The Patea Mail. ESTABLISHED 1875. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 24, 1883. NEWS OF THE DAY.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 988, 24 January 1883, Page 2

The Patea Mail. ESTABLISHED 1875. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 24, 1883. NEWS OF THE DAY.

The Waihi is due from Wellington tomorrow morning, and will, if possible, leave again on the same tide at about 11 o clock. During the .punier ending 31st December there were 7(5 civil cases dealt with at the Patca H.M. Court, the aggregate amounts claimed being £1197 Ms 7d, and amounts for which judgments were given .-£782 17s 2d. Eighteen criminal cases were dealt with, and thirteen distress warrants issued, of which ten were within two miles of the Courthouse.

The following arc the names of the team to represent Patea on Saturday, in the match to be played against Hawero, viz., Messrs' Jacob (captain), Fulton, Read, Doneghue, Jacomb, Taplin Rose, Waite, Tennent, Norman and Dixon. Waitingmen will be chosen if the whole of the team are aot sharp up to time. No official inquiry will be held regarding the burning down of McCarthy’s fellmongery. Two deaths, occasioned by accidents, happened at Havelock yesterday. A man named Maher, succumbed to injuries sustained by a fall of earth, and another named William Davit through falling off a bridge. William Stretch, collector of dog (ax in Wanganui County, while pursuing his rounds on Monday 7 , fell out of the saddle dead. Disease of the heart is the cause alleged. Mr Dale will hold an extensive Property Sale at his mart on Saturday at 1 o’clock. No less than thirteen different lots are advertised. Amongst them are some very desirable properties, both town and suburban. Now is the time to buy, as, when the present dullness has passed off, there is bound to be a re-action, and property will rise again in value. Purchasers at the present time will reap the benefit of (hat. The weak and dangerous condition of the Patea biiclge, will be the means of letting the Council in for serious damages, if it is allowed to remain as at present. The planking in places is quite rotten, and while Mr Sharp was cm ssing it with his express this morning one of his horses put his foot clean through.

There is a large entry 7 for Messrs Nolan and Co.’s sale at Manaia to-morrow-Additional attraction will be found in the announcement that Mr J. Riseley’s thoroughbreds War Eagle, Wcllington2nd, and Essence of Fun will be offered after the cattle. These horses are well known in tlie district, and the Auctioneers should have no difficulty iu quitting them. An important notice of the Borough Council, relating to the valuation list, will be found in another column.

Applications for (ho office of poundkeeper are invited by the Borough Council, Nominations of candidates to represent tlio Otoia Riding on the Harbour Board will be received until noon of Thursday, the Ist -pros. Mr F. R. Jackson will bold a sale at the Kakaramea y’ards on Friday at the usual hour.

We remind subscribers that the annual meeting of the Patca Institute will be hold to-rnorrow evening at 8 o’clock when the annual report and balance-sheet will be submitted.

A painful accident happened to a man named James Kerris on the road to Waitotara, oh Monday evening. He was driving a reaper and binder from Wanganui, and when within a few yards of his destination fell off the seat, and the wheel passed over his right leg. The unfortunate man was kept at Waitotara all night and sent in to Patca by a vehicle yesterday, the journey being an exceedingly trying 0..c for him. His brother went out, on learning of the accident, and accompanied him in. Ken is was taken out at M’Kittrick’s Hotel , and attended by Dr Keating, who pronounced his right leg to be broken. His patient, who has all that thoughtful care and attendance can do, is now progressing favourably.

A little fellow aged five years, son of Captain Webb of Nelson, fell into a well, twenty feet deep a few days ago, and, when discovered, was standing on the bottom with the water up to his chin. On a bucket being lowered to him, he got into it without exhibiting the least fear.

A man named Kenny, who possesses a farm at Mataura, has been arrested in Melbourne, at the instance of his wife, for having deserted her and family, and married a barmaid in Dunedin.

