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Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2565, 27 March 1877, Page 2

There was considerable excitement at the Cornei* last night, and shares in the Moanatairi improved in price, going up to £21, whereas the highest quotation at the afternoon meeting of brokers was £18 10s. To-day the market opened very firmly, but in a short time it was depressed, owing, it was said, to the number of shaies offering in Auckland. The breaking down of specimens this morning was reported to be the largest and best yet seen, some of the stone being exceed: ingly rich. The share list appears in its usual place in our columns. :•. . -.. .

An accident happened in the Waiotahi this morning the result'of which may be regarded as a fortunate escape. A horse and dray, belonging to Mr Owen Griffiths, going to load quartz at the Waitemata tip, were in charge of a; boy. A' small cutting has .been .lately made by the County Council to this tip, and in going up the horse became restive, and in turning, instead of backing up to the tip, backed over the bank, falling a distance of about 20 feet on to the road. Neither horse nor dray appeared to be injured.

A special meeting of the Borough Councillors was held yesterday' evening in the Council Chambers. There were present—His Worship' the Mayor, Crs Butt, Ehrenfried, Gibbons, Macnab.Eead, Eenshaw, and Eowe. The object was to discuss the best site for a bridge over the Kauaeranga, as the Borough had been asked to aid the County in the matter. It will be remembered that three sites had been selected by the County Engineer, the most suitable of which was iv his opinion one at! Parawai Gardens. Through Dr Kilgour it Had been said that the only site the Borough could entertain as a suitable one was that at the end of Pollen street. After some discussion on the subject the Council agreed to adjourn the question until the close of the business of the next regular meeting. . .

The members of the Grahamstown Fire Brigade, in view 6f their forthcoming match with the Shortland Brigade, met in good numbers last night for practice in Brown street. The run up, &c, and other parts of the exercise they will go through, were well executed by the men, who stuck to their work well.

The members of the T^N.B. assembled for.shell practice at their.drill-shed yesterday afternoon, Lieut. Bennett being the officer in charge. A floating target was placed 1200 yards distant from the beach, and the practice made by the members seemed to be very good. We say seemeH, as from the beach only an approximate opinion could be formed as to where the shot actually struck.

During the last week or two we have had to record several mining accidents, and though: none of ..them, have .proved fatal several have been very serious ones. Yesterday added another to this list, a man named Lewis employed in the Caledonian mine being the victim. The man had fired a shot, or thought he had, and whs clearing oufc the hole with "a -pick when the charge exploded. He was burned about the face and arms; but his eyesight was uninjured. The injuries to the face and arms are not considered dangerous.

In reference to the dead heat recorded in our telegrams yesterday as having been rowed between the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, we. may state that it is the first time on record when such a termination to a race rowed by eight-oared crews over a four and a-half mile course has been recorded. It was, generally believed that the crew which had a clear lead through Hammersmith Bridge (2£ miles) would win, until this theory was upset in 1865 and confirmed in '66 ; and '67, the reason being that- it was also, .thought that before 1 2\- miles were rowed the superiority of one crew over another would assert itself. In this instance we have two crews, each unable \o shake the other off, except, pechaps, for a few strokes,- over four miles and a-half. The closest finishes over the same course -prior to the race of Saturday were in 1857, when Cambridge, with J. Hall stroke, beat Oxford, J. T. Thorley stroke, by three-quarters of a length, and in 1867, when Oxford, K. G. Marsden stroke, beat Cambridge, W. Griffiths stroke, by half a length. ,It will be observed that the unit figure in these three years of close races has been 7.

The New Zealand correspondent of the Brisbane Courier makes the following extraordinary statement with regard to the Counties Act: —" The working -of the Counties system has set all the. people of New Zealand at feud with one another— I even to the setting -of brother .-against brother, and father against son ; mem* bers of the County. Councils opposed to each other go into public houses,'get excited, fall to fighting, and pet bound over to keep the peace ; the rich oppress the poor, and endeavor to unfairly overtax the poor, and generally a condition of the greatest anarchy and confusion has arisen. . •

The conduct of the " larrikins " and roughs generally at places of entertainment in Oamaru is reported to be so bad that notice has been ?,iven by a Borough Councillor of a bye-law to punish persons guilty' of smoking, using bad language, • or other misbehaviour at public entertainments. After a discreditable interruption during the performance of DarreU's dramatic company recently, Mr Darrell came before the curtain, and said that when;he came to Uamaru, he made up his mind not to tolerate such rowdyism, and he was determined to put a stop to it at' all hazards. The conduct of the gallery in Oamaru was. a bye-word amongst the profession in all parts of the colony, and he was surprised that the educated portion of the audiences bad borne the conduct of the roughs for so long a period.

The Dunedia Stay, speaking of the difficulty the Opposition party is in for want of an efficient leader says:—"Promotion of Sir George Grey's -late lieutenants is an impossibility. Who would follow the blatant Bees, or that selfpossessed Colonial youth Mr John Sheehan ? The rank and file of the Opposition offer very little scope for choice. There ia hardly one whose position in politics is not below mediocrity."

We (Herald) are glad to be able, on good authority, to state that the Government have ordered a survey to be made fora railway between the Thames and Waikato. We have never had any doubt that such a line—connecting as it would the agricultural district of Waikato with the mining district of the Thames, passing through a level and fertile country, at

present almost unoccupied, and joining with the fine river system of the Thames and Piako—-would be one.'of the best and most successful railways in the Colony. It would fulfil one of the purposes of the Public Works scheme, which has not been even attempted in Auckland, that is, it would-eDable land to be settled which has hitherto lain waste.

