CANTERBURY.

Colonist, Volume II, Issue 171, 10 June 1859, Page 3

CANTERBURY.

Many of our readers will be very sorry to hear of the death ©f Mr. Charles Maunsell; at Limerick, of disease of the heart. This gentleman was one of the original land purchasers and early settlers in this province, and was known to many among us, by whom he will be deeply regretted. Mr. Maunseli has left a legacy of £100 towards the establishment of a Provincial Hospital.— Lyttelton Times, June 1. An interesting event in the shipbuilding line took place on Wednesday afternoon last, by the.lannph of the schooner Wellington from the berth which she has occupied so long on the beach below this

. town. The Wellington went ashore in the neighborhood of Motunau some three or four years ago, and, after being brought to port, was laid up on the beach, and then abandoned, to perish, The work of decay, proceeded with rapidity, and perhaps but a short time longer would have sufficed to scatter 'her in small fragments from Officer's Point to Governor's Bay. However, before this result was accomplished, Mr. T. Hughes, the well-known contractor, stepped into the rescue, and bought the hull as it lay, completing her purchase on the last day of last year. Since then shipwrights have been busy at work at her inside and out;,the greater portion of her timbers and even of her skin was found almost uninjured, the amount of battering which she had sustained seeming to have produced but a small impression on her constitution, as compared with the decay arising from natural causes during her exposure. Mr. Hughes has restored every inch of stuff in which damage was perceptible, and hss placed her in a condition which, it is not too much to say, is better than the Wellington ever had to boast of since she first left the builders' hands. On Wednesday last tha launch took place, and the event attracted some attention in the town, the circumstances presenting a. few difficulties. For instance, the vessel having been repaired in the position in which the lay, namely, broadside on to the water, the launch had to be effected sideways; the rise and fall of the tide, also, is not sufficiently great to float a vessel of her size, unless launched further into the water than low water mark. Whatever the difficulties Were, however, they were foreseen and provided against, for just before high water the arrangements were all ready, the shores and chocks were knocked away, and, the cradles being released, the .revived schooner slid down at once land", easily into the sea, and, after pnly serapm'g lier "cradles against the shingle, floated off triumphantly into deep water, where she will prove", we hope, as remunerative to her owner and his assistants as the work bestowed upon her has been creditable.—Lyttelton Times, June 1. A man named Robevt Cartridge was proceeding to Tripp's station from Timaru, about six months ago, and was missed. Search was instituted for him immediately, and his blankets were discovered in Peel forest, but no trace of the body could then be found. Within the last fortnight, however, the skeleton of the unhappy man has been met with, at a very short distance from where the blankets had been found. A. shirt was lying by the body, which seems to have been the means of identifying the individual.—/^.