Farmers in the South Island are experiencing great difficulty in obtaining sufficient labour for harvesting. For ordinary harvest work, £3 10s a week and found is being paid.

Messrs Williamson, Garner and Musgrove, of Melbourne and Sydney, arc bringing Ingersoll to the colonies to deliver a scries of lectures. It is stated they offered him — which he has accepted, but is too busy to leave America just yet—£2,ooo for twentyfive lectures. In Chicago Ingersoll had audiences of 2,000 at (Is, 4s, and ,2s each.

A " Celestial Invasion.” so much dreaded a year or two back (says the Evening Post) seems now to have been totally averted. In the year 1882 only 23 Chinese arrived in the colony, while 108 left New Zealand, 92 tor China and 70 for Australian colonies. The arrivals included two women and two children. The departures were all adult males. From these figures it would seem that all danger of the ;< yellow agony ” becoming formidable in New Zealand lias now been effectually removed.

Approbation of the frozen million from New Zealand is now very general at Home. A correspondent sends the Utdyo -Daily Times the following extract from a lady’s letter on the subject. The lady resides in London ;—"We have had a, number of joints of New Zealand mutton, and always try to get it when we have strangers and they all seem charmed with it, and ask us our butcher’s address. It is so fresh-looking that Ido not think the butchers would thank us for telling, as they sell it. I believe, for Is and Is 3d us English, but as Colonial they have to sell it at 8d or S.pl. 1 have a leg of mutton in the house, and as the two Grants, who were with you, are coming to dinner, wo arc going to use it. It was pretty hard when it came, and the fat was as pure aud while, and the flesh as good a colour, us if it had only been kilted a few boars.”

An instance of the fertility of the soil, and the capability of the district in the way of growing grass, came under notice recently when Mr.James Preston, who Ins charge of Mr Joseph Pcott’s farm at Eltham, exhibited -ome cocksfoot no less than eight feet high. The sample was very much admired, and it was not a matter for surprise when Mr Preston said that in sixteen years’ experience of growing and saving grass seed he had seen nothing to equal the Eltham cocksfoot.

The plans for ttie now Courthouse at Hawcra are now completed, and it is expected that tenders will be invited shortly. In the course of hearing of a case at (he R.M. Court on Tuesday a defendant asked a -witness if he had noliced him take a memorandum of a circumstance. Witness said he had seen defendant make a note on In’s shirt, Mr Barton, counsel oh (he other side, asked if the shirt was going to be put in as evidence, but defendant asked to be excused.

The Egmont Jockey Club held a meeting on Saturday when the Secretary (Milk 11. Nolan) reported that the Grand Stand was being well proceeded with and the fencing was finished. A Maori race was added to the programme (which will bo found in another column) and will no doubt prove an additional attraction to an already attractive bill of fare. Our neighbours are teaching us a great lesson by the unanimity with which they work together whether it is for a race meeting, a Court-house, or a railway. Hawera people know how to push their town along.

The Count}' system is not in favour in the Manawatu district, a meeting of ratepayers there having passed resolutions in favour of abolishing (he County and working through the Road Boards.

The Iren Company have made a start with the furnace at the Henui works. The point to be decided, say’s the Herald, is whether the price realised for the metal will repay the cost of producing it. It will probably 7 be necessary 7 for (ho manager to make several experiments before attaining the best method, under existing circumstances, of smelting ; and these preliminaries are expected to take till the end of the week.

According to one of tiio Manawatu papers, mosquitoes are so numerous and persistent in their attacks that some of the workmen employed on the new railway bridge works near Kerere have been fairly driven away.

The projectors of the Egmont Sash and Door Factory, Hawera, not having sufficient capital to establish branches and carry on the business, a local company is being floated to buy and work it. The proposed capital is fixed at £SOOO, in 800 shares of £5 each.

Brevet Major Charles Stapp, New Zealand militia, having been appointed to command the volunteer forces in the White Clifts, New Plymouth, Cape EgLiont, .Pa tea, Waugramii and Xiangfitilcei districts is now making an official tour along the coast. Seigoant Whelan is about to be transferred from Pateo to Taranaki. .

