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Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1256, 23 January 1883, Page 2

From a private telegram we learn that M. Archibald Forbes was moat enthusiaeticall.i received on hie arrival in Napier, and that hi*, lecture last evening wae largely attended Those resident in Gisborne who no doubt ar. desirous of hearing Mr Forbes recount “ tin dangers he had passed,” will be present in large numbers. Messrs Adair and Tucker, two of the Directors of the Southern Cross Petroleum Company, returned to town yesterday, after a visit to the Company's works. They re port that the shaft was down a depth of 237 feet when they left the Springs, and that the work is being vigorously pushed on. Then are three casks of crude petroleum collected as the sinking progressed, awaiting shipment at Awanui for this port. There is still a little oil rising in the bottom of the shaft. At the next meeting of Directors the future working, whether by shaft sinking or boring, will be fully considered. Mr T. J. Dickson intends shortly to open a Museum. What with Icthiosaui, deformed potatoes, peculiar turnips, boys in boats, sea horses, &c., his collection is something to be gazed upon and wondered at. Mr J. Cohen, the Manager of the Argyle, showed us to day the latest addition to the curios, namely a distorted sextant (not the “Old Sexton ” he sings about), of which he tells the following history: “New Zealand was first sighted by Tasman in 1642, but it was not until 1769 that Young Nick, on board Captain Cook’s vessel, shouted out ‘ Land Ho.’ Of course, the skipper, after doing a considerable perish, was anxious to come ashore, and being thirsty, he wended ’his way up to Jimmy Scott’s, Roselaud Hotel. Of course you know that Captain Cook without a sextant in his hand is not Captain Cook at all. Well, he had a long ‘ Speight,’ and spotting the Roseland Gardens, went over and regaled himself with fruit. Whether he was discovered in the act or not, is a matter which he alone esn answer; but it is generally understood that having the fear of Mr Price's £lO penalties, he dropped his sextant and bolted. A few day’s ago, Mr Knights was sinking for oil, and at a depth of 7432} feet below the surface he discovered the sextant, for which Mr Dickson has paid an enormous sum. ” Such is the story as told by Mr Cohen, but we will leave it to our readers to decide if he has not distorted the truth about as much as time has the sextant. The matinee on Thursday afternoon, to be given by the Juvenile Opera Bouffe Troupe, pro nises to be highly successful, as the lessee has wisely reduced the prices of admission on this occassion. A pantomime is something almost unknown to the children residing in the Bay, and no doubt the country settlers as well as the parents in the town will give their little ones a treat by taking them to see the lilliputian artistes.