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Southland Times, Issue 1731, 22 April 1873, Page 2

The following telegram was received yesterday by the Mayor, in reply to the resolution authorised to be sent to the Minister of Public Works by the meeting held on Saturday evening, with the object of having copies of the plans and specifications for the Winton-Kiagston contract sent to Invercargill : — " Dunedin, 21st April. Have received your telegram of 19th re Winton railway plans. We have no spare copy of contract plans. If it had to be made, plans must be withdrawn, and time for receiving tenders extended ; and I fail to comprehend why any intending tenderer for work of this) magnitude cannot come here to examine plans. Our available staff here could not copy these plans in less time than a fortnight. — Edward Riohaedson." A number of Volunteers assembled at the drillshed at half-past ten on Sunday forenoon, for church parade, and marched, preceded by the band, playing sacred airs, to St. John's English Cburch, where the Key. W. P. Tanner preached an appropriate sermon. This is the first occasion on which a church parade has been held by the Invercargill Volunteers. An accident occurred to Mr M'lntyre's mail coach on Friday morning at Woodlands, immediately opposite Mr Gobi's hotel. It seems that by some means the coach, which was full of pas-* ■engers, was upset, when a Mrs Collins, of Green Island, had her collar bone broken, her daughter, Mrs Gardiner, received severe contusions on the I face, and the servant of Mrs Tibbits had two ribs broken. Dr M'Clure was summoned by telegram to attend to Mrs Collins and Mrs Gardiner, and lost no time in reaching the scene of the accident, where the necessary attention was bestowed on those injured. The contractor, Mr M'lntyre, speedily reached the apot, and, we hear, spared ] no trouble in subsequently forwarding to their destination the injured passengers by a comfortable vehicle, specially hirad for the purpose, those who were not hurt having proceeded, after a short delay, in the mail coach, which waa not materially damaged. A meeting of the Invercargill District Road Board was held on the I7tn inst. There were present Messrs Hare, Gilmour, Stock, Tucker, Brown, and Angus. Several memorials from ratepayer* were read, and ordered to stand over for consideration. A deputation from Hare wood

requested that the road through that township, which had been gazetted as cloned, should if possible be constituted a public road The Board resolved to use every endeavor to have the road kept open. The amounts contributed by various localities were considered, and works to be executed were apportioned accordingly, to the following roads : — Crombio's road ; Seaward Bush road ; and Kew road ; tho engineer being instructed to prepare plans and specifications. Tha meeting then adjourned to Thursday, 24th inst., at the offices of the Board in Mr Brown's photographic rooms, Esk-street, at half-past seven o'clock. The Hon. Major Richardson delivered the initiatory lecture of a course projected for this winter by the Athenseum Committee, at the Theatre last night. The subject was announced as " Pathways to Success," a title, as the lecturer said iti his opening remarks, which might cover a great deal of ground. This proved indeed to bo i the case, for the lecture touched on an amazing I variety of topics, all of them, however, being so skilfully and gracefully handled that the pleased attention of the audience was maintained, apparently without an effort, to the close. After referring to the evident tokens of prosperity which everywhere met the eye in the town and neighborhood of Invercargill, and the conspicuous tsbange for the better which had taken place since his last visit to the locality with Sir Gaortre Grey, the lecturer proceeded to describe, as onoAof the pathways to success, the effect of what he termed "the associative principle," and the results attained by that principle, in combination for a common object, and in the contact of mind with mind. The elevating effect of association with the great minds of ancient and modern times, by a study of their writings, was eloquently described ; and the modern practice of lecture-giving, an association of mind with mind for the purpose of intellectual gratification and culture, was instanced as a development of the associatiTe principle. The good effects of such a course as that projected by the Athenaeum were dwelt upon, and suitable and interesting ■übjecti for future lectures suggested. The ! special characteristics which may be regarded as pathways to success were then described, the I first, on the importance of which the lecturer strongly insisted, being pluck and perseverance. These qualities, ha said, might be displayed by I the fairer at well as the ruder sex, and could be I shown in the performance of the common duties i of life as well as in those commonly regarded as of a more exalted kind. Largeness o f heart was another essential qmlific iti on, being that pow ?r which enabled a man to disregard petty and vexatious difficulties and distractions, sectarian animosities, and paltry distinctions, and to pursue the object he had set before him, in a broad and catholic spirit. The grace of simplicity was then touched upon, in connexion with which the lecturer found means to introduce some amusing but keenly-pointed remarks regarding the fashionable follies of modern times. Honesty was the next topic treated of, and then the necessity, as a means of success, of thorough attention to details. In illustrating this, as well a^s the other principles insisted on, a number of admirable anecdotes were introduced, with the effect of giving great liveliness to what, in less skilful hands, would have been in danger at times of falling to the level of a dry abstract disquisition. The duty of making the most of our time, and the no less important duty of living within our means, both received their share of notice. The career of George Stephenson, the cow-boy, and subsequently the successful engineer, was referred to as an illustration of that of a man who combined most of the requisites described, and wbose life was a success. The concluding and most interesting portion of the lecture consisted of a graphic sketch of the lives of two men who combined all these virtues, and others of even a higher kind, whose career, in each case, might fitly be cited as affording the highest exemplification of true success, and who had been known to the lecturer as personal friends, Sir Henry 1 awrenee and Sir Henry Havelock. The lecture occupied more than an hour and a half in delivery, during which the frequent applause of the audience showed that the speaker never once permitted the interest of his hearers to flag The Mayor presided in the chair. At the close of the lecture a vote of thanks to Major Richardson, proposed by Mr Lumsden, President of the Athenaeum, and seconded by Mr T. M. Mac— donald, was carried by acclamation. The Theatre was well filled throughout, and the presence of a large number of Volunteers in uniform, lent animation to the appearance of the house. After the proceedings, the Volunteers were paraded in the street, when the Major addressed to them a few friendly words of encouragement and advice, and thanked them for the compliment ol their attendance. They then marched away, as they had arrived, to the mußio of the band. Our contemporary, in his issue of Saturday took upon himself to insinuate a doubt as to the correctness of certain information which appeared in the local columns of our issue of the previous day, saying that it was ■" premature, if not absolutely incorrect." We beg to assure him that it was neither, though, in comparison with the slow-going style of obtaining news adopted by that journal, it may have seemed to its conductors that our infor nation must have been " premature." The New Zealand Herald says :— ln this Colony it is a popular error, very generally believed in, that for a debt to be barred by the Statute of Limitations an interval of six years must have elapsed without application for payment ; such, howerer, is not che case, and it is proved that, no matter how many or how oftrepeated may have been the presentations of account or requests for settlement, with the view of "keeping the debt alive," as is commonly understood, nothing less lhan a written promise of payment,- made within the six years, can setaside the plea of the statute. Thus, if a debtor desires to take advantage of the lenity and forbearance of his creditor, he has only to procrastinate, if possible, by verbal promises of payment or otherwise, and in due time to shuffle off his liability under cover of the Statute of Limitations. The Oamara paper regrets to state that whooping-cough is very prevalent in that district just now, adults as well as children is many casei suffering therefrom. An immense auinber of mutton birds visited the Waikouaiti Bay last week, forming one dense cloud stretching from the mouth of the river i northwards furtker than the eye could reach. ,

