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Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 799, 8 April 1871, Page 2

We remind our readers that an entertainment in aid of St John's Church Building Fund, will take place on Monday evening at the Masonic Hall, Westport. An excellent programme has been arranged for the public and, we trust, ;to see an excellent attendance.

A meeting took place at the Hibernian Hal], Addison's on Thursday evening for the purpose of raising further funds in aid of the French peasantry, sufferers by the war. Messrs Eteveneaus and J ules Simon, delegates from the Westport Committee attended the meeting. About half-past eight -o'clock a large nun.ber having assembled, Mr Gallagher was voted to the chair, and briefly explained the object of the meeting. The Chairman then introduced the delegates, who explained the results already attained, and urged the necessity for further subscriptions. Mr Phillip M'Enroe proposed that a committee be formed to act in conjunction with the Westport Committee. The proposition was seconded aud carried. Mr M'Enroe was appointed local Treasurer. The lists were to be kept open for a fortnight, and a vote of thanks to the chair terminated the proceedings. Yesterday the Committee made a partial canvass of Addison's Township with satisfactory result.

The Charleston Hospital Committee held a meeting at the Melbourne Hotel on Thursday evening; present, Mr Broad, Chairman, Messrs Behan, Scanlon, Riordan, T. G. Mhcarthy, P. M'Carthy, F. M'Parlaud. C. M'Cavthy, Sbapter and Jones. The minutes of the last meeting were read and confirmed. Mr Fennell, one of the members appointed from Brighton, sent in his resignation which was accepted. In hi 3 stead Mr Buckley Weston wa3 appointed. The Warder lodged a complaint against a boy, an inmate of the Hospital for bad conduct, and he wa3 ordered to become an outdoor patient. Admission tickets, £\ per annum, were ordered to be printed. The permanent appointment of the Medical Officer was then dhcusied, and Mr MM'arland asked whether the present meeting could be deemed a full one for the purpose of arranging the matter. The Chairman said that it could not be called a full meeting as thej Brighton members were not present. Mr M'Par land might give notice of motion that a full meeting be summoned for the pnrpose. Mr M'Parland accordingly proposed and Mr P. M'Carthy seconded that a special meeting be called for this night fortnight, for the purpose of taking into consideration the permanent appointment of a doctor. The proposition was carried and the meeting adjourned. Bartholemew Murphy was brought before the Resident Magistrate at Westport, on Thursday, charged with stealing two £lO notes from a woman named Sarah M'Cullough. According to the evidence of the prosecutrix, Murphy came to her house in Bright street, on Tuesday evening, and from there accompanied her to the Orawaiti Bridge hotel. Tho prosecutrix had occasion to go to her bo:r iu the bed room, from which she took all note in the presence of the prisoner. The money was theu safe. They went together to the Orawaiti, and returned about five o'clock the following morning. The prisoner and another man accompanied her a portion of tho way. Murphy was left behind, and M'Culloug'h and the other man proceeded to har dwelling. Murphy arrived a few minutes afterwards, and the other man then left. Murphy and the prosecutrix remained talking for some little time, when tho prisoner, who was intoxicated, fell asleep on tho sola. Prosecutrix then locked up the house, nnrt went to bed. Before doing so, she went to the box.for the; purpose of putting away some ariicle of' clothing, but, finding it