.-An excellent instance has just been, afforded here (writes the Wellington correspondent of the Lyttelton Times) of the sincerity of. the Ministerial promises about reducing the Civil Service, providing for Provincial Government .officers when vacancies arose, "&o.~* Mr' Hudson Williamson, the chief clerk in the Crown Law office', has just been "appointed Deputy Registrar of the Supreme- Court in; Auckland, and his place in the SolicitorGeneral's office has been given to a young son of Mr Batkin, the Secretary to the Treasury—a young man who was for some time a clerk in Messrs Brandon and Quick's office, articled, I think, but who did hot manage to become a member of the profession. I believe he never even passed the Civil Service examination. Any special claims he may have had to the appointment simply lie in the fact of his father being '.one of the heads of departments who govern the Government. Only one of our late Provincial Government officers entered the General Government service, and less than a month's experience satisfied him with it. He found that, instead of being treated as gentlemen, the officers in the department in which Tie was placed, the Receiver General's, were treated like slave's, and he applied to be allowed to.give up his. appointment and take the compensation to which he was entitled for his Provincial services. ■"' This was at first demurred to, but afterwards the request was.granted, and now he rejoices in regained liberty after a month of very unpleasant servitude.

A foot-bice of a somewhat novel character (says the Wallaroo Times, N.S.W.) took place at Green's Plains on 16th February between Messrs Oharlton, jun., and T. Nugent. The distance fixed upon was 100 yards; Mr Nugent to carry a saddle and the heaviest man in the locality, arid to have 50 yards' start. Mr W. V. Brown, being possessed of the greatest quantity of ■ adipose tissue,' was selected for the jockey, and the race duly came off, .resulting in a victory for' the weight-carrier by one yard.

A CpNTBMPOEAET .^sks —"Can such things be ?"" An Adelaide paper of a recent date states that lately a man residing at Oaklands, Yorice'-Peninsula, .sent his son, aged about fourteen, down a rather deep well to fetch up a bucket. When the boy had descended, the father, to save himself the trouble; of windi.ng ■ him up, ordered the boy to make fast to the rope, which the man attached to a team of bullocks and drove- them; along, drawing the rope over the windless^ The boy was drawn to the top, both his arms were broken, and he, with the bucket;, was.then precipitated to the bottom of the well, whence he was taken up dead, with his neck, it is said, broken. He was buried without an inquest or inquiry of any kind.

Me A. Mobbis, Executive .Commissioner at the Philadelphia Exhibition, in a further report to" the New South Wales Government gives the following interesting account of how the Americans propose to dispense with lighthouses : "An invention has lately been brought into operation in this country which'will not only do awaz with the necessity of multiplying lighthouses along our coasts, "but which will reduce the risks of ocean navigation to a minimum. This invention has been patented in Europe and America, and patents have been applied for in the Australian colonies. A working model was sent from New York last October in a ship which sailed for Melbourne. The invention consists of a large wrbught-iron budy, which by automatic action-screams louder than a fog horn, so that it can be heard in tempestuous weather fully 20 miles off, and in calm weather, with only the ordinary ocean swell putting the buoy into motion, 10 miles off. From Mr Cameron's house on ' Staten Island; • with the wind blowing against the Sound, we could distinctly hear ihe automatic roar of the buoy which is moored beyond Sandy Hook, 12 to 14 miles away. Up the centre of the buoy T is an/ iron, tube, extending downward into the" water below the buoy 30 feet. The water in this tube, every time the buoy is in the trough of of the wave, compresses the air, which in escaping causes the-roaring sound which can be heard so far; off. Eyen\ with a wave or swell six; inches high!a sound is emitted which can be heard four or five miles off. The ad vantages, of this invention are obvious, in enabling every danger to the mariner to be indicated day and night in foggy as in cleaT weather." People sometimes grumble (says a London correspondent) at what they call the large salaries which are paid to Ministers of State. What would they say £30,C0Q a year to a bank* manager ? I happen to know that the head manager of Coutts' Bank receives this sum and the two assistant managers £10,000 a year each. I admit these are big figures; but then Coutts'is not an ordinary bank. Many of the crowned heads of Europe keep an account there, and the manager has, as a matter of course, to mix in most aristocratic society. n

A. London correspondent of the Melbourne Argus tells a story qf a Hospital Sunday sermon, which shows the clergy are aware of the " ticklish" nature of commercial credit. The rector of Bayswater parish read out, oefore his, discourse, a letter which he said he had received from one of his congregation. It was a case of conscience:—"l am apparently well off," said the writer, " but I am in fact on the verge of bankruptcy. I should like to put my usual contribution—a £5-note —into your plate tomorrow, but I feel that it is really giving away the money of my creditors. What am Ido ? " The clergyman said that he had advised the gentleman to. give nothing. "And I give the same advice, dear friends, to you, if any of you are unhappily in the like position. Those, on the other hand, who are in- good circum-' stances will, I am sure, give in proportion to their means." It proved the largest collection that this wise rector had ever made.

The Waitangi Tribune is severe on the Otago/Daily Times. It says :—" The following telegram reached ids last evening : ' Will you wire us on Monday say 600 words re' opening Waimate "Branch railway? Hard facts.—J. Gr. Fraser, Daily Times.' Now, seeing that the Dunedin thunderbolt does not even condescend to exchange with us, the request displays a little too much assurance. Probably Mr Fraser is a very youthful aspirant to literary fame."