NEWS OF THE DAY.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2132, 22 January 1880, Page 2

NEWS OF THE DAY.

A correspondent writes to us re the Mormons of Sandietown in the following strain:—“Mr Editor, would you kindly inform me how it is that the Mormons never come into the town to preach, but always keep out in Sandietown? Is it because they arc ashamed of their religion ? Ac.” In reply, we can answer for the Latter Day Saints that they are ashamed of nothing. Unlike Christians, Pagans, and Mahommedans, they have no religion to be ashamed of. Sensualists and polygamists lack the quality of shame, as well as common sense, decency, and a regard for the laws of their country. The Mormons are but the vicious dregs of many lands. They luxuriate in vice, they are apostates of the worst desolation, and their habits and customs are too loathsome to describe. Still they serve a purpose. It is as well that there should be a corner of the globe set apart for the banishment of human vice and licentiousness. Utah is that corner. As for the Mormon converts of Sandietown, the atmosphere of the district will be the purer for their absence, and Xew Zealanders will be able on their departure, to congratulate themselves on a good riddance. We do not despise the Mormon elders who are laboring so hard. On the contrary, we regard them as fulfilling the useful purpose of a moral nightcart. When they wend their way to Zion with the deluded Sandietonians, society will feel rejuvenated.

At the annual meeting of the United Fire Brigades Association in Dunedin, on Tuesday, the draft of a Bill to be introduced to Parliament next session was read. In it is the following clause : —“ It shall not be lawful to use any building within a borough of more than two storeys high as an hotel or public lodging-house, without providing outside of such building one or more iron ladders, so fixed from the top of such building in front of the windows of each storey to within 10 feet of the ground, as to provide a means of escape therefrom. Every such ladder must be fixed, and shall be constructed in such a manner as shall be required by the surveyor or other officer appointed by the Council.”

A girl named Gilmore, a servant at the Iloyal Hotel, Napier, has reported to the police that when going from the hotel to the Spit at 8.30 last night a man sprang out from the side of the road and attempted to commit a rape on her. She struggled with him, losing her hat and handkerchief, in which was £l. Her dress was also torn in the struggle. Finally she bit him in the neck and got free, and ran back towards the hotel. The man followed her, but she outstripped him, and he soon gave up the chase. At the hotel was a man named Marsh who returned with the girl to the place where the assault was committed, and there her handkerchief and money were found. Sergeant O’Malley has been looking for the man, but has not succeeded in arresting him. The girl can give but a very indifferent description of him, owing to the darkness and her fright, but she is positive about biting him severely in the neck, and that will be a mark of identification.

In the Supreme Court Dunedin, in the case re the llevD. Calder’s will, the jury, after five minutes’ deliberation, awarded the issues in favour of the plaintiff’s declaring that the testator was of sound mind, necessary to the undertaking, when he made the will, and that no coercion had been used.

It is stated that in consequence of the wet weather prevailing in Sydney, on Dec. 2(5, the New Zealand court at the Exhibition was flooded, and that all the exhibits had to be removed, and some of them were considerably damaged. A contemporary says it is reported in Wellington, that Sir George Grey is going home to the Old Country shortly, and that is not unlikely that he will be a candidate for an Irish constituency in the Home Rule interest at the next general election.

The poll on the waterworks loan question was taken to-day. As the ballot closes j ust as we are going to press, we are unable to record the result. Up to 3 o’clock 160 votes had been recorded. Some of the violent opponents of the scheme, we understand, rushed to the poll, but were disconcerted at finding that, as their rates were unpaid, their votes could not be recorded.

A large surf-boat for lighter work is being constructed at Anderson’s Foundry, Christchurch, to the order of the Timaru Landing Company. The boat is made of iron, measures 10ft. Oin. beam, is 3Gft. long, and will carry thirty tons of cargo. She will be the largest boat of the kind employed at this port. At a banquet in Timaru held some time ago a young gentleman was feelingly responding to the toast of “ The Ladies.” “ Gentlemen,” he gushingly exclaimed, “ I love the ladies, God bless them I My sisters were ladies! (Cheers). My mother was a woman !” “ You don’t say so?” came in a deep sarcastic tone from a distant part of the table and there was a general yell of merriment. The lover of the ladies looked daggers at all around him. The Annie Low, from Newcastle, laden with coal, belonging to Messrs Geddie and White, arrived at this port to-day, after a passage of ten days. This is one of the smartest trips for a sailing vessel, that has yet been made between Newcastle and Timaru.

The Gem Burlesque Company repeated the performance of the previous evening at the Theatre lloyal last night. The performance was as successful as on the former evenings. The company open at the Town Hall, Ashburton, to-night.

The South Orari School Committee held their usual meeting on Saturday. Present —Messrs 11. A. Barker (Chairman), Brosnahan, Henderson, Bates, May, and McLeod. Correspondence was read from the Board of Education asking the Committee to nominate two persons to fill the vacancies on the Board and forward copies of same. It was decided that the remaing 14 days of the summer holidays commence from the second Friday in February ; also, that the Chairman be authorised to expend the sum of £ls for the purchase of an American organ for the school. A small account for books was passed for payment, and the meeting adjourned.

At the R.M. Court this morning, before G. Elworthy, Esq., J.P., Duncan Emerson was sentenced to 48 hours’ imprisonment for drunkenness. A first olfender was dismissed with a caution.

A two-roomed cottage belonging to E. Woofindin, at Pleasant Valley, was burnt ?o the ground early on Tuesday morning. The fire is supposed to have been caused by some swaggers who were camped in the vicinity.

The adjourned sitting of the District Court, which was to have been held tomorrow, has been further adjourned to Feb, 2.

