MISCELLANEOUS.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 139, 6 October 1870, Page 7

MISCELLANEOUS.

Four little boys, including one about 12 or 14, named Michael Fitzgerald, living in Little Bourke street, Melbourne, were on a recent Sunday wandering in the Richmond Paddock, near Jolimont, when they discovered a bottle of old torn gin and immediately set about drinking it. Fitzgerald, however, almost monopolised the liquor, and drank till he became quite insensible, and cold, as if on the point of death. He was taken to the Hospital where proper treatment after some time brought him round, and by night he was sensible, and as well as could expected after his dissipation. A pleasing and highly recreative amusement for a Sunday evening is indicated by the following curious paragraph from the Brisbane Courier of August 9 :—": — " A case of shooting, certainly unique in Ibis colony, occurred at Witty's Hotel, on Sunday night last. The person wounded is Dr. Doudney, late surgeon-superintendent of the immigrant ship Indus. It appears that a bet of £1 was made by Dr. Doudney with the Hon. C. H. D. Butler, to the effect that the latter could not hit him at a distance of 60 yards. Butler accordingly loaded his gun, and the doctor started to run down the yard at the rear of the hotel. He had not got many yards when the shot was fired, and the doctor severely wounded in the back. Mr Butler states that, believing the doctor was trying to dodge him by keeping within the shadow of the building, he fired at random, in order that the doctor should run out in the . moonlight, when the shot took effect as stated above. Dr. Doundney is so far injured as to be confined to bed, arid as his medical attendant refused to give a certificate that the wounded man is out of danger Mr Butler was arrested on the charge of careless use of firearms, and still remains in custody."

Two years ago (says the Western News) the Derby was witnessed by a young marquis who had been compelled to sell one after another of his ancestral estates, and who hoped to retrieve his fortunes by a tardy success. Another disappointment, further disasters awaited him, and a little later he lay dead, worn out in less than five and twenty years. A year later it was a duke whose losses were the theme of every gossip. He bore an honored name — a name associated with statesmanship and pliilanthropy. But the Duke of Newcastle had turned his back upon the path which his father had taken, and had chosen a path of his own — the path of pleasure, the path of ruin. He is not dead, but he is a bankrupt, and is self banished from his own country. A bankrupt duke — that is a new thing ; but before we have had tune to get accustomed to it we have had the spectacle of a bankupt viscount. As the Derby of 1868 had its Marquis of Hastings, and the Derby of 1869 its Duke of Newcastle, so the Derby of 1870 has had its Viscount Courtenay. Not that the last of these noblemen was present at Epsom on Wednesday. England is not a place where he can conveniently remain just now. But the Derby week has seen him before the registrar. He, too, like the exlord of Clumber, is going through the Bankruptcy Court, and a melancholy balance-sheet it is which he has to send in. Seven hundred thousand pounds gone — gone to the Jews, gone to G-entile blacklegs, spent on the Epsom Dowus, spent in the chaste regions of Pantom-street ; due to horsey friends in his own rank of life ; due to his own relatives, who can scarcely hope to see their money again ; due to creditors who have taken care to obtain good security in the estates held by his ancient family for many a century — the estates which the present owner has been toiling hard all through his life to relieve from the heavy burdens laid upon them by a former possessor, only to find that he has labored in vain and spent his strength for nought.

Carrying the mails in the flooded north country in New South Wales is no light matter at the present time, judging from the following paragraph supplied by a correspondent to the Sydney " Morning Herald :"— " A Mr. Napoleon Smith carriesjjthe mail from Forbes, pursuing the course of the Lachlan river down to Booliga and Hay, a distance of 250 miles ; and although the river has been in high flood, and, in many instances, inundating the va9t plains running parallel with its banks, giving it at such times the appearance of an inland sea, yet we have had our m lils regularly and almost punctually delivered. Some time ago I came up the river from Condobolin 60 miles from Forbes, with the mailman, and for 15 miles we came through water up to the knee pads of our saddles, and a strong current running the most of the way. The only way we got through was by driving a mob of bush horses ahead of us for a guide as to its depth. During the time of the first flood this year, one of Mr Smith's men, by name Henry Oliver, started from Booligal with the mail to Colidobolin, a distance of 140 miles. Ho went utraight through, but, finding the man who should have comeonto Forbes sick, heatoncestarted, on with the mail a further distance of 60 miles, when he was again disappointed, and had to ride 15 miles with the down mail before he was relieved, making a journey of 215 miles without leaving the saddle except for the purpose of getting his meals."