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Southland Times, Issue 641, 8 March 1867, Page 2

From our advertising columns it will he seen that the performances at the Theatre Royal tonight are for the henefit of Mr. C. F. Searle, whose engagement will shortly expire. The programme for the evening is, we think, the most attractive and diversified one hitherto presented to the puhlic under the present management, including the "Polish Soldier," selections from Sheridan Knowles' splendid play, " The Hunchback," and the favorite farce, " The Area Belle j " in all of which Miss Eloise Juno and Mr Searle take the leading parts, the other parts heing also well cast. Songs will also be given by Mr Searle, and by a Lady and a Q-entleman amateu? j and we understand that, by particular desire, Miss Juno will give ** The Charge of the Light Brigade." — Considering the great popularity Mr Searle has acquired, during his short stay in Invercargill, and the attractive Bill he has got up for his benefit, we anticipate a crowded house. It was said by a celebrated actress (Madame Vestris), that no structure, human or material, need look dilapidated however -shaken by time, as long as paint, and the skill to apply it, existedWe are almost inclinecLto adopt this as a truism The Provincial Government Buildings, whioh have

to perpetually chant as a dirge, " the light of other days is faded," has assumed a cheerful appearance calculated to impress strangers with the idea of activity and progress. We have heard of a large capitalist in a neighbouring colony, who, desirous of investing, visited many towns ; in every one of which he was surrounded by parties desirous of impressing him with the-*gßOwing importance of their especial locality;. . Hej had one reply as a refusal to invest, in the inviting town sections offerred. " There is no paint." — No place can be advancing that cannot afford to paint." T f his view as to paint being the sizre indication of progress is correct, and we think he was not rery far wrong. Invercargill must be rapidly progressing. There is paint everywhere — the Government is painting, shop-keepers are painting, hotel-keepers are painting, in fact everybody is either painting, or dreaming of doing so. Is not this indicative of returning prosperity ? We think it is, but we require to see the Churches painted before subscribing to the capitalists creed. We have been requested to call the attention of members of the Order of Oddfellows in this province, to the announcement appearing elsewhere of a grand banquet in honor of P.P.G.M., John C. Bellamy, fixed to take place in the Lodge-room on Friday evening, the Bth inst. Tickets are to be obtained from the following officers : — Messrs Webster, Fraser, Todd, ; . Goodwillie, Wilkinson, Kingsland and Ferguson. At the Resident Magistrate's Court, Wednesday, , Thomas Fox was sentenced to two months' imprisonment for stealing a piece of beef, the property of Mr J. H. Smith. The beef was missed by the owner, and found by a constable in a bag carried by the prisoner, who was apprehended for being drunk and disorderly. No one saw the prisoner take the beef, and he asserted in his statement to the Court that he had taken it from a dog which was carrying it away for its own eating. The joint, a large one, was produced in Court, but its appearance proved nothing more than that the dog had a capital notion of a prime cut. Prisoner was marched off asserting his innocence. A fossil discovery was made lately near the summit of Bluff Hill, by an officer of one of the wool ships, at present in our waters. It consisted of the remains of a skeleton of very gigantic proportions, presumed to be that of a Moa. The principal bones were* carefully collected and presented to Captain Francis of the s.s. Taranaki, on his last visit. He kindly agreed to take them North with him, and have them submitted to Dr Hector, who, there is no doubt, will soon be able to pronounce definitely to what tribe the monster remains belong. [From what wa have heard the " remains " are those of one of the larger ruminantia.] A good illustration of the advantages gained by New Zealand colonists from the opening of the Panama route was afforded lately on the arrival of some miscellaneous goods from London. Several packages which had been booked in London on the Ist January, were delivered by rail at the goods sheds, Invercargill, on the 28fch February. All charges on them to the Bluff having been defrayed by the prepayment to an agent in London of a through rate. We may now say with perfect truth that it is possible to get goods from " home " in the same time that, but a few years since, was required to obtain them from Melbourne: We have received some further information (says