In the libel case Anderson v. Xirkbridge, the jury have returned a verdict that the plaintiff was not entitled to any damages. Mr Beresford, the Grand Secretary for the Orange Institution of the Middle Island has received a telegram from Auckland stating that Pastor Chiniquy will leave for Christchurch on Monday next, and will lecture the first night after his arrival. A man named Clarkson, undergoing a sentence of’ten years’ penal servitude in the Lyttelton gaol,attempted to escape yesterday morning from the hard labor gang. He was pursued and fired at, and soon stopped. Two persons coming down the hill were nearly shot by the warders, who missed the prisoner.

The Synod of Otago have issued a welcome to Pastor Chiniquy who is invited to visit Dunedin.

The Sydney “livening News writes:— One of the Wantabadgery bushrangers is named Graham Bennett, and it is presumed from a circumstance occurring during the Police Court trial at Gundagai, that the officiating magistrate is interested in Victorian politics, and has strong Conservative sympathies. When the duty devolved upon him of committing the bushrangers for trial, he is reported to have looked solemnly at the prisoner Bennett, and said, • Graham Berry, you are charged before this honorable Court,’ Ac,, Ac, Luckily, the P.M. is not a Victorian civil servant, or such a fearful joke would probably result in another ‘ Black Wednesday’ for his special and exclusive benefit.”

The Wellington “ Chronicle ” says : “There is at present only one Minister in Wellington, namely, the Premier. The Hon. John Hall, like Atlas of old, is bearing the whole burden of the New Zealand world on his shoulders. Mr Hall looks careworn and haggard, like a man who is greatly overworked. He is experiencing some of the disadvantages of ambition. He is shunning delights and living laborious ways. What a pity it is he is not a Liberal!”

lletrcnchmcnt of a peculiar kind is being carried out on the Government railways. The process is thus referred to by a correspondent in the Dunedin “ Star ” :—Dor instance, it is stated that the stationmaster at Port Chalmers has been sent to Lawrence, at a salary of £250 per year, whilst the former station master at Lawrence (a first-class railway servant) received only £IBO per year. The late station-master at Lawrence is sent to a station on the North line (Waikouaiti) at a salary of £3OO a year, while the former station-master |at the latter place received only £IOO per year. But possibly there is some wise end in view in connection with these changes which the public know nothing about. After all, it is only a matter of £llO per year. It is reported that Mr Grant is to get another £IOO per year ; and why not ? It is thought by many that were there to be a general washing up day on the railways, some curious facts would be disci osed. Our readers will soon be able to dine at tea time on the literary intelligence supplied at the London dinner tables. The Melbourne “Argus” says: The duplicate submarine cable having been laid between Singapore and Java, the telegraph line is being worked direct between the former place and Banjoewangie, and English telegrams, are now received from three to five hours after being handed in at Londoh.

It is reported in town (says the “ North Otago Times ”) that a well-known business man has found it necessary to suddenly leave for other fields, and it also reported on equally good authority that his presence will be required in town again before he can be allowed to finally make up his mind to say “ adieu.” Mr Giblin, the Colonial Treasurer of Tasmania, in delivering his financial statement in the local Parliament on the 18th, stated that as a means of raising revenue the Government proposed to levy an excise duty on beer of 3d per gallon. He expects to derive £16,000 a year from the duty which will be collected on the American system — by means of stamps. It will be remembered what a terrific hue and cry was raised in New Zealand, when Mr Ballance, in the session of 1878, proposed a tax of l£d per gallon, and what a quantity of unmitigated bosh was talked about the tax being equivalent to robbing the poor man of his beer. The Colonial Treasurer, of Tasmania, we observe, expresses the views which sensible men in New Zealand, who were not blinded by self interest, entertained at the time of Mr Ballance’s proposal. He describes the tax in no sense prohibitory, but as being simply a tax on an article of luxury. Says the “North Otago Times” : Apropos of the trouble which has recently arisen in Dunedin between the Rev Lorenzo Moore and Archdeacon Edwards, the Rev Mr Barry, Anglican minister, New South Wales who was formerly censured by the Bishop for preaching in the Wesleyan chapel, has issued a circular challenging the Bishops consistency in officiating in the private Wesleyan Chapel of Sir G. W. Allen, the speaker, in performing the marriage between Miss Allen and Mr Leeper, of Melbourne.

The engineer of the San Paulo Railway in Brazil has hit iqjon a novel way of utilising the old iron rails which have been superseded by steel, by making them into telegraph posts, and thus overcoming the trouble and annoyance occasioned in all tropical countries through the destruction of the wooden posts by ants. These rails when originally laid down, cost £ll per ton, and the steel rails which have displaced them have cost only £4 10s. The population of the globe may be roughly estimated at 1,421,000,000, divided thus: Europe 309,000,000; Asia, 824,00,0000; Africa, 199,000,000; Oceania, 4,000,000; America, 85,000,000. It has been calculated from the mortality tables of known countries that the annual number of deaths throughout the world is 35,093,350, or that in other words, 97,790 persons die each day. On the other hand, the balance of population is more than kept up by births at the rate of 104,800 per day. Seventy new lives are ushered in every minute of the 24 hours. The eagerness with which the Wellington Waterworks Loan was subscribed by Loudon money lenders should satisfy those who doubt the successful floating of the loan for the completion ofjthe Timaru Waterworks, that there is ample willingness in London to float any colonial loan which can be backed up by good securities, and such securities are offered by Timaru.

The tradesmen’s quadrille assembly will beheld on Wednesday evening next and not on Friday as previously notified. Lovers of good beer should lose no time in paying a visit to the Clarendon Hotel, where Mr Edwards has now on draught some Tasmanian ale of exceptionally fine quality. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and, during the hot weather, especially, no better drink can be found than this “ Cascade ale ” which, possessing a capital flavour, is as clear as sherry, and as mild as lemonade. — [Advt.]