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Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 9 October 1880, Page 2

A discussion which took place the meeting of the School Committee last evening upon that portion of the report of tlie Hector of the District High School announcing that he had started a speoial class for those pupils who have passed .the highest standard provided for, brought once more to light the anomalous position which the High School occupies. Endowed with the proud title of High School, it is in reality little different from a common public school. The only actual point of distinction lies ip the simple fact that the Education Act provides that the higher branches of education may he taught in the District High School; but while the Act thus contemplates the imparting of instruction in the higher branches of learning, it makes the teaching of primary subjects imperative, and fails entirely to make any provision for the performance of the additional work which the teaching of the higher branches entails. Tims it will Tie seen that instead of the District High School in reality an institution wherein the teaching of the higher subjects is the first consideration, it is for all practical purposes as much an educational nurserv as any of the common public schools known by less high-sounding and 1 empty titles. Instead of being a finishing : school, receiving pupils who have passed through the ordinary schools, it is reduced " to their level, and the education of infants is in regard to it made as imperative as in the case of the ordinary schools. No provision is made for the additional work, and no higher standard of efficiency is insisted upun in the selection of teachers. True, in many cases .the applicants for appointment to district high schools are 1 teachers of superior attainments, who are induced to seek appointment in the hope that their sphere of labor will be more elevated. That hope, however, as we have seen, is delusive, for thp sanje routine has to be gone through, with the addition of greater labor. The district high schools are simply primary schools, endowed with high-sounding but empty titles, and the teaching within them of the meanest branches of pdupation is imperatively demanded by the AGt as the first ponaidepation. This was the ground taken up by several members of the Committee last evening. "While admiring the energy displayed tjy Mr. Peattie in seeking to raise the status of his school and make it in reality what it is now only in name, they were unable to entirely concur in the step which he proposes to take, because they felt that the imposition of the additional work must, at any rate, have a damaging effect upon the ordinary standards of the school. Thus it was ch.Vt tljp Qqmmittee, while approving of the principle of forcing an additional class, avoided entirely adopting the course proposed by the Rector, and added a special suggestion that the greatest care should be taken to secure efficiency in the regular standards. To Mr. Peattie, whose aim is the higl}J7 praiseworthy one of progression, this respiutiou pari not prove entirely satisfactory, but, if it occasions tq him any disappointment, to the Education Act, and not to the Committee, must he attribute the fault. The Committee, as was shown by the suggested amendments in the Education Act forwarded to the Government prior to last session, fully recognises the desirableness of provision being made for raising the class of education imparted in the District High Schools to a standard more in consonance with their titl.es. Wo can only regret that those amendments yrepp jiqi, given efjept tq, and that a wet blanket should be qast upon energy such as that displayed by Mr. Peattie.

Business is 'wearing a more hopeful aspect. Money is grpiying in pre plentiful What is now necessary to accelerate our recovery to a healthy commercial state is tho restoration of confidence. That will be coincident with the influx of qapital, A Dunedin commission agent has written in the following strain to another gentleman in a similar line: —"The quantity of money offering for investment is almost certain to send shares up. An agent just returned from Melbourne informs me that heaps of money are offering there at 5h per cent., and that the rate will be yet lower immediately." Captain Edwin telegraphs to-day :—lndications are for the glass falling within twelve hours, and strong winds between north-east and north and west after that time. A man named Michael Crowley, who neglected to answer a sumpions at Geraldine, chafgipg him with having assaulted one Patrick Cronin on tlie 24th June, has been arrested at Duntroon by Constable Livingstone, and was brought into town yesterday

