NEWS ITEMS OF INTEREST.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIV, Issue 9391, 10 March 1909, Page 6

NEWS ITEMS OF INTEREST.

Raglan County has a clean sheet. All the rates due have been paid. The amount for the year ending. March 81st next is about £5600, and there was a sum of about £8 carried forward from the previous year for arrears. A shipwreck is, after all, a mere incident in the lives of the men who go to sea for their livelihood. No less than four survivors of the Penguin disaster are now back in their old calling on the Te Anau, which has succeeded the Penguin. The men are Messrs 0. Jones, Hull,, and D. Rees, stewards, and the cook, Mr Dan Lynn. An amusing episode took place a* the Gisborne Police Court on Mon* day. A native, who was fined lor assaulting a Chinaman, declined to pay the fine, and a warrant was accordingly made out for his commitment to prison. There being £no police constable available to take the man into custody, the latter undertook to convey the warrant in person to the gaoler, and hurried away topriaon, remarking that he hoped he would be in time for dinner. | It is stated that a|new and interesting development has arisen in connection with the famous Westport murder* case, which is to be tried in Christchurch at the criminal sittings]: of the Supreme Court in May. It will be remembered that at the conclusion of the hearing of a charge of perjury, Connolly, who was convicted of that offence, made a confession implicating himself in the murder of Burke. Hallinen and Anderson were subequeatly released,, aud Connolly was committed for trial on a charge of murder. It is said that Connolly now repudiates hia confession, aud thsit the case will be fought out at the hearing in Christchurch. | A case of some interest to travellers on railways was before the Full Court in Sydney the other day. A person who had been charged with selling the return half of a railway ticket between Sydney and Brisbane was prosecuted, and fined, and he appealed against the conviction on the grounds that the by-law under which the prosecution was brought was ultra vires, as being beyond the power of the Railway Commissioners to make. The Full Court unanimously overruled the objections, holding that the by-law was quite within the power of the commissioners to make, and was consequently sound. The rule nisi which had been granted was, therefore, discharged, with costs, and the conviction stands good.