AUCKLAND.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 423, 12 November 1861, Page 3

AUCKLAND.

(From the Nep Zealander, Nov. 6.) The election of the Superintendent of the Province was the political business of the month, and we are glad to be able to state that throughout the settled districts public interest in the event was everywhere manifested. At noon on Monday last the principal Returning Officer having made the usual statement of the number of votes, declared Mr. Williamson to have been duly elected —the majority in his favor being 49. We were enableJ to announce, a tew days since, that the accredited agents of the contemplated Colony of Nonconformists in this Province are now on their way to Auckland. The great ' Bay of Islands Settlement' scheme having borne no fruit, it is not impossible that the new colony may find in that district a location suitable to their purpose. There is a town site ready to their hands, and land enough of fair quality within no great distance, sufficient for the probable wants of the settlement, in the first instance at least. The Bank of New Zealand has taken its placo amongst the ' institutions' of the colony. The offices of the Company in Auckland were opened on the 16th October, and there is, we believe, every reason to be satisfied with patronage and support which it has already received. | VVe.are still without the direct steam service ! between this port and Sydney which the InterI Colonial Royal Mail Company engaged to provide some time since. Regularly for months past the clippers of Messrs. Henderson and Macfarlane's lino have brought the English news to Auckland

kau, and in point of fact, so far as the receipt of some days before the Mail steamer reached Manuthe mails is concerned, this Province would be much better off without the present steam line. There is, however, we believe, a prospect of speedy improvement; a change in the local management of the Company has been effected, and it appears to be the desire of Captain Vine Hall, the new Manager, to restore the service to something as like efficiency as the very inadequate means at present at his command will admit. A Coroner's inquest was held at the Auckland Hotel, on Monday, October 14, on view of the body of a boy, aged four years, named William Cherrington, who had been in perfect health up to Friday morning and lived with his mother (a Maori) in Chancery-lane. On the morning in question, the child got up aa usual and went out to play, but in a few minutes afterwards returned, saying,'Oh, mother! I'm drunk.' He was observed by several persons to be quite intoxicated. After some time he vomited, but insensibility rapidly set in. Mr. Kenderdine, surgeon, attended, and used every means in his power without avail: death ensued in little more than thirty hours from the time the child was taken ill. The evidence was very meagre, and showed merely that the child had gone into the house of a Maori neighbor, who had been drinking some brandy and wine. Whether he took it, or it was given to him, he undoubtedly drank it, and died in consequence. The verdict returned was—Died from drinking some intoxicating liquor, hut were obtained, or under what circumstances taken, is hot proved.