locked, she did not trouble to open the box. On awakening, about seven o'clock the same morning, she noticed that the hasp of the shoe trunk was bent, &ad that the prisoner had gone away. She opened the box, and found that the two £lO notes had been stolen. She recognised the two notes produced as those stolen from her—one by a grease stain in the centre, and the other by a brown discolouration on the margin. The latter note was returned to her by Mr Simon, a storekeeper, and the first note by a man named Kennedy, who at the same time gave her a £5 and four £1 notes. James Kennedy, who is a fireman on board the steamer Charles Edward, was called, but failed to appear, and a warrant was is3uedto-coropelhis attendance. Mark Simon, storekeeper and licensed publican, gave 'evidence as to the prisoner having come to his house early on Wednesday morning, and getting drinks. He paid for the first m silver, and for the next with the £lO note produced. He gave the prisoner his change, consisting of a £5 note, four £1 notes, and silver. Constable .. tephenson stated that, in conseqaence of an informatioa laid by Sarah M'Cullough, he went to the wharf oa Wednesday, where the steamer Charles Edward was lying, and there met the prosecutrix. Witness remained in the vicinity about half-an-hour, and prosecutrix then pointed out a man as the person whom she suspected of having robbed her. That man accompanied them to Mr Simon's store, and the previous witness stated that he was not the man who had changed the note. Witnes3 subsequently arrested the prisoner. The police asked for a remand, for the production of the witness Kennedy, and the prisoner was remanded for eight days.—Morris Connell, charged with violently assaulting a married woman named Mrs Fallaha, at Addison's, was remanded until Saturday. The European Mail via Suez is due in Melbourne on Thursday the 13th inst. The " Mail" publishes the following as the result of the census taken in the city of Nelson. For greater convenience, the town was divided into sub-districts, namely east and west, the diyision line being the middle of Trafalgar-street. In Nelson ease, the numbers are—males, 1415; females, 1502 ; total, 2917. In Nelson west, males, 1259; females, 1248; total, 2507; grand total, 5424. The " social condition " is indicated by the following figures:—Married—males, 812; females, 90(5; unmarried—males, 1792; females, 1720; widowers, 61; widows, 114; not specified, males, 40; females, 9. The above figures disclose the unpleasant but not altogether unexpected fact that the population of the town is on the decrease, the total number as shown by the census of 1867 having been 5,652 ;or 282 more than in 1871. During the three years that elapsed between 1864, in which year "the census was taken, and i 867, the town population had increased by 951, thus shewing a far more favorable state of things than that revealed by the present returns.

A gentleman who arrived at Queenstown from Martin's Bay recently states, according to the local paper, that things generally are very quiet at the Bay. He also says there are not more than twenty residents at the settlement, and one party of miners at Big Bay. The ground being worked is said to be shallow, and the mode of working is by stripping off the upyer stratum until a heavy wash is reached, when the big stones or boulders are cast aside, and the remainder i 3 put through the cradle. The men are supposed to be making ordinary wages; but this can hardly be sufficient to induce the men to stay, as provisions were both scarce and dear; and it is most likely, as the season progresses, that the place will be deserted for the winter. On Tuesday—the first anniversary of Mr J. C. Thomson's arrival in the district on survey business—that gentleman was making his last observation from the Saddle, near Lake Harris. Sunday, the sth, was the first anniversary of the Martin's Bay Settlement, and although it has not made any very great stride, numerically speaking, it hap, nevertheless, risen in estimation, in a commercial point of view, as possessing a port which will one day be, perhaps, the chief medium of outlet and inlet for the Lake trade.

The following theatrical items relate to actors who are well known to New Zealand play-goers : —Rosa Evans appears to have made quite a hit in San Francisco, and her impersonation of Juliet in ' Romeo and Juliet ' is warmly commended by the papers. —Mr J. L. Hall recently became the manager of a. theatre in Boston devoted to vaudeville and burlesque j but in about five days after the commencement of his lease it caught fire, and was burned to the ground. He is said to be a great favorite with the Boston play-goers.—Mr. Walter Montgomery has been playing successfully in the city,—Messrs Batson, J'ollock, Morrison, and Howe are playing very successful engagements at Calcutta, in conjunction with Mr and Mss Roberts (Mis 3 Polly Leake). The whole secret of making Stilton cheese is said to be in mixing with the new milk as much cream as it can bear. This gives the cheese its peculiar richness. Extreme care and unremitting attendance do the rest, and now Stilton cheese is made everywhere but at Stilton, where, indeed, it was never made, except in tho way of aroat( ur farming, by the landlord of tho 801 l Inn.

The ship Caduceug, which arrived at Auckland last week, successfully landed five hares out of six shipped in London, only one having died on the voyage, and that when close to Now Zealand. She also landed 125 yellowhammers out of 250 shipped. A firm of civil engineers in London, Phillip Brammon and Co, profess to have solved the whole problem of aerial navigation, and state that they could have utilised their invention to carry provisions into Paris. Thiir new " air-packeV as they term it, can be raised to any height in the air, or lowered, at pleasure, It can go either with or against the wind, as the steersman chooses, at a speed varying from four to sixteen knots an hour. Each airpacket would carry from one to two tons, besides passengera, crew, and equipment. Had the siege of Pari3 lasted ever so long, a fleet could have been secured numerous enough to carry in all that was needed in way of food. It i 3 added that the Prussians could not dostroy these ve33els, but would suffer terrible injury in the attempt.— " Western Daily Press." Scarlet fever is now raging in almost all the country districts of Otago, and has made its appearance in Dunedin. The deaths are numerous, and considerable alarm prevails. Tho "Wellington Post" says that the new Bishop of Dunadin is to be consecrated on Ascension Day, 18th May, when it i 3 expected that the Primate and the Bishops of Wellington, Nelson, and Auckland, will assist in the ceremony.

