the most convenient positions, or so as to revolve by the aid of machinery, directing the fire of the single big gun within at the pleasure of the garrison,' and it is the latter system which finds most favor with the engineers of Strasburg and Berlin. If nothing should occur to shake their confidence, the iron forts will soon become the rage, and the critics will.begin to laugh at the old defences of stone fronted with iron, which still make an important part of the defences both of Oonstadt and Portsmouth. With regard to the .latter places, they would naturally be the first to adopt the new system of protection, inasmuch as it would be comparatively, easy to transfer the big guns from them to war vessels, or vice versa, white' the land turrets, being arranged on very much the same system as those of the navy, would not make bad schools of instruction and practice iu time of peace or war." , , i .

There was a very good attendance at the Imperial Opera House on Saturday night. The curtain rose "to “ Our Boys,” the entertainment concluding with the burlesque of “Aladdin.” Judging from the heartiness and frequency of the applause, both pieces appeared to give great satisfaction to the audience. Tlie proprietors of the Sydney Hail. have offered £IOO for the best story written by an Australian author, the competition to be open till the end of the year. No doubt the word Australian! might be interpreted as Australasian, and the competition extended to New Zealand, authors.

The Dunedin Star says When Mr. Beetham, R.M., was transferred to Napier from the Lakes, the Queenstown people made him a presentation of a very handsome clock. Mr. Kohu, of Dunedin, from whom it was obtained, considering that he has waited long enough for payment, has issued a summons against Mr. H. J. Finn, of Queenstown, through whom the order .came, for the value of the clock.