the " Otago Daily Times ") with respect to the gold-getting at Waikawa, and the result is that there does not appear to be at present any inducement fer miners to visit that neighborhood. Our informant (Mr Bannatyne, who is well known in the Tuapeka district) was at Waikawa for a fortnight, and during a week he worked on the beach without finding anything to pay. The beach is about three miles long, and has a bend horse-shoe shape. In an elbow, about the centre of the beach, there were three or four claims yielding from £5 to £10 a week per man, but Mr Bannatyne believes that those were the only claims that could be said to be paying when he left, and when there were some 60 other men at work on or near the beach. At the paying claims there wis a layer of black sand, about Ift. thick and I7ft. or 18ffc. wide. For some 6ft. of that width the black sand was fairly on the beach, and the stripping was not more than 3ft. deep ; but there the layer ran under an old beach which is called the terrace, and to get fairly into that the stripping varied from 15ft to 25ft. The sand which yielded best was that just along the line of the foot of the terrace, Towards the north (or in the direction of the sandspit) the layer was proved to fork into small streaks, all of wliich were found to contain gold, while none yielded it in a payable quantity. Towards the south the black sand runs entirely under the terrace, and all the tests showed that there is not gold enough in that direction to'be payable, with the 15ft or 25ffc of stripping which is necessary. Away to the north, near the rocky head, there is cement, which has all the appearance of being similar to that at the Blue Spur ; there is more of the same sort on the inner side of the tongue of the low land from which the spit extends, and not far from the jetty. In sinking a well within the limits of the township cement was also passed through. The cement has not been tested, but our informant does not believe that it could be profitably worked, even if it proved to contain gold. Most of the men who were at Waikawa had come overland from the Riverton neighborhood, mainly along the coast. One party had gone inland so as to strike the Waikawa River about five miles up, and near Williamson's station, Gold was found there, near the river's bank, but not in a payable quantity. On a very small beach, to the south of Waikawa, a party has been doing very well, but there is no room for anyone else, all the beach being taken up. In a former notice we stated that the men employed at the sawmills at Waikawa had left their work in order to dig, but that was not quite correct, as one of the mills was temporarily stopped owing to the completion of a contract. The Waikawa sandflies are described as a dreadful pest, and blow-flies are most numerous arid prolific^ The " Hawkes Bay Herald " complains that the operation of the postage rate upon newspapers has shewn that it is virtually, what it has often been described to be, a tax upon knowledge — a tax, prohibitory in its effects, upon the dissemination of intelligence, and further remarks — "Last mail- from the south afforded a proof of this in the comparatively small number of exchange papers that reached us. Notably, not a single Wellington journal came to hand by post. By steamer, a few copies of the Advertiser and Evening Post were received, but no complete files. As for an Independent, we have not seen one for a month. Soprte of the t^JMjjgUUMUi^aJSSiSS^Sl^oA^^-?' that

penses, they cannot afford to pay postage upon their exchanges. The consequence is that the . circulation of knowledge is greatly restricted, and that an injnry will be done to the interests of the colony, for which the additional revenue accruing will do but little to compensate. While, * injury will result to the public -from the imposi-. tion of this rate — injury in more ways than one, for it will do much to imperil the success of the Panama line — one thing is evident, that the capital of newspaper proprietors, who as a class have worked hard in the public service, is sought to be unduly taxed. For ourselves, the postage upon exchanges, according to the list we keep up to the present day, cannot be less tban £50 per annum ; while, in the case of proprietors of daily , journals, it must be much more. We therefore hail with joy the disposition shewn to act upon a suggestion made in these columns, that sotae 1 kind of organisation should be formed for the i protection of the fourth estate." A statement of the Canterbury provincial accounts for the quarter ending Sept. 30, has just been handed to us. (" Lyttelton Times.") The 1 Government has no doubt some good reason to advance for this delay, but the public are ignorant of it, and till it is