The O-reymouth poopla, having failed in their negotiations with the Wellington men for opening up a coal mine, have set to work to form a local association. The prospectus proposes to Btait a company, to be called the GreymouHi Coalmining Company (Limited) with a capital of €40.U00 in 8000 shares of £5 each, subject to the following conditions : — One shilling per share- payable on application ; 4a per share on allotment, the balance to be paid in calls not to exceed 5s a share per month. - The objects of the Company are stated to be — 1. To lease and work the extensive coal-ssama situate on the Grey and to sell their produce in such a manner as the company shall from time to time determine. 2, To lease and work, upon its completion, if found advisable, the railway from the coalmines to Greymouth, about to be constructed by the General Government. 3. To purchase or charter, if necessary, steam or other vessels adapted for the conveyance of coals to other ' places, and the doing of all other things which , are incidental or conducive to the attainment of the above objects . At the meeting of the Otago Waste Land Board, held in Dunedin on the 17th. inst., plans of application for unsurveyed land were submitted and approved of, and the applicants declared the purchasers as under :— Quartley and Co, section 4, block VIII., Waikaka, and 4, block VIII., Tuturau ; C. Thoneman, section 5, bl>ck VIII., Waikaka, and 5 and 6, block VIII., Tuturau ; A. M'Nab, section, 1, block 1., Waikaka; F. Milne, section 67, block VIL, Tuturau ; W. Carpenter, section 38, block 1., Wyndham ; R. Dodd, section 36, block 1., Wyndham. Arrangements have been made by the Provincial Government to despatch seven Shetland fishermen, with their families, to Stewart's Island, to form a piscatorial settlement there. They will be sent to Stewart's Island free, and be provided with fishing gear and provisions until they are able to make repayment. This batch of immigrants arrived in Dunedin recently by the Euterpe. The Wellington Independent denies the acouracy of a statement made in an Auckland telegram to the Otago Daily Times to the effect that the Government proposed to employ the Auckland police as canvassers for assisted immigrants at 5s per head, to be paid on landing It says the enquiries made show that the Superintendent of Auckland was simply asked whether it would be desirable to employ the police to canvass for nominated immigrants at the same rates per arrival as that novr paid to sub-immi-gration officers, viz., 10« for women, and 5s for men, but the general opinion of the Provincial officers being unfavorable, the idea was abandoned. It is announced that the negotiations for the taking over the business of the Bank of Otago by the National Bank are now practically completed, and that Mr W. J. M. Larnach has been requested to assume the management of the DuDedin branch of the new institution. The want of water is seriously retarding the progress of mining operations in some parts of the Dunstan goldfields. A very fine specimen of pure copper (says the Cromwell Argus) was found among the washdirt in the Excelsior Company's claim at Quartz Beef Point, by Mr C. Seymour, a few days ago. Mr Seymour states that several other specimens of the same mineral have lately been picked up in the claim. These indications seem to point conclusively to the existence of a copper lode somewhere on the western slope of the Dunstan Eange. The Nevis correspondent of a goldfields contemporary writes as follows: — Mining affairs wear a cheerful aspect. All art) busy, and few complaints are heard. Two or three claims in Prummond's Gully, Upper Nevis, are reported to be turning out extremely well. Tliis gully or creek was opened ten years ago, and, if I mistake not, weut by the homely name of Porridge Gully, Borne Scotchmen who eihibited a devouring love of their national dish being the prospeotors. A.'ter the first rush to it, it was almost deserted until two years ago. Since then, several parties have been doing well in it. This is another proof of the imperfect; manner in which the auriferous ground in this district was originally wrought.