WELLINGTON.

Thames Star, Volume IX, Issue 3079, 30 December 1878, Page 2

WELLINGTON.

This day.

The Chronicle is informed on very good authority that the Hon. Major Eichmond has been appointed Speaker of the Legislative Council, and Sir Wm. Fitzherbert will retain the Speakership of the lower House.

A circular has been issued by the Secretary to the Executive Committee of the New Zealand Rifle Association which states that the rough draft of a programme for the Nelson meeting comprises eight matches for volunteers only, four for rifles and four for carbines. In the matches the firing for the Champion Belt will be taken. For any members there are ten matches, two of which are for carbines and two for small bores, the latter being up to a thousand yards. There is also a consolation match. Between nine hundred and a thousand pounds will be. given in money prizes at the match.

The crops in Wairarapa are reported to be looking splendid. Hankin, a well known journalist, has I purchased the "Wairarapa Guardian. The' saw millers in Wairarapa complain of the want of railway trucks. H.M.S. Sappho left this morning for Home, having been detained here longer than expected, owing to the roughness of the weather preventing the coal hulk getting alongside. Saturday. The following gentlemen are gazetted as appointed Governors of the Thames Boys' and Girls' High School:—Lemuel John Bagnall, Alexander Brodie, John Brown, William Davies, James Kilgour, William McCullough, and William Wilkinson. ... ,

The railway working account gives the total receipts and expenditure during the

financial year 1878 79, and shows that the total receipts of the following sections of railway for that period were :—Kaipara (16 miles open for traffic), £1,723 ; Auckland, 97 miles, £17,695; Napier, 65 miloa, £9,734; Wellington, 45 miles, £4,531; Wanganui, 86 miles, £10,977; New Plymouth, 21 miles, £3,171; Westport, 19 miles, £968; Nelson, 20 miles, £2,455; Christchurch and Dunedin, 532 miles, £158,140; Invercargill, 167 miles, £18,695.

Not satisfied with the progress of the Wairarapa railway, the Government intend urging the contractors to put additional men on the work.

The valuators under the Land Tax Act for the several Counties have nearly all been appointed, and their shames will shortly be gazetted.

So great was the force of wind near Featherston last night that a roof was blown off and carried a distance of several hundred yards by the gale. . Arrangements have been made, for opening a temporary post office and telegraph office in the middle of next month in the Te Aro suburbs of Wellington, the Thorn don suburbs haying one already at the Government Buildings.; The post office will embrace Money Order and Savings Bank offices. The permanent office will, however, be erected upon another site.

The Minister for Public Works is expected in Wellington to-morrow night. It is said that a Pakeha-Maori has turned up who claims certain property at Pipitea Point, near the railway station, j valued at forty thousand pounds. According to his statement he has .Crown grants for" the property, which were issued to his father by the New South Wales Government. The ship Gity of Auckland, on the Otaki beach, broke her chain, and has again been thrown upon the beach, and is now laying broadside on, as the wind is still blowing on shore. Nothing has been done to remove the Hyderabad. Sunday. The steamer Glenelg has been standing off and on for several days with the object of towing off the ship Hyderabad when an opportunity served, but, owing to last night's heavy gale, the Hyderabad was blown upon the beach again, and is now in a worse position than ever. It is I doubtful whether she will ever be got off.