satisfactorily explained have , ground for complaint. As usual the statement is divided into the four schedules of Ordinary, Land and Works, Railway and Harbor Works, and i West Canterbury Goldfields. The receipts under L the first account for the quarter amounted to £17,052 2s 6d, and the expenditure to £15,346 L 15s 2d, leaving a balance in favour of the former 1 of £1,705 7s 4d. Subtracting this credit balance i from the debit balance of the former quarter — £12,983 2s 4d— we find that there was still a balance against the account of £11,277 15s, at the end of September. The receipts under the i head of land and and works were £23,958 17s Bd, . and the expenditure £16,294 4s 4d, which leaves a balance to credit of £7664 13s 4d. But there was a balance against the account of £8061 15s 7d, - from the previous quarters, and the difference ; between the two last sums, namely, £397 2s 3d, • is the balance standing against the account on Sept. 30. The receipts under the head of railway and harbour works account, amounted to £33,459 1 13s 6d, and the expenditure to £31,083 19s ld, leaving a credit balance of £1475 14s sd. To this must be added the credit balance of the previous quarter, namely, £44,123 6s sd, and we have a balance in favour of the account at the end of the quarter of £45.599 0s lOd. The receipts under / the head of West Canterbury Gold-fields amounted to £38,059 16s sd, and the expenditure to £35,175 14s lid, which leaves a balance to credit of £2883 Is 6d. This sum substracted from the debit balance of £105,295 5s 7d, from the former quarter, reduces the debt of Westland to £102,412 4s ld at the end of September 30. The balance against the province on Oct. 1, was £64,488 0s 6d. It will be seen from the foregoing analysis, that although there is still a considerable balance against the province in the aggregate, the receipts for the quarter in each account were in excess of the expenditure. This excess was applied to reducing former debit balances, and in the case of the land and works account it is cleared off with the exception of some £400. The Canterbury papers report the following mysterious case : — An inquest was held on Saturday last, at tlie Hospital, Christchurch, at 10 a.m., before Mr J. W. 8. Coward, the coroner of the district, on the remains of a body lately found in the Rakaia. Mr "George Jones ■. was chosen as foreman of the jury. Sergeant Horniman was the first witness. He deposed that on the 17th inst. he we went to the north branch of the Rakaia in company with a man named John Campbell, who pointed out to him the remains of a human skeleton. Witness gathered the bones together, and searched the shingle, and found the knife produced. Witness brought the remains to the Hospital at Christchurch. He found some clothing, the fragments of Bedford cord trousers, and a patent-leather gaiter. These j were on the remains.. The body was found about twelve miles below the South Road ferry, towards the sea. He remembered Mr WalterWilson and a young man named Macdonald being drowned in the Rakaia about twelve or eighteen months ago. Macdonald's body was found, but that of Mr Wilson had not been recovered. He (witness) had made enquiries, and had found that no one had been drowned since that time. The clothing found' on the remains corresponds with those usually worn by Mr Wilson. The remains had been shown to Mr J. C. Wilson, who thought they were those of his son. John Campbell, the man who found the bones, was called as a witness, but refused to give his evidence unless his expenses were paid. He stated that he had already lost some days in harvest time. The coroner remonstrated with him, telling him that if he persisted in his refusal to give evidence ho (the , coroner) would be compelled to commit him for contempt. Campbell, however, still refused to be sworn, and the inquest was adjourned until this day, at 4 p.m., at the Hospital. On the following day the adjourned inquest on the remains lately found in the Rakaia, was held at the Hospital, at 4 p.m., before J. W. S. Coward tbe Coroner of the district. John Campbell stated that he lived at a Station called Waterford, near the Rakaia. On Sunday, the 10th inst., he went to an island in the river and saw the shining of a patent-leather gaither. Subsequently he saw some bones, and on his arrival in Christchurch, on the 15th, he communicated what he had seen to the police. He did not know whose remains they were. He returned to the spot wifch a constable who collected the bones and brought them to tne Hospital. The jury returned a verdict that the remains of the deceased were found upon an island in the Rakaia, and that it is supposed that he was drowned, but by what means he came by his death there was no evidence to shew.