News and Notes

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 31, 27 October 1894, Page 7

News and Notes

A conference of school teachers is to be held at Invercargill during January. The holiday section of the programme includes a trip to the West Coast Sounds.

T/iraestone and Oreti Plains settlers are devoting a good deal of attention to linseed this season, experience proving that it yields better results than anything else at ruling prices. J. A. Proude, the celebrated historian, who visited New Zealand a few years ego, and was the guest of Sir George Gray at Kawau, is dead.

We have to thank Mr J. E. March, Superintendent of Settlements, for a copy of the latest report on villagehomestead settlements. As to general results, Mr March says : 41, The system is intended for men who, when not otherwise employed, may devote their spare time on their holdings. It has been tried. It has proved successful, and others can go and do likewise.”

Messi's Stronacb, White and Co. started- business as auctioneers on Monday last. They occupy part of the old Prince of Wales Hotel a capital stand. They have secured the Criterian saleyards. It is said that the Republican leaders in the United States ‘ire about to abandon protection, owing to the success of the new tariff. A misunderstanding re a claim near Cromwell caused a man named Archie Blue to shoot his mate (John McKersie) on Saturday, and then commit suicide.

Four men were drowned at Hokitika last Saturday while crossing the river in a boat.

That tight little island, Tasmania, is apparently in a had way financially, and if the exhibition to be held next month does not improve the customs returns, an early meeting of Parliament will be held to consider ways and means.

Mr J. Stead, who has a good record as a councillor, is a candidate for the In vercargi 11 mayora 1 ty. The Mikado of Japan has been authoi-ised to borrow the trifling sum of twenty millions sterling- for war purposes.

A man named Brown, who has worked his passage from Wellington to Sydney, gives the colony a very bad name. He says the distr-ess in Wellington is “ something awful,” and that “ Dunedin is the only city seeming to get along.” And yet if you ask in Dunedin ‘‘Plow’s business ?” they reply “ There isn’t any,” A wel-known c Icnist has passed away in the person of Mr Peter McGill, flour miller of Milton, and one of Otago’s pioneers.

Success continues to attend the operations of the Golden Site (Wilson’s River) Co. During six weeks about £2,500 worth of gold has been got, and £750 of this is to be devoted to a dividend at the rate of 6d per share on 30,000 shares. A London penny-a-liner had to write up a fashionable wedding the other day, and this is how he described the bride, the daughter of a duke : “ A fair English gentlewoman approaching in all the spotless stateliness of white Duchesse, satin, and old Brussels lace, shimmering purely through softening mists of tulle, her wedding coronet orange blossoms, linked with a sun of diamonds and pearls ; in her hand white roses and rai-e orchids drooping their blossoms like the spray of the silver birch.” There!

The Emperor of Germany has delivered another characteristic speech at a gathering' of soldiers. The army, he declared, was the only support of the monai’ch. Some ruleis seek to secure the goodwill of the great mass of their subjects, and the Kaiser is not too old to revise his ideas of government. The annual meeting of the J. G. Ward Farmers’ Association will be held to-day.

Mrs Wallis, whose husband was one of the victims of Bateman’s insane attack, has been offered the office of postmistress at Tophonse, Nelson. Cr. Roche looks with disfavor on the proposed toll-bar at the Waihopai bridge, and will invite the borough council to use every legitimate means to prevent its erection. Mr R. Scollaj'-’s boarding house at Stewart Island has been burned down. Misfortunes never come singly—only a few months have elapsed since he lost a cutter.

A writer in the Nelson Colonist says that the “ pestering some of the country teachers have to put up with from vindictive persons through imaginary evils is beyond all bearing. If the well-doing of the children were properly regarded at home, a teacher’s task would be easier, and the number of squabbles be lessened.” They have a large and liberal way of looking at things in Gore. A traffic bridge is wanted over the Mataura, and an indignation meeting was held there the other night to hurry things along a bit. One speaker declared that if “ the Government took up an antagonistic position, there would be a general election some day, and it would not be forgotten.” Poor Government ! Unfortunate Colony ! with every little centre clamouring- for “loaves and fishes” and threatening to bring about a general smash if their wishes are not acceded to. Needless to say the orator was applauded. A sum of £I,OOO is on the supplementary estimates for the work, but that was declared to be only a flea-bite to what they should get. It is evident that nothing short of a crocodile-bite will satisfy them. It is said that in New York many women make a regular income by washing, combing, and trimming-up the fancy dogs of their richer and lazier sisters. A Frenchwoman at a West End dressmaker’s receives a large salary asa “suggester” tocustomers, so littleimagination, as a rule, have Englishwomen, Wearing new boots, in order to render them comfortable to their owners, is also a novel means of earning money adopted by several women on the other side of the Atlantic. A local band was one day playing at Dunfermline when an old weaver came un .and asked the bandmaster what that was he was playing. “ That is 1 The death ofSNelson,’” solemnly replied the bandmaster*.''- “ Ay, man,” remarked the weaver, “ye hatV gien him an awful death.”