UPPER TAUERU NOTES.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4470, 14 July 1893, Page 2

UPPER TAUERU NOTES.

(From Our Own Correspondent,)

A continuous downpour of rain, commencing o» Tuesday evening and lasting till Friday, put our creeks and rivers in a state of flood, and as many of them are not bridged, traffio was stopped, and bushfellera and set" .tiers awaiting stores by the oarrier were in coosequence subjected to great inconvenience. Considerable damage has been done to the road iu many places from Blips, and the loss of small bridges, As tho permanent roadman has expressed himself unable to cope with tbe work of repair without assistance, let us hope the Board will take the hint and put on some extra hands, as labour is now cheap and plentiful.

Tho reason why cats ato credited with nine lives I have never had explained, but I shall be glad to think that a neighbour's feline pet, which lost one of its lives the other day, by a sort of cremation process, may conclude the remaining eight, under more favourable circumstances. The cook decided to bake, it was a large colonial oven—the door was open, She olosed it, hurried on with the wood and soon had a satisfactory fire. The next process preparatory to putting in the dough, was to sweep out the oven, but great was the astonishment of tbe femalo domestio when out rolled the mortal remains of her favourite tabby I Poor puss bad sought warmth, and got it, but this time it was decidedly an overdose, This reminds me of the fate of two priests in China, who' forgetting tboir vows of chastity, were immured in a brick building six feet square without doors or windows, a steady quiet firo waslit underneath, and the executioner, keeping bis post outsido, regulated tbe fire, so that his victims would simmer and stew in their own gravy, and have plenty of time for reflection before lifo was extinct, This bit of culinary process occurred in Canton in 1862, when I was there. A woll-known athlete of the name of Bob Xirkwood had tbe misfortune to get his leg broken to-day by a limb of a tree, whilst busbfalling. His mates, under extraordinary difficulties succeeded in carrying him to tbe residence of Mr Rutherford, where an ambulance waggon was improvised in the shape of a stretcher fastened on to a sledge, and by this means he was conveyed as far as Johnston's creek, where a horse and trap were procured to take him into Masterton. As much of the journey was negotiated in the dark, and over a very rough road, bis sufferings must have been terrible, yet I am told not a murmur escaped him, Belies of the moa bird having frequently been discovered in such heavily timbered valleys as the Wangaehii and Mungarai, seems to confirm the .opinion of scientists, that this giant bird was a denizen of tbe bush. Many years ago a Mr Snowden, a'surveyor, presented to the Wellington Museum samples found |.in tbe latter yajley, and, later oi) a

leg bone, which is now in the Engineer's office in Masterton, It is much to be regretted that Rome large specimens of moa bones wbioh were discovered in the Waogaehu were sacrificed by. unappreciaiive bushfellers, who covered over the remains with felled trees. In the Wairarapa generally, evidence of that extinct hird has not been much found, as compared to larger discoveries down South. These remarks, 1 hope, may induce some of your readers / who have any local' information re- //1 I gerding this interesting bird, to make // f in known through your culumns, // f Throughout this tality amongst sheep has been exceptionally low, due chiefly to an abnormal amount of feed arid a mild winter,