AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2424, 12 November 1892, Page 3

AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

(Otago Daily Times.) The war of fares has begnn in earnest between the Union Company and Huddart, Parker & Co. The Union Company announced a further reduction on Monday as follows :—Saloon to Bluff £3, and return 15s; steerage £1 10s, and return £2 10s; round ticket to Sydney £9 10s saloon, and £6 steerage. This was met on Wednesday by the new opposition by the announcement “ Steerage fare to the Bluff £l.” The other fares are not stated, beyond that “ rates of freight and passage money are very much reduced.” During the last two or three months a horde of “ sporting clubs ” have arisen in the city of Melbourne and suburbs. These places were simply totalisator shops, and they wore doing a largo business. On Derby night, about eight o’clock, the police made a raid on them, with the result that they arrested aboui fifty persons and seized about £IOOO in money. In the Melbourne Criminal Court the other day, Mr Justice Hood sentenced no less than live prisoners, each of whom had been convicted at that sitting on charges of indecently assaulting young children His Honor drew attention to the disgusting and atrocious nature of the offence in question, and declared that such crimes must be prevented. One prisoner, who had offended against two young girls, was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment and a flogging of 20 lashes. The most serious case was one in which a father assaulted his own daughter, aged nine years, on two occasions, and this prisoner received a sentence of three years’ imprisonment, with two floggings of fifteen lashes each.

An elderly widow met with a terrible accident at the St. Kilda railway station last week. It would appear that she mistook the side of the carriage on which the platform was, and instead of getting out on the right-hand side she must have stepped out on the other. As there is no platform there, she probably fell upon the set of rails used by the locomotive when shunting to the tables to reverse for the return journey. What happened precisely is not known, for no one observed her error or noticed her on the rails, and it was only when the engine in shunting ran over her right leg and drew from her a scream of pain that her terrible plight was discovered. At the hospital her leg had to be amputated. Being deceived by the numbness in the limb and mentally upset by the shock, the poor woman persisted in declaring that she was not hurt, and should therefore be permitted to go home.

The gold mining industry of Victoria has taken an upward stride lately, principally on the Bendigo field. The dividends paid from yields of gold during the quarter ending September 30 amounted to £185,968, showing an increase of £49,922 as compared with those declared during the preceding quarter, and of £56,259 compared with the same quarter last year. The amount of dividends declared since the beginning of this year to September 30 was £435,354, as against £359,875 during the corresponding period of 1891. The remaining charges against Mr Mansfield, secretary of the Seamen’s Union, for inciting the men to leave the s.s. Gabo, have been withdrawn. The total amount of the fines inflicted on him thus remains at £4O, with costs. Mr Mansfield i« in trouble in another direction Just now? as fiitt >yi|p is proceeding against him for maintenance of herself and three children. She declares she has not received one penny from him for the last three months, The extraordinary ease in Melbourne of the disappearance of twin brothers has caused a good deal of interest. One was married, and the single brother, who was afflicted in some degree by religious mania, lived with him, Thu Wif{? going upcountry left the two men in charge of the house, and on returning found that both had disappeared. Their bodies have since been found in the Yarra. It is believed that the single brother, directly or indirectly, paused the death of the other. It is said that he had been heard to remark that he and his brsther had come into the world together, had lived 38 years together, and whenever they died would die together. Either he had induced the married brother to die with him, or the latter in trying to save him when in the water had himself been drowned as well.

The burglars in Melbourne are increasing in audacity. The other night they broke into a house in Toorak, made merry with wine, ginger ale, and wedding cake, and even dallied long enough, apparently, to play a game of cribbage, as the cards, and the cribbage-board, and “ counts ” were subsequently found lying on, a table, iioyond this audacious but comparatively harmless amusement the intruders busied themselves by ransacking most o£ the rooms of the house, including the bedroom in which the mistress (there were no male inmates in the house) lay asleep, and carrying away with them a miscellaneous collection of jewellery and valuables, worth altogether between £bo and £4O. The robbers did not hamper themselves with dark lanterns or grease-dropping candles. They turned the gas on, and lit it all over the house, and having concluded their business and and pleasure left the lights burning, and departed through the front door, which they also left ajar. There was an exciting scene at St. George’s Presbyterian Church on Sunday evening last. The Rev. J. G. Davies, pastor of the church, has suffered from an attack of influenza yrhiCn greatly affected him recently. The church congregation considered that he should have a holiday, and arranged for the sermons to be preached on Sunday by the Rev. Dr Campbell; but fbydi' action did not meet \yi& Mr. Davies’' approval, and piiiutbjlia w.e.re, distributed on Saturday: blight announcing that ho would preach on the Melbourne Cap. . Mr Davies vofruinec] 1 .(vo.u preaching at the nfP.Vb!bb BvU'Vhjo, and in the evening wan refused permission to preach in the pulpit. Over a thousand persons assembled in the vicinity of the church, and after the ordinary service by Dr Campbell the gates of the church gvoumia were locked. The public, however, lifted the two ga-j,os oft’ the hinges, and the croyvd swarmed into the grounds fronting the uianse. Mr Davies then preached to them from the manse balcony, denouncing horse-racing, betting, &c., and occasionally receiving encouraging yheeys. The affair has caused grwgt c.toiionient, and it is Gated that Mr Davies will be ashed to resign his charge. The sermon was one which scarcely seems possible to

hive come from a sane man. It denounced owners of horses, jockeys, visitors to races (including the Govexmor), &c., in the most violent fashion.