A young man who, a short time ago, was an inmate of the Patea Hospital, and is now employed as cook at the Railway Hotel, narrowly escaped drowning in the river on Monday evening. He stripped on the shipping whaif and plunged into the stream for a swim, but soon became exhausted, and was got out with some difficulty by means of a fishing line which was thrown to him. The fortunate circumstance of assistance being close at hand saved his life.

A find of superior gravel has.been obtained on the Harbour Board property leased by Mr F. O’S. M’Carthy. The correspondence columns of the Wellington papers arc dail} 7 occupied with letters pro and con regarding the curative powers of Mr Milner Stephen, from* those who have been under his treatment Some patients aver that they have derived great relief from him, while others have obtained none. Mr Stephen is a brother of the well-known Mr Justice Stephen, so many years Chief Justice of New South Wales. The Stephen family are noted for their talent. The Chief Justice must be now some 80 years of ago ; his brother probably 70, if not more. The Paris correspondent of the Daily News states that in a conversation he had with the late General Skobeloff, theGenera] said : “ I hale war. On my honour and conscience I detest it. Before God I tell yon that I do. I have had 21,000 men killed under me in one* campaign, and have realised all that is sickening, cruel, odious, atrocious in the military profession. The following mosquito yarn has been going the rounds of the Auckland wharves

during the last few days as having come under the experience of a very well known master mariner, whose veracity no one would doubt, especially as it has boon given as having occurred to himself. The narrator says : —*‘ My vessel sailed into a perfect army of mosquitoes one day when off the coast of Queensland. They wore ravenous from their long flight, and consequently they took complete possession of the vessel and <HI on hom'd. In live minutes they had drawn as much blood as ever an old doctor drew from a fever patient, and within linif-an hour they had succeeded in boring through my oilskin overcoat. 1 was driven almost desperate, and climbed to the maintop, thinking to escape the ferocious animals. You may well understand how glad I was when .1 found they had not got up so far. The first male hailed mo to-know how I was gutting on. 1 called back that the mosquitoes had not got up so Jar as where I was, and therefore told him to come up, and tell the crow to come up as well. This they did, and we stayed aloft all night. When ten o’clock came the cook ventured down, and brought up some victuals, which we wore only to glad to got hold of, being so perfectly weak from loss of blood. About four a.m. a breeze sprang up, and then the mosquitoes left us, aud we ventured on deck.” The following gentlemen have been appointed Superintendent Collectors of Agricultural Statistics within the Counties in the Taranaki Provincial District : —J. H. M. Good, Taranaki ; W. W. Garland, Hawera, Patea, and Wanganui.

