LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Temuka Leader, Issue 303, 12 October 1880, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

A lady contributor appeals to us to insert a statement of her wrongs in this journal. In reply, we c mnot do so. It is not our inlention to open our columns for a discussion of S'-andal or cases of imagined cruelty. Toe subjeci of the communication referred to was amply discussed as a part of our duty as a public journalist and nothing more. This is often a painful duty to have to perform ; but once done we wish it to be understood that we do not refer to such subjects again. Every one have their faults and failings—the writer admits that she has hers, A public journal is not for publishing statements of such- We think, moreover, the complainant is not entitled to despair or be discouraged., Surely she could obtain employment of some sort, and we would advise her to live at peace, and be careful ot her conduct, when no donut she will find friends.

The trial of Ah Lee and Lee Guy for the Kyeburn murder was concluded on Saturday last. Ah Lee was found guilty, and sentenced to death, Lee Guy was acquitted. We learn by telegram that Mr Warden Stratford, wlio was recently appointed magistrate for the Temuka and Ashbunon districts, has received insti actions from the Government to proceed to Greymouth to take over that district. It is likely Mr Guinness will not be removed after all.

The Hinemoa, the Havvea, and Te Anna (says the New Zealand Times ) had a race a few days ago. and the Govern meat yacht got beaten all to tits ; but the imperturable Fairchild turned never a hair and saved his own credit and the good fame of his boat thus “ What’s the use of racing a boat when the blessed Government has taken 10 per cent off the screw I’’

Sub-Inspector Thomas has made an important seizure of smuggled spirits and beer at Whangutata, near Kalikati. The stuff is estimated at £3OO in value. The cases were found buried in the sand near Gainboro’s stores.

The barque James A. Stewart drifted on to the beach at Kaipara, Auckland, on Friday last, and has since been considerably damaged. All the crew, it is feared, have perished, as there was no one on the stnnded vessel on the pilot boat putting off to her.

A Home paper of August 15th says . * The success of the herring Ashing on the east coast of Scotland is somewhat remarkable. The boats are returning with extraordinary catches, and the markets are completely glutted. The herring merchants are calling out for rest, the yards being in a crowded condition. The lading crews are overwrought, and seem to have had more than enough of overtime work. In Fraserburgh, a few days ago, the ‘Ayr Observer’ says, the town-crier went his rounds calling upon the fishermen not to go to sea that day, ‘ because the women were completely worn out by overwork.’ The request, however, was not complied with, some 400 boats having left the harbor in the evening.”

News from Samoa by the Coronet states that Savau is in a disturbed state. AH are prepared to fight, and such is the state of affa rs that a public meeting of the London Missionary Society had to be postponed. The return from the top plates of the

Golden Fleece Extended Quartz Mining Company, Eeefton, for the two weeks ending 2th October, amounted to 5700zs of amalgam.

The severe frost at Christchurch on Friday night has done serious damages to early potatoes, &s.

Vv ainui Terewafca, one of the prisoners on JJipa Island, was liberated on Saturday Hu belongs to Temuka.

An American arrived theother day at a little hotel in a French provincial town. Tired and dusty with travel, he demanded a room with plenty of water to wash with. ‘ Water ! We have nut a drop,’ aud the landlord. Muttering expressions of dissatisfaction, lie reached his room, and immediately bellowed, in a voice which could have been heard a mile : “ Fire I fire|! fire !” A dozen servants rushed uc stairs and into his room, bearing in their hands vessels of all sorts, filled with water with which to extinguish the flames. “ Ah,” said the guest turning composedly upon them, ‘ You may leave the water. Thank you ; thank you ; that is all.

There will be no more police cases in Oaraaru proceeding from the adulteration of spirits by publicans (says the North Otago Times). A number of hotel bars are ornamented with placards bearing the words ‘All spirits sold here adulterated with water.’ Nothing could be more honest than this, more profitable to the publican, and less injurious to the imbib r We are rapidly drifting in the direction of total abstinence from everything but water By-and-bye we may have the pleasure of seeing placards m the hotel bars bearing the legend, ‘ All water sold here unadulterated with spirits.’