The nomination of candidates for the seat oil Waitaki Road Board for the Papakaio sub-division, rendered vacant by the death of Mr. Smillie, took place yesterday, and resulted in the election of Mr. Richard Wilson, unopposed. In the civil case S. Lintern v, T. Falconer, heard'at the R.M. Court yesterday, being a claim for labor for the erection of a concrete' tank and fence, judgment was given for defendant with L2.4s costs. ' ■ * ' Theßailway Department have made special train arrangements in connection with the Waitaki Jockey Club's races, to be held at Duntroon on the 14th and 15th instant. Full particulars, are given in J our : advertising columns. The Hampden School Committee have arranged to hold a concert in aid of the school funds on the 12th November next. This timely notice is given with the object of preventing a clashing of dates. To-morrow sermons will be preached ,in Wesley Church in aid of the Sabbath School, and on Monday evening a public meeting on behalf of the New Zealand Wesleyan Home Mission Fund will be held. At the Resident Magistrate's Court to-day, John Sullivan was charged with having stolen L 6 10s from a room in Ross' Hotel, Upper Waitaki, and was remanded until Monday. Five little children, named E;ent, arrived by the steamer Grafton this morning en route from Grey mouth to the Dunedin Industrial School. The father of the children shot himself some time since, and their mother afterwards took up her residence on the Seventeen Mile Beach, leading a life of degradation in a small tent with her five children. The woman was eventually sent to gaol for vagrancy, and the children have been added to the Industrial School as neglected children. They will be forwarded to Duuedin on Monday, It ought to be more generally known (says the Sydney Mail) that wheat flour is the best article to throw over a fire caused by the spilling and igniting of kerosene. Mr. John Dillon, M.P. for Tipperary, speaking at a laud meeting at Kildare, said :—" As soon as the Land League had 300,000 men enrolled they be able to strike against rent entirely if their demands were not granted, aud all the arms in England would not be a.ble to levy rent in Ireland. They would have a Coercio.n Act, ant] ftey could go put ajiy hour qf fhe night tliey pleased and carry rifles with them," Que §eldom hears of a postal official turning both dootor and preacher. This, however, appears to have been the case in regard to a Mr. Cecil Biss, who, a few years ago, was an officer in the New Zealand Postal Service. This gentleman has now a good practice in England as a physician, He aiqp a "vypll ' and during the intervals of business ' preaches in various parish churches in the : neighborhood of London, i The finale, to the nor'wester we experienced ; during the early part of the week and which threatened rain, but passed over to.wn, gave to the Waimate district a splendid shower, | accompanied by vivid liglitning and heavy ; thunder. The rain has. made the country : around Waimatefresh and green and the early 1 crops of young wheat are looking in capital : condition. Messrs. Studholrfie Byos, }iave put ' about 5000 acres this year in wheat, and . laid down about the same quantity in Eng- . lish grass on last year's stubble, which will [ make about 15,000 acres of this splendid • estate in grass.—Lyttelton Times. ; J. M. Perrier, the "Intelligent Vagrant," . is now editing a paper called the Central Australian. He appears to have created some little stir by his advent, which the ; Barym Aygijs, tlie.riyftl journal, did not relish, So, for the benefit of the supporters of the opposition journal, it amuses itself by revealing a page of history which must be eminently cheering to the genial "Vagrant:"—"The Central Australian since its establishment has had more than one editor from Sydney for each year of its existence—journalistic; etiquette prevents our naming thern—who have each started with the idea that their Heaven mission was to utterly re-model everything within the radius of the circulation of their paper. Sad has been the fate of the majority : Four are dead, two got into gaol, another into an inebriate's retreat, another turned policeman, another baker, and of the remaining two, one stjll follows the profession, and the other does not. It is to be hoped the present holder of the office may be spared a similar fate." Tobacco, like those who smoke it (remarks an English paper) is credited with many sins ox which it is guiltless. The "loss of healtl} " go oftep laijl qt its do,or is probably due in many instances not to tobacco itself, but to some villainous compound bearing its name. A story told by the principal of the laboratory ef the Inland Revenue Department in his report for the past year shows how easily this may happen. The supervisor at Birmingham, observing that an article was being sold at a very cheap rate in packets, under the name of " smoking mixture," sent a sample to the Inland Revenue laboratory for examination, anc] it being found tp ooutajn a large proportion of vegotable matter resembling the broken-up heads of camomile flowers, further inquiry led to the discovery of the manufactory. The process of manufacture consisted in exhausting the bitter principle of camomile flowerwith water, and then dyeing and sweetening them with a solution of logj wood and liquorice, whioh brought them, when dried, somewhat to the color of tobacco. The heads, when broken up, were then mixed ■with from 20 to 30 per cent, of cut tobacco, according to the price at which , the mixture was to be sold. The mixture was supplied to retailers in packets labelled " The New Smoking Mixture, Analysed and Approved}'' £p4 as agencies had already been established in several towns, an extensive trade would no doubt soon have arisen had the manufactory not been suppressed at an early stago of its existence.

Cast iron is nov in such general use. that ope might be apt to imagine tlia,t it. had never been but Tttpsy " ftad growed" Cast iron was riot however in commercial use before the year 170Q, when Abraham Darby, aii intelligent mechanic, who had brought some Dutch workmen to establish a brass foundry at Bristol, conoeived the idea that iron might be substituted for brass. This his workmen did not succeed in effecting, being probably too much prejudiced in favor of the metal with which they were best acquainted. A Welsh shepherd boy named John Thomas had some little time previous to this been received by Abraham Darby into his workshop on the recommendation of a distant relative. Whilst looking on during the experiments of the Dutch workmen, he said to Abraham Darby that he thought he saw where he had missed it. He begged to be allowed tq so he and Abraham Darby remained alone in the workshop all night struggling with the refractory metal and imperfect moulds. The

hours passed on, and daylight appeared, but neither would leave his task, and just as the morning dawned they succeeded in casting an iron pot complete. The boy entered into an agreement with Abraham Darby to serve him and keep the secret. He was enticed by the offer of -double wages to leave his master, but he continued faithful, and from 1709 to 1828 the family; of Thomas were confidential and. much valued agents to the descendants of Abraham Darby. From some correspondence which has taken place between Commissioner Sperry and the Nelson Permanent Building Society (says the Wairarapa Standard), it would j appear that there is likely to be trouble between such associations and the Land Tax Department. The return made by the Nelson Society has been challenged by the Commissioner, on the ground that the Society's assets and liabilities have not been treated in ' the same way as those of an ordinary trading, company, the directors considering that the value of each subscriber's interest is a legitimate deduction, whereas the Commissioner insists that nothing shall be taken off except what is due due to persons outside the Society. The Colonist put the case thus :—The Commissioner, in" a. genuine official spirit, is determined to obtain as large a yield as possible from the tax he is appointed to manage, and treats Building Societies, as companies "formed "wholly or mainly for the purpose of gain or profit divisible amongst the shareholders," On the other hand it is contended that as the Building Societies Acts both here and in England. class them as Friendly Societies, imposing restrictions that materially lessen the possible profits, and granting privileges no one would dream of conferring on trading companies, no return can properly be called for of the funds a3 a whole, but that each person concerned should include the value of his interest in his statement of the personal property belonging to him. Mr.. Sperry, however, insists on dealing with, a Building Society as "a Joiflt Stock Company," though he must be well a,wftre that it in no sense conges \inder the laws affecting that class of associations,, while thedireotors submit "that the. sjbares held by members are in almost the same relative position as they would be were their amount placed as fixed deposits ill a bank, seeing that any shareholder may withdraw the amount of his deposits at any time by giving one month's notice of his indention to do so." The directors of the Society refuse to comply with Mr. Speryy'a request, which in their case involves fhe payment of the tax on the sun} of L2i,350.