PROVINCIAL AND GENERAL

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 209, 1 February 1872, Page 7

PROVINCIAL AND GENERAL

A publican's perplexity formed the subject for hearing in a small debt case heard before the Resident Magistrate at Wellington, on the sth instant. A quantity of liquor had been supplied, which the defendant refused to pay for, and how to make out a bill on which to recover was a performance Boniface was evidently not equal to, for in his anxiety to get at the defendant he had made out three bills, which were in turn forwarcted to that individual, the first being for "stuff supplied for the heart disease," the second being "To nourishment, £1 125," and the third "Refreshments, £1 12s 2d." His Woi'ship did not clearly see his way into or out of such a mire, and dismissed the case with the recommendation that the plaintiff shoved make out a bill pomewhat more specific in terms, which he stated his ability to do, though he was rather chagrined at his temporary defeat.

The " Wellington Independent," in a leader upon the Martin's Bay settlement scheme, remarks: — The utter failure which has attended the establishment by the Provincial Government of Otago of the special settlement at Martin's Baj , goes a long way to dispi-ove the oft reiterated assertion that the Provincial Government can manage the work of immigration better than the General Government. A great3r fiasco in the work of colonisation was never perpetrated. From first to last the Martin's Bay settlement scheme has been thoroughly mismanaged."

A correspondent of the Hobart Town " Mercury" writes: — "I was told by an Irish gentleman who has recently travelled through a great portion of the Huon that he believed that Ireland in her worst days never witnessed such distress .as he saw in many places of his journey." The "Thames "Guardian" lately wrote of the condition of the colony as follows: — The history of the colony is the record of an unbroken series of crimes and blunders, the avenging Nemesis now following us being the speculative borrowing poft'cy of Mr. Yogel. We have to deplore the alienation of our waste lands without settlement, the extirpation of the. native race without the progressive advance of civilized men, burlesques of the Imperial Parliament in lieu of representative institutions, corrupt administration for economic responsible government, the daily depletion of of our natural resources without increasing the fixed capital of the country , an overwhelming load of debt, for which there is nothing to show, army officials, for whom it is scarcely possible to find the semblance of employment, public and private indebtedness rapidly increasing, taxation the most grinding in the universe, also on the increase, and an indefinite indebtedness, according to Mr. Fox, the Premier."

In the late session, a member suggested that a tax should be levied on all photographs, but it appears that in Auckland they are far more ingenious. A correspondent of the "H.B. Herald," writing from Auckland on the 21st ult., says: — A late issue of our provincial " Gazette" notifies that a tax of five shillings will henceforth be levied on the erection of new ivater-closets. Some fear is entertained that, unless the General Government step in and put a stop to this species of legislation Auckland will quickly become another " Auld Reekie," impassable by night, resonant with a cry equivalent to the famous Gardes 100, aud pungently odoriferous at all times. I have heard this imposition of a . heavy tax on latrines attributed (unjustly as I thinkj to the Scotch element residing here."

The "Evening Star" says:— lhat "Heathen Chinee" has been victimising the banks in Southland to the tune of £500. The perpetrator of the swindle rejoices in the .name of Kee Chang, and has sevoral aliases. He was acting as " boss" of a mining party of his country men at Orepuki, for the last three months, and disposed of spurious gold on three separate occasions. The first was on the .15th instant, to Mr. Howell, buyer for the bank of New Zealand, who purchased a cake of amalgam, weighing 27 ozs. : the next day he got rid of a cake of 25 ozs. to anotherbuyer from the same bank; and subsequently disposed of a cake of 100 ozs. to the agent of the Bank of Ota^o. He then left the district and has not yet been heard of, although the police are undefatigable in ■ their endeavors to capture him. Two men have been arrested as accomplices of Chang, and the police found £38 on them, and succeeded in intercepting two letters of credit for sums amounting to £350. A northern paper says that there

are 300 marriageable young ladies pining in single wretchedness in Taranaki.

The Cromwell people are going in for a share of the General Government subsidy for works for the supply of water to the goldfields. The prospectus of a company, with a capital of £12,000, to construct a race from Coal CreeV to the Bannockburn, has been issued. A Maori chief residing at Eiverton, having treated an invitation to appear before a Eesident Magistrate, sent to him by a creditor, with lordly indifference, has beeu incarcerated in H.M. gaol. A work written at Wilhelmshoe by the Emperor of the French, on the organization of toe Prussian Army, has just been published by Amy ot in Paris. It is said that the Emperor has reclntly been engaged in the composition of a work on the re-organisa-tion of the French army, and on the revision of grades. Advices from Brazil mention the discovery of a most extraordinary tree in the district of Calacoras ; it was 302 feet high, and its diameter 32 feet; five woodcutters were employed for over three weeks in cutting it down, and by the rings visible on the trunk it must be at least 2,500 years old. It will be sent to a European museum shortly.