THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M Resurrexi. FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1877.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2585, 20 April 1877, Page 2

THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M Resurrexi. FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1877.

The members of No. 2Hauraki Volunteers, will parade for commanding officer's monthly inspection at half-past, seven o'clock this evening. The Bank of New Zealand shipped toj day by the Kotomahana for Auckland two boxes containing 3271 ounces lOdwts : sp^-f' .v,"''.".. ':':.y'/,* i -!-".-.";' ■".,.". Ti,. ';./■'"., A .MEETiNo;,pf; foot-ball players was. held at Mr B'obmsbn's, Brown street, last night, but as the. attendance was limited, owing to a niimbef of players having other engagements, the business was, adjourned until Saturday night. The skating rink at St. George's Hall has been fairly well patronised during the few evenings it has been opened, and there is no doubt that as the season advances St. George's Hall will become one of the favored resorts on the Thames. : At the inquest on the body of Mrs Cross, who died from the effects of poison at Parnell on Tuesday last, the following verdict was returned:—" The jury find that the deceased, Jane Cross, came to her death by oxalic acid poison, but by whom administered there is no evidence to show." If; came but" in evidence that deceased's husband had been in the habit, while under the influence of drink, of using opprobrious epithets towards his wife.

At the Resident Magistrate's Court today there was no business to bo transacted.

We understand that Scvi>t. Greenville of the Thames Engineer Cadets?, who carried off the.fil-st of;;:the caik-t district prizes, is to compete for the Cadet Championship of the Colony, ho being one of the thirty highest scorers at the district competition which is the qualification for firing,for the championship. He is, we believe, the only representative in this district. .

A complimentary entertainment to the ladies and gentlemen who kindly assisted at the concert in aid of the Walter street Catholic Boys' School was held at the Hibernian Hall last evening. There were about 60 persons present, and the entertainment consisted of singing and dancing, the songs being rendered by Miss Shanaghan, Mrs Nikorima Poutotara, Miss Hunter, and Messrs John Gibbons and C. Brown. The dancing was kept up till a verylate, or rather an early, hour, and; Mr H Robinson efficiently performed the duties of M.C.

When the question of striking a rate came up at the last meeting of the Vincent County Council, Mr Pyke, the. Chairman, stated that he doubted whether the subsidy on the rates would last five years under the existing financial difficulties of of the colony. He was in a position to state that it could not last.

Referring to the Governor's visit, the Otago Guardian wrote: —"Disguised as it may be, the present visit has a. political object,' and if political excitement is aroused, let the blame be cast in the proper quarters. The intimation that the city shall give a public reception to. the Governor we regard as a challenge and an insult. The Governor has demeaned himself, not as a constitutional Governor should have done, but as a virulent partisan. He has maligned and snubbed Mr Macandrew and Sir George Grey, and the whole party in'which this people placed, and still place their*trust, and now he has the audacity to invite this people to give him a public recognition and reception.

The writer of " Sporting notes from home" in the Australasian says:—The testimonial to W. G. Grace is likely to assume large proportions. At a meeting held on; the 6th inst., at Berkeley Castle, under the presidency of Lord Fitzhardinge, it was decided to make the movement a national one, with the.M.C.C. at its head; over a hundred guineas were subscribed in the room, and, I have no doubt, a very handsome sum will ba realised—" A small piece of plate and a large purse being," wrote the Duke of Beaufort, " the most useful form it can take." Dr E. M. Grace, who was present, said that he believed his brother meant to pass his final examination, and follow his profession, as a surgeon; he was not in a position to say whether his brother would play during the ensuing season, but if he did he thought he would retire at its close.

2Egt.es in the Australasian tells the following story:—One of the richest squatters;in Hew Zealand—and there are rich squatters in that colony—let a freehold estate to a tenant" at a rental, with the option of purchase for the sum of £150,000. In the course of the lease the tenant elected to purchase, but was compelled to send to London after his landlord to obtain the latter's signature to the conveyance. 1 When all the documents were prepared, as previously arranged, a meeting was held of lawyers, banker, agents, and the one principal—the vendor. The deeds being placed before him for execution he stiffly declined to signassigning as a reason that he " saw nothing to prove that the last halfyear's rent had been paid." Upon this discussion ensued. The tenant's agent - stoutly maintained that the rent must have been paid as a matter of course, and remonstrated against delay in completing purchaser's title. After a long and animated debate, a compromise was arrived at, on the basis of the interest on the amount of,rent in event of such not having been paid. This interest amounted to £30/ and the vendor agreed to accept half, if paid at once, and to forego ( all further, claim for. interest if it turned out that the rent was in arrear. He thus succeeded in obtaining a cheque for one hundred and fifty ; thousand^ and fifteen pounds. Now if this' gentleman had not been habitually particular upon minor points perhaps he would not have had the opportunity of dealing in such big figures.

The World remarks as follows with reference to the late famous elopement in high life :—" £98,CCD, the worth of the diamond necklace which.played so prominent a part in the French Revolution ! Now-a-days £90,000 is in the market, and may figure in the Divorce Court. Verily in the market; for the woman who has left husband and children for the company of an 'honorable' protector, with that :sum settled on herself, may try other society when her present rapid life tires and satiates. £90,0C3 is a large sum enough to tempt the tirtue of men; enough, we trust, to induce the injured husband to dare publicity, and secure some portion of the mother's dower for her deserted children. Would it not be well, now that' divorcb cases are so fashionably common, for a clause to be inserted in marriage settlements regarding the disposal of money when the xunaway episode takes place ? Certainly a new method is required to, check the epidemic which pervades some portion of the habits and customs of our upper ten."

