TELEGRAPHIC NEWS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1633, 13 September 1887, Page 3

TELEGRAPHIC NEWS.

At about 8.40 oa bunday morning an eight-roomed house at Ponsonby, Auckland, owned and occupied by John Brown, was completely gutted by fire. The house was in cured for £230, and the furniture for £lO9, 1 both in the South British. A seven-roomed house occupied by Sir Edward Osborne Gibbs, of the Education Department, Wellington, was burned down on Saturday night. Sir Edward left a candle in the front room for a moment, sol on return found it had fallen out of the socket and set the wall-paper on fire. Ha made a vain attempt to put it ont, and then carried his little daughter out nf the house. A high wind was blowing, and nothing was saved except a couple of boxes. The furniture was insured for £2OO in the New Zealand Office, and the building for £360 in the South British. At Bleheim Sinclair and McOallum have, been instructed to issue writs, failing an ample apology, for £IOOO in each case, against Seymour, formerly Chairman of Committees of the House of Representatives, the Marlborough Express, and the Nelson Evening Mail. The writ against Seymour is for slander in making certain statements reflecting on Millr, one of his opponents, in connection with same local bodies, and the writs against the newspapers are for libel in publishing the statements. In the Auckland Supreme Court on Friday Joseph Mannex pleaded guilty to a charge of making a false entry in a marriage register and George Johnson pleaded not guilty to a similar offence. Sentenced was deferred. Albert Sanford, a witness in the case, was not present when called, and His Honor ordered the bonds of £IOO to entreated. John Edward Quinn, who plerded guilty on Thursday, to making a false declaration to the Registrar of Marriages, was also absent when called on Frday, and his bail and that of his surety, Sandford, was also ordered to estreated, Sandford and Quinn subsequently appeared, but His Honor said the matter of returning the bonds had gone beyond his jurisdiction, and they would have to apply to the Minister of Justice. Ultimately Quinn and Johnston were placed under probation for 12 months, and Mannex was sentenced to three month imprisonment with hard labor. At a meeting of the Star of Wellington Lodge, 1.0.Cx.T., it was announced that the two grand lodges representing English and American jurisdictions would meet in Wellington in January next, for the purpose of forming one Grand Lodge for the whole of New Zealand. At the Police Court on Friday at Rotorua, James Pettengell, a well-known Wellington pugilist, pleaded guilty to stealing a number of valuable wood carvings from th* o'd runanga-house Hinemihi, of the ruined village of Te Wt-iroa, and was sentenced to one month’e hard labor.

At the Auckland Supreme Court on Saturday, Alexander Campbell, charged with perjury, was remanded. An application being made that Davis, recently sentenced to two years’ hard labor for attempting to levy b'nckmail, should be dealt with under the Probation Act, as be was a first effender, Hie Honor pointed out that he had no authority to deal with the prisoner under that Act, as the offence was one of extortion. He considered the sentence he passed rather lenient, seeing ttiat the extreme penalty lor the crime was penal seivitude for life. The hearing of the charge of perjury against Hoero Te Maniha, arising out of a criminal assault case dealt with last session, then commenced.