WOODVILLE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 4, Issue 1012, 2 March 1882, Page 2

WOODVILLE.

j .. (from our own correspondent.) ' Woodville, Feb. 28. f I must just drop you a few lines to let you , know I haven't gone under, but news is scarce iti Woodville7 The only "little excitement we have had lately is a few oattle being ohopped, and people could not make out who was the perpetrator of these outrages until Mr Neil Thompson waß caught red-handed by two settlers' wives. He was taken before a magistrate at Waipawa, and committed for trial. I suppose in March we shall have Bome large bush fires, that is if the weather will ; only keep fine long enough to dry the bush a little, but at present it looks as if they would have to postpone burniug till next year, however I hope we shall ha.ve a dry autumn, There is something like 3000 acres fell and ready for burning as Boon aa dry weather seta in. _ About 6,000 acres of bush landuno be sold on 22nd of March. The plans and terms are published, and I expect there will be keen competition for some of the blooksj as there are a few sections really [ splendid land but the greater part is broken and rough, but will/make good . grazing land. ( ) The widening and footpatWtflVnc.nl. i street will be a great improvemenrto our r township, as will also Mr Jaokson's new i shop, the tender of which is let te Messrs Gilbert and Smith. The building it to consist of six rooms and a shop, and a ' really handsome front, The design is bv ,Mr Gilbert. . * ' i Messrs Monteith and Fouutaine's new store is nearly completed, and when 1 finished will compare favorably with 1 many Wellington shops, This building has been in the oarpenters hands nearly eighteen months, and it with take another three months to finish the house portion of the building, which is to be all plastered. To Bhow the scaroity of really good bushmen, the contractors of Mr Jackson's shop told me they would have to get piles fmm Danevirk, 16 miles distant,'as everybody hereabouts was too busy to split; and another gentleman told me he wanted 5,000 palings and could get no one to tackle the job, although he had offered them their own prices. The same may be said of post and rails, lots wanted but very few care about splitting. The sporting season opens late in Hawke's Bay, which is very annoying, for pigeons are very plentiful, flying about the township and bush outskirts in hundreds ; but there are no rabbits to have a pop at, have'nt seen a bunny {or twelvemonths nearly. The following unique passage, which is put down to the credit of an o,tago immigration agent, ought to take high rank as a literary ourioaily. Writing of the demand for female servants, lie ■ said "Onegood looking lass who emigrated, on arrival at the harbor of Otago, had six offers made from the shore before she got landed througta spiking trumpet." By the time the reached , the shore through a speaking' trumpet tho probability is she urouldboiany thing but "goodlooking.'-' Further particulars of the .mysterious doings of the "midnight barber 6f Wai pi\wa are to hand, It appears that after Miss Inglis had discovered that during her sleep her back hair had been' shorn off and had. given alarm, Mr Inglis, her father, immediately instituted a searoh oround th e premises to see if any trace of the perpetrator of the cowardly outrage could be found. Underneath Miss Inglis 1 bedroom window was found one of her boots, In this were the hair of Miss Inglis and a slip of paper, on which, written in'a cramped hand (apparently disguised) were the words, " I wanted a bit of your hair through the window/-l). L." This piece of paper had been taken from the sitting-room, so that the " midnight barber" must have wandered pretty well over the house, and he (or she) muat have been very quiet, Nothing valuable was missed, nor was any violence (save the Mir cutting) attempted, so that it is evident that revenge or spite must have, dictated the outrage. The Inglis family now nightly lock, bolt, and bar their domioile,