The Melbourne Spiritualists apparently repudiate the Davenport Brothers, who once lighted up the ■ spiritual heavens. We rather think, however, that the Davenports first repudiated them. The Harbinger of Light says : "According to last accounts, the Davenport Brothers were in New Zealand exhibiting their phenomena, They do.not say they are Spiritualists (which for the cause of Spiritualism is well); neither do they affirm that the phenomena witnessed in their cabinets are produced by spirits. And yet,- for some reason or other, they are largely patronised by Spiritualists. When in our city they charged £20 for a private seance. And what, with other things, was .to their discredit, they had as a travelling companion Mr Keller, a noted conjurer and illusionist. This one of the Davenports admitted to one of tho most influential Spiritualists of Melbourne. And this Mr Keller (now in our colony) asserts in public that he had travelled with the Davenports more or less for eight years. It is the opinion of Spiritualists generally that the "Davenports have mediumistic gifts; but that they have so prostituted them to mercenary ends and low occult influences that they are utterly unreliable. It is reported that Hindoo jugglers could excel

them in rope lying. This much is certain, they did no good to Spiritualism in Calcutta or Melbourne."

The Pangiora Standard has the following :—"lt is a remarkable coincidence, which shows how well nature does balance things.inthis sub-lunary planet, that while the- editor of the Licensed Victuallers' Gazette is, and has for years past, been a strict teetotaller, the editor of the Good Templars organ, the Temperance Times, has always taken, and still continues to take, his liquor freely. Hence, probably, v the moderate and courteous tone in which, each brother of the quill attacks the other. Things- would be different if they exchauged places." ■ •

The Dunedin- correspondent of the Lyttlelton Times tells the following story : —A respectable young man some months ago bought a pair of unmentionables from a tailor, the tailor immediately after became insolvent, and his estate was placed in the hands of a wholesale .firm in Dunedin. The firm sent the customer an account for the article supplied; the bill was promptly paid, and to the firm's collector. Judge of the young man's surprise when, on coming to the office one morning, he, on opening a letter addressed to him in the senior partner's handwriting, found it to contain a memorandum from Messrs ——,' the liquidating firm, to the following effect—"Mr Senior Partner,—Mr Blank, in the .employ; of. your firm, owes the enclosed, iailor's account. Will you kindly see it is paid." The young man so treated was naturally very irate. He Lad paid his bill, and immediately showed his employer the receipt in proof of his assertion. But even presuming a case in which payment had not been made, the sending of a trumpery account to an employer is a practice that cannot be too strongly reprehended, and in this case the victim of the practice was manly enough to administer some stern treatment. He demanded that a written apology be at once forwarded to his employers. This was declined, whereupon he punched the head and wrung the nose of the person who gave the refusal. The police were sent for, but as the matter did not take place within their range of vision, no arrest could be made. The head of the liquidating firm, the person who ordered the letter to be sent, he met in the street, and publicly squirted tobacco juice into his teeth. A lawyer, whom he accused of putting the firm up to the course adopted, he met in the bar of a hotel, publicly charged him with having given such advice, and them gave him a quid of tobacco between the eyes. The compliment was calmly taken; a receipt paid on the 9th of the month for money claimed through the employer on the 24th, together with the liquidating ■ firm's letter to his employer has also been shown round Dunedin. So far, the person so dealt with, has been unsuccessful in getting the parties he has publicly insulted to take him to court, but at the present rate a crisis will sOon be reached.

Mes Caroline Chisholm, whose death is reported from London, by cablegram, was born at Wootton, Northamptonshire, about 1810. Her maiden name was Jones. When in her twentieth year, she married Captain Alex. Chisholm, of the Indian army. When in Australia, this lady took a deep interest in the protection of her sex, and in ameliorating the sufferings of-the immigrants who frequently arrived friendless and penniless. She fought successfully against the Government influence to secure attention to her representations. She was the founder of the Female Colonisation Loan Society. Mrs Chisholm is the author of "Perils in the Polar Seas,", and "True Stories of Arctic Adventure and Discovery."

Br order of the Lords of the Admiralty, the Admiral-Superintendent of Devonport Dockyard has formaUy and severely reprimanded an engineer student for replying to the examining-officer in a facetious manner. The student when asked " How would you proceed to get steam ?" answered,. "Tighten, your funnel stays and regulate your funnel draught, then look up to Our Father &nd say, ' I am ready to go home if the boiler fronts come out.'"

: An advertisementi appeared recently In a Melbourne 1 newspaper directing a;laiiy at Ballarat to call for the wedding trousseau she had ordered. Perhaps the following from the Ballarat"? Evening- Posfciexpiains^ the delay:—"A pretty little piece of scunmag is going the rounds just,npw. ; A rather grey-headed Lothario employed by One of our softgoods firms ' hung out' in a hotel in the west, where he was charmed by a black-eyed Abigail, to whom he made the last request,.popped the question, was accepted, ,and the happy .< day. was fixed. Part of the trousseau was provided and placed in possession of the fair though dark-complexioned-j/?awce, and things; were as merry as a marriage bell. .But even as at Waterloo, where pleasure was rupted by the boom of a cannon, so here pleasure was marred, by the shrill scream of Lothario's wife, who having from some cause or other thought fit to migrate from one of the adjoining colonies, came malapropos to 'upset his' little apple-cart; Let us draw a veil over the meeting of husband and wife, the grief of the dark intended, and only chronicle that those whom God had joined together ho woman has as yet put asunder, for they are both housed in the same hospitable hotel, while Abigail has abqsuatulated, though not without sticking to that part of the trousseau which was entrusted to her keeping. It is said that we are to have an action! for breach of promise, though we do not. exactly know if it will lie. That's.for the lawyers to say."