The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 1874.

Thames Star, Volume III, Issue 1678, 20 May 1874, Page 2

The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 1874.

Tab bazaar in aid of the Wesleyan Church opens tomorrow in the Acadeifij of Music , at three o'clock. His Worship the Mayor will preside on the occasion. A CiSE was set down for hearing in the Warden's Conrf this morning, Punch v. KinioU*. The sitting of the District Court necessitated its adjourn'm'ent^which was done ,for a week. Ws learn that His Excellency Sir , James Fergussoii will give a birthday ball ufc Government Hou»e, Auckland, on the 28th iustant. . .Several Thames residents have received invitation*. Mb. Ch4kleß O'Neill, M.H.R., loft by the Wofiga Wonga on Saturday, and . will return in- thre» weeks- We understand Mr O'Neill goee' to New South Wales to advise on some important engineering works.—Cross. ■ Ik to-morrow's Star will be published the Lilt of Objections to parsons on the Electoral 8011. The Star will be published as an eight-page paper, and extra copies will be printed to accommodate persons wishing for them. The objections number nearly nine hundred names. Wl understand that Mr Robert Graham has made a free gift of the rite on which the Mechanics' Institute is erected, and that arrangements are in progress for securing to the Institute an enlarged area of building ground on liberal terms, Mr Graham having intimated his willingness to meet the views of the Committee in this respeot. We (Cross) understand thai, a petition, intended for presentation. to the Provincial Council to morrow, Tuesday, is being numerou»ly signed by the Roman Catholics of Auckland and surrounding settlements, including the Thames and Coromanriel, expressive of their views on the question of education, a tubject which is largely engaging public attention at the present time. Ws learn that Mrs Whitaker haa forwarded to Mr A. Bredie a quantity of cuttings of choice plants and flWering shrubs for distribution amongst the miners. Mrs Whitaker was pleased with the appearance of the ' miner§' gardens during her recent viait, and evinced her thoughtfulpess by forwarding these cuttings, which may be had on applying . at this office. 2fs. W. J. Moonbt, travelliag agent of th- Government Life Assurance and Annuities scheme, has arrived in this district for the purpose of bringing before the public the advantages of the Government scheme over others. Mr Mooney will deliver a lecture in the course of next week, when he will fully expatiate on the numerous and paramount inducements offered to assurers in the New ' Zealand Government scheme.

"Atticus" writes as follows in the Melbourne Leader:—"A lecture was give^n at Ballarat this weok to expose spiritism. The lecturer apparently didn't make his meaning very clear, for at the' end of two hours' talk some of his hearers had to a*k , him what h» meant to prove, and whether the ■ lecture was against spiritism. This must have been sufficiently disconcerting but worse fol>!low«d,.for it was gravely moved and seconded, ,' that; the lecturer, not having devoted suffi- ■ dent time to the study of the subject, is not capable of »xpres»ing an opinion thereon.' After this we may expect to see votes of want of confidence moved in clergymen at the end of their sermons." A pink athletic specimen of tho noble savage, was. brought before our Resident Magistrate this morning, en no less than three distinct charges of having broken the law. It appeared from evidence th»t he had gone into the kitchen of an hotel and boundbly demanded food,'which was rrfusod him, whun he helped himself. He then went to tho bar and asked for a gliss of beer. When asked for payment he showed fight, tore the clothes of the policeman who had been sent for to quell the rumpus, and kicked up-a row generally. His Worship, to impress the - prisoner in particular, and the Maoris generally, with the respect they must pay to the law of the land, inflicted a fine of £5 or a month's imprisonment. The prisoner, when in the row, was much sympathised with by hit countrymen ; but they did not seem to •M it when the money question came in, a* they allowed him to be put in chokey in lieu Of paymtnt. Perhaps John Maori won't ba in a hurry to assault a policeman again, IHB Ohioo Enterprise of January 16 has tbt following aooount of a Calefornian agrioulturiit j— " H. J. Glen, an enterprising farmer of Oolusa County, will put in, on his little farm, near Jacinto, this year 40,000 aorei of wheat, from which we make the following estimate:—At 25 bushels per acre —which is not a high, estimate for the prosef the present season—the yield will be 1,000.000 bushels, or 60,000,000 pounds. At 137 lbs. to the Back, it will require 430,000 sack*. At 300 tons per barge load, oa the Sacramento Kiver, it will take ono steamer two yean to deliver it to San Farnciseo, allowing one trip per week, and will take 20, •hips, of 1,300 tons each, to deliver it to England. But the most important calcula* tion still remains to be made, especially to Mr. Glenn, and that is, the calculation of thertt profit accruing from the 1,000,000 dtl* that it bring htm on the ra&oh, at 1 dol» | f» kuihdU . „ .■; j

Thi Oaraaru Licensing Bench haa laid down the rule that one conviction under the Act should be regarded as an act of misconduct on the part of the licensee, disqualifying him as holder of a renewed license. Timaru bench has resolved that only married men shall hold licenses, and the application of a baohelor publican has been adjourned fora fortnight, with an intimation that it will be refused unless he gets married within that; period.

The Auckland Star says:—The Auckland correspondent of the Otago Daily Times writes: " four readers will not yet have fngolti n an old Otago celebrity (Mr Jameß Browne), once connected with your paper. Mr Browne left Otago for the West Coast, thence to Murlborough, and finally settled in Auckland, where he ia comfortably ensconced in the editorial chair of the New Zealand Herald. Mr Browne has achieved celebrity in Auckland chiefly by the vein of rich and kindly humour with which nature has endowed him. As S-nyder his etches have attained great popularity and been repeatedly copied in the New Zealand .anil .^Australian papers. In Auckland 'Old Snyfler' is an institution. He appears weekly .'in the Herald, and his pieces are sometimes revprpduced in the daily issue of that journal. The 'Weekly News, a rival nsue from the Southern Cross office, has lately fallen foul of Snyder, and indirectly accused him of plagiarising Mar-k Twain. So, there has been a passage of arm?, in which the Cross comes off second best. The Herald reprinted Mark Twain side by side with Snyder. The subjects were the same—namely, ' Life Insurance,' but there is certainly not the slighteut similarity in manner, matter, nor mode of treatment. Put together, one sees how rich and pleasant the humour of Snyder is, even at the side of a master in the urb like Mark Twain, with whom ha does not unfavourably compare. I mention this because I believe ifc is contemplated by Mr Brown to make a collection of bis writings for publication, and it will bo exceedingly unfair that they should have a prejudice excited against them by false charges of plagiarism. Mr Browne was on the staff of the first free journal started in Tasmania. Ho was through the whole of the Australian ! G-oldfields in their palmiest days, when men nailed up ten-pound notes against the wall and ordered the landlord to supply fvoe drinks to all comers so long as the notes would pay. I have seen him convulse large audiences with his lectures, and any book published by him ought to be of wide colonial interest, as I am sure it would be." [The writer of the above, had he been aware of it, might also have mentioned the fact that Mr M. L. Browne, son of Mr James Browne, is one wlo has risen from the ranks of the Otago Daily Times office, in which he some years ago filled the position of " reader boy," to the responsible post of sub-editor of the TS.'Z. Herald.—Ed. E S.]