There wore twelve new members sworn in to the Patea Rifles last night, which makes a compliment of thirty-six. Seven more members are required to bring the Company up to the minimum strength. A farmer in the Ashburton district drew a £4O cheque recently, for his month’s supply of milk to the local Butter and Cheese Factory. The milk-dealers of London have hit upon an ingenious mode of confounding the analysts. They get a cow which gives milk of,very poor quality, salt its hay, and give it. plenty of water to drink. The consequence is the milk it yields is actually poorer than that which has had 30 per cent of water added. The analyst certifies that the milk sold by Mr So-and-so is adulterated. “ That cannot be,’’ is the answer ; “it is the natural milk of the cow, as can be proved.” The analyst is invited to visit the dairy, or to send a competent assistant to see the cow milked. The lactometer shows that the milk sold is rather better than that drawn from the cow. The analyst cannot understand it at all, and although he suspects that he is jockeyed, he thinks it prudent to abandon the prosecutionEven if the trick were discovered it is hard to say that it involves any illegality, unless it be cruelty to animals. Milk from the cow varies very much in-quality, and there is no law to compel the cows to work up to the analyst’s standard. Mr Black is occasionally addressed, in an old lady’s handwriting, as “ William Black. alias MacVean, Esq... -Reform Club, London.” These letters upbraid him for his ingratitude and want of proper affection in refusing to acknowledge himself her nephew, who was mourned by her as drowned at sea. She, however, happened to read “ A Daughter of Heth,” and she declares that this story contains family revelations that could only have been known to herself and her nephew, and could only have been written by her nephew., A year or two ago Black called upon her in the Highlands. He found her a respectable and fairly educated old lady.' As soon as she knew he had called in answer to her letters, and that he was William Black, she professed to recognise him as her nephew, and offered to get him a watch and some jewellery, which she said had belonged to his mother, and which were at Skye. It was in vain that on the score of age, he pointed out that her identification of him must be a mistake. Her niece coming into the room, Black, on telling me the story, said, “ I felt that now I should be able to put matters straight. If I was the nephew, this was my sister. ‘Surely,’! said, ‘you cannot think I am your brother : he must have been eight or nine years younger than I am, and see, my hair is beginning to turn grey.’ ‘ Ah, but,’ she replied, ‘ I’ve known young men turn grey at a very early age.’ This settled nie and X bolted, X felt that if the entire family had concluded to claim me for the dead nephew, I had better get out of the place quickly, and I did,” This incident is none the less curious that it began before the Tichbovne case, and is kept up by upbraiding letters from 'Mrs MacVean.— Harper's Magazine.

During a thunderstorm on Monday last a valuable horse belonging to Mr B. R. Raird, of Cromwell, Otago, was struck by lightning and killed on the spot. Simultaneously with a flash of lightning the hor=e was seen to jump almost vertically into the air, and fall dead upon the ground. The occurrence was witnessed by several persons, one of whom was unpleasantly near the scene of the accident. There were no marks of violence visible on the horse. While on the subject of thunderstorms (writes a correspondent from Lake County), it may be remarked (hat their occurrence in tin’s district is exceedingly rare, and that during the past week we have had more thunder and genuine lightning than have been experienced here for the last six or seven years put together.

Some of the innocent children of the Flowery Laud who find their way to New Zealand are really enterprising people, and occasionally we find them pushing themselves into positions in which they are least expected to be found. In a case which is to be heard before the next sitting of the Divorce Court in Christchurch, an oblique-eyed, olive comploxioned son of the moon is to appear as co-respondent —a position which ho will doubtless occupy with becoming dignity and pride. This dusky gay Lothario and his vegetable cart are well known in the city and suburbs, and he has now succeeded in making himself of greater curiosity than ever. Husbands beware, for John may come at a time when ye know not, with a cabbage in one baud and his heart in another, lavishing smiles and blandishments which cannot fail to find an echo in susceptible woman’s breast. So, once more, beware of the Mongolian destroyer, and grow your own vegetables

Before Sir William Jervois left for Melbourne en route for New Zealand he was entertained at luncheon at Adelaide on January 5, the Mayor presiding. Members of both Houses, the Press, and the most prominent men in all circles in the Colony wen? present. In reply to tho (oast of in’s health, tho Governor gave a long and interesting speech, in tlie course of which he alluded to the material progress of the Colony since lie took office. He referred to tho population, which had increased by 02,000, and railways, which had nearly trebled, being 946 miles against 321. He spoke in eulogistic (onus of llm educational foundations. The local

Volunteer force is equal, if not superior, to the other colonies Ho looked upon naval as being more important than land forces. II o til ought that (lie Port Darwin railway should be placed in the hands of a company to construct, otherwise too Jong a time would elapse before it would be made. He suggested immigration on the princiual of federation, the expenses being defrayed pro rata to the population by the Home Government and the colonies conjointly. This would meet the difficulty of intercolonial immigration. lie favored an income tax as a fair and equal system, and recommended pastoral ns against agricultural pursuits. In conclusion he earnestly advocated federation o: the colonies. Largo crowds assembled in Adelaide and Glenclg to bid Sir William farewell.