News and Notes

Southern Cross, Volume 1, Issue 11, 10 June 1893, Page 7

News and Notes

The New Zealand Police have been instructed to prevent all glove fights in future. Cholera is prevalent at Marseilles and Madrid. 'J he King of Greece receives the smallest income of any European sovereign, his salary amounting to £40,000. Seven arrests have been made in County Clare in connection with the wounding of a rent collector. In Sydney the formation of a department of labour, and the establishment of State farms, as in New Zealand, are recommended. The whites in tlxe Southern States of America are forming societies to co-operate with the negroes to abolish lynching. In the R.M. Court on Tuesday last, George Saunders obtained judgment against G. Buttolph for £34 12s 7d, with costs, £4 3s. Wheat rings have brought about a reduction in prices, and the market on June 6th showed a decline of 6d per quarter. John Burns says the Hull strike is a sign of the coming agitation with a view to the abolition of capitalists as a class. Carnegie, the millionaire, predicts a union of English-speaking nations, in which Britain and America will dominate and put an end to war. At the last meeting of the Education Board it was resolved that the sons or daughters of teachers be not appointed to schools when other suitable candidates are available. Eircs in East London destroyed the works at the Messrs Hope’s two timber yards and forty of their workmen’s dwellings. Damage, £150,000. The Full Court (Melbourne) has quashed the conviction of Mr Mansfield, late secretary of the Seamen’s Union, for persuading a sailor to desert a vessel. The revenue of Victoria for May fell by £285,000. Had it not been for the sale of Treasury bills there would have been a deficit of £1,068,000. Mr E. T. Booth, the temperance lecturer, has filed owing to depreciation of properties in Australasia. He lias no New Zealand debts of any consequence. Several Salvation Army officers in Canada have resigned on the ground that Mr Herbert Booth is importing and appointing Englishmen to the best positions. During a cyclone the town of El Dorado in Arkansas was buried in an almost solid pillar of dust. Thirty persons are dead. The survivors escaped by fleeing on horse-back and in vehicles. The Unionist leaders have arranged to move a large number of amendments on the Home Bide Bill. Ulster has enrolled 170,000 members as a defence union an d elected 600 members of assembly. Captain Fairchild, who recently returned from his periodical trip to the Snares, Auckland, and Bounty Islands, reports that the depots for castaways are in good order, and the cattle, sheep and goats thriving. Significant. M. Goblet in unveiling a monument in Paris stated that the forbearance of France with regard to Alsace cannot last much longer hnless Germany avoids conflict by an amicable settlement.

The licenses in the Gladstone, Waihopai, Awarua, and Campbelltown districts have all been renewed, and in the case of the Bluff a new license was issued to Mr J. Metzger for a building to be called the Bay View Hotel. Mr H. S. Fish has got through the ordeal of an address to his constituents. There were a good many interruptions, and no vote was taken, the curtain being lowered before an adverse resolution (subsequently published) was put. Mr Isaacs, who resigned the SolicitorGeneralship and his seat in the Victorian House ef Assembly because of the Government’s apparent hesitancy in respect to the prosecution of Davies and Milledge, has been re-elected unopposed. General Eoberts, who ought to know, states that 25,000 additional men are required for the defence of India, while it is reported that Admiral Tryon states that he cannot guarantee the neutrality of the Mediterranean owing to the weakness of the squadron there. The action of Mr W. Saunders, Gladstonian Liberal, in not attending divisions on the Home Rule Bill on the ground that the House of Commons is is incompetent to give Ireland a new constitution, is being followed by Mr Thos. Henry Bolton, Liberal member for St. Pancras North. Ministers fear that their abstention may prove contagious. It is said that among the “ sensational ” journals ef America, there are seven printed on handkerchiefs; three that give their subscribers coupons for free photographs; five that invite their subscribers to dinner once a month; 260 that provide gratuitous medical advice and medicine ; and three which bear the expenses of the funerals of their readers. It appears from a return just issued that the amount expended in poor relief, including both “ in maintenance ” and outdoor relief, in the 648 unions and parishes under separate Boards of Guardians in England and Wales, during the half-vcar ended at Michaelmas, 1892, was £2,191,172, being £1,192,389 foxoutdoor and £998,783 for indoor relief or a total cost of Is 6d per head on the entix-e population of England and Wales, 29,403,340.

A very pleasant reunion, in the shape of a dinner to Mr A. Kinross, chairman of the Lindhurst Road Board, which has been merged (after a life of 21 years) in the County Council, took- place in Deschler’s Hotel on the 2nd inst. Mr J. Strang (Woodlands), the oldest member of the late Board, presided. The only members of the original Board present were Messrs T. Mac Gibbon and W. Halliday.

Zimcr’s patent boat, which is operated on after the manner of a cycle, presents, says an exchange, many new features. The occupant rides upon a saddle, and the treadles, actuated by his feet, work either a propeller or a stern paddle wheel. His hands hold a horizontal Uar—as in a bicycle—the movement of which causes paddles to work alternately on either side of the little vessel. The boat is said to bo far more efficient in a rough sea than an ordinary row boat, while at the same time it is well adapted for use in smooth water. Ihe Jacobite League, whose agitation for the restoration of the Stewart dynasty to the throne of Britain is slowly gaining adherents, principally among clergymen, has taken a step in advance. According to the London correspondent of an exchange, it has caused to be printed postage stamps bearing the effigy of the legitimate sovei’eign of this country, Mary of Modena I fancy. These stamps do not at present help to forward a letter to its destination ; therefore when they are gummed on, an ordinary stamp is affixed to the letter also, only Her’Majesty Queen 'Victoria’s head must be turned upside down. That “new” invention —the bullet-proof jacket—reminds the Berliner Tageblatt of an old anecdote of tlxe Duke of Wellington:— “A stranger was one morning received by the llukc. He submitted a bullet-proof jacket, and requested him to introduce it into the army. ‘All right,’ said Wellington!, ‘put the jacket on.’ The stranger did so. The Duke rang a bell, and an officer appeared. ‘ Tell Captain So-and-so to send two soldiers here with loaded rifles.’ When the inventor heard these ominous words he quickly made himself scarce.”

It is, of course, but I’ight (remarks the Tuapcka Times) that representatives should come before their constituents at reasonable intoi’vals, so that, to use a hackneyed phrase, they may not “ lose touch ” with them—that they may learn the drift of popular thought, as well as the popular estimate of their own actions. Hut then, it is necessary that a representative should have something to say—something that may serve as food for reflection, something that may help to expand and strengthen political thought, and so produce a high standard of political judgment, and a national as compared to the rabid, purblind party feeling that is now demoralising and eating all healthy patriotism, as well as all generous political rivalry, out of the hearts of the people. We have just heard of a man who had been employed on a neighbouring station, who drew his cheque, amounting to| £6O, and went to Dunedin with the good intention of taking a few days’ rest and innocent recreation. In the course of his rambles he ran against a very old friend, and before he had recovered from the surprise the two were making a bee-line for the nearest pub. Drink followed drink, with the usual result, and next morning when he came to his senses he found himself without a red cent. The sixty pounds he had sweated and toiled so many mouths for was gone, every penny of it, transferred to the pockets of some prowling thief. As our Lawrence contemporary remarks in relating the incident, there is little use at this hour of the day in pointing the moral. Incidents of this kind arc as old as the colony itself, and are likely to continue to the end of the chapter.