The Glasgow Herald says ;—There is ;i prospect of operations being resumed at the Kildonan gold diggi gs, Sutherlandshire, a German gentleman is at present testing the gold producing properties of quartz taken from several point-.; in t-He strath. The results are reported to be very promising. The process to be adopted for separating the gold from the quartz is sdd to be quite new, chemicals being the principal agents employed. Persons long resident in Australia state that they are struck with the resemblance of the geological features of Kildonan strath to those of the Australian goldfields. The Post hears that the 65 Maori.prisoners sentenced at New Plymouth the other day by District Judge Shaw feel the humiliation of their position acutely—being shaved, dressed in prison clothes, and put to hard labour the same as any other prisoners, —and they bitterly reproach Te Whiti for having thus misled them and got them into so disagreeable a situation .

A Wair«rapa correspondent of the Post writes to that journal:—“An amusing story is going the rounds. Two men set in from a back run to Masterton, being rather new chums, got benighted, and in looking for a place of shelter for the night espied a small snug-looking building and immediately took possession. Upon reconnoitring to their horror they found a coffin in the centre, and near it a quantity of old bedding- One of the two, a Cockney, was for decamping, but the other, who had been in the Franco-Prussian War was less timorous, and made light of the affair by a profane joke. Pie then coded himself in the clothing, and slept calmly by the side of the coffin. When morning came it disclosed a coffin with a glass pane in the lid, which revealed the mortal re . mains of a departed native. Upon enquiries they learned that they had entered what the Maoris-call a uropo , or small building built specially to receive the coffin of some deceased person of note—a chief or chieftaincss.

A native paper states that the Chinese Governor ut has prohibited opium smoking throughout the whole of the Empire, and after two months, if anyone violates the law on the subject, be will be very severely punished. The Melbourne Argus (remarks a Sydney paper) calls Mr Williams, the new Minister for Mines, “a double-distilled traitor” and an “infamous renegade.'’ In New South Wales, were u wealthy paper to say such things about a Minister, the latter would make his fortune out of the libel action and be able to buy a new mule.

As a specimen of extravagance (says 0. D. Times) : n the Government service, we may instance a letter recently received about a trifling matter of delay from a Government Department at Wellington it might have easily been compressed into a sheet of ordinary letter-paper, but was written with wide margin on three sheets of foolscap of the most expensive hand-made quality procurable. We commend this point to whoever has charge of the Stationery Department. If all the correspondence of the different departments is carried on upon paper of similar quality and with a similar disregard to the quantity used, the cost to the Colony must be many hundreds a year more than it need be.

Not long ago the members of the Mataura Cavalry contingent elected a liv-j piper to head their very creditable corps when out at drill, or, perhaps to cheer them on wjien called for active service. But the piper’s election has been “ teetotally ” eclipsed. Quite recently a select few of Matanra’s peaceful inhabitants, anxious to do honour to a respected fellowcitizen, decided that the order of knight-

hood should be conferred upon him. They conferred it, and the ceremony was unique, interesting, and impressive. The gentleman now wears his honors with becoming yet dignified modesty and rejoices in the title just as much ns if it had been obtained by a 16,000 mile trip to Europe.—Exchange.

The Daily News states that for some years past there had been an influx into England of spurious sovereigns, which it is beiieved are manufactured in the United States. Each coin is true in weight, and so perfei t in its ring as to deceive any but the most skilled ear ; while the workmanship and execution are such as,to make it morally certain that the offenders have discarded electrotypy as a clumsy process and possessed themselves of coin-ing-presses and dies of hardened steel, such as are actually in use at the Mint itself.

A tall stalwart gentleman says the “ Sydney Bulletin ” who is well known in Moore Park, where the color of his locus corresponds with the warmth of his temper, thrust Ida head out of the window of a stationary train and angrily demanded of the guard “ why the d—t:ain was not going on ?” The g - uard quietly responded J Oh, put your head in ; how d’ye think the trains to go ahead when the danger signal is slickin’ out 1” The crestfallen footballer’s look was a study. He is now known as ‘‘the danger signal.”

“ I believe in a pet sonal devil,” said Mr. Moody at a revival meeting held in a remote Western City. “That’s true; you’re right there stranger,” said an old farmer, rising from his seat in his earnestness. Whereupon a calm-faced, placidlooking woman rose from the other end of »iie pew, took him by the car, and slowly ltd him out, and the assembly knew them for tbe first time that the old man’s mind was filled with domestic thoughts instead of the hereafter.