We extract from the " Times " the following interesting statement a3 to the recorit progress o? the shipping trado ia Iha North ot England, which shows, iu another field, what has lately attracted some notice in connection with the Suez Canal—the

rapidity with which screw steamers are gaining upon sailing ships in the carrying trade of the world:—" The most remarkable circumstance in connection with the iron steam shipbuilding trade of 1870 in the North is the extraordinary increase in the number of steamers that have been built for local owners. The vessels are mostly held by partnerships, each share being of the value of between £2OO and £3OO. North Shields, which had scarcely a ton of iron steam shipping five years ago, will have steam shipping property worth a million sterling, it is anticipated, by the end of 1871. There has been a very great increase in the number of iron steamers owned by Newcastle in 1870; and Sunderland and South Shields are going extensively into iron steam shipping property. If the trade developes at the rate it has done during the past year, sailing ships on the Northern rivers in ten years' time will be as rare as stage coaches in the streets of London. The steam-ship-ping North did well in 1870. Some of the steamers returned as much as 40 per cent, to their owners, and very few of the new vessels made less than 25 per cent." One of the reasons why steamers are so rapidly displacing sailing ships is no doubt the greater effectiveness of the same tonnage —a steamer, though a far more expensive article, doing several times the work of a sailing ship of similar capacity. Hence a single steamer of large size may easily cut out a whole fleet of sailing ships. The statement as to the profits of the new steamers is very remarkable, and there must be some special circumstances in the Northern trade to account for such large profits, when shipowning generally has been unprofitable.—" Economist," Jan. 14.

A remarkable instance of the power of the Press in eliciting sympathy for a£>rdjri"and distressed people is now being exhibited. Some few months since a correspondent ot the t; Daily New< " detailed the harassing sights he witnessed among the vill ges rieso lated by the tread of war in the North of Prince. A few days after the pr ]>rie f ors initiated a fund for the aid ol the helpless peopi;. They healed the subscription list themselves with one hundred guineas. Some two hundred or more pounds were contributed on the first appealance of the appeal, whi h has been continued day after d iv until, without personal solieitaion of anyki id, nearly fifteen thousand pounds have now been subscribed. The proprietors deduct nothi'ig for administration of the fund -, they themselves miint in gentlemen to do that. Truly the " Daly News " re'i«f fund is the noblest monument that could bo erected to the benijrant influence of that great journal.

The "Medical Press " warns ladies ngainst wearing green gloves. Tt mentions a case in which skin poisoning resulted from their us , an arsenical salt being used to produce the color.

According to late accounts from America regarding the exploration for a canal roue from the Atlantic to the Pacific, it appear* that thus far the only one definitely pronounced hopeless is that of Panam i. The " pass " asserted to have bjen discovered by aDr Cullen twenty years ago has been ascertained to have no existenc \ alt <>ugh last year on the commencement of the United States' explorati ns, it was attempted to reassert his title to acknowledgement in connection w rh. it, so as to secure the ad antage in case anything of the kind should be found. The Atrato route, the most southerly of the whole, has h?en partially eximined al-o, with unfavorable result; but there are still some researches to be madj bsfore a final judgment can lie pronounced. The Nicaragua and Tehua'itepec are those on which expectations are now concentrated, and there are active personal and 'oc il. as well as national,interests mixed up with the question of preferonc •. On the whole the balance of opinion stil incl nes to the Nicaraguan as the one that aiil ultimately prove to possess the best recommendations of practicability and cheapness.

Mr S. W. Mnquay, of Sunken Vessels Be-co>-ery fame, writes very triumphantly of his doings. The " Ballarat Stiir" publishes a letter from him at 'Dublin t~> the present secretary of t!ie Australian Vessels Recovery Company, in which he states that nothing has been d ne with the Brother Jonathan, but he has " managed to astonish the nalires here. A large schooner, tho Aginora, with 800 tons of wheat, on board, sank in a gale off (he lighthouse in Dublin Bay. There was about thirty-five feet of water at high tide. She struck and went down in twenty minutes. Well, for about ten days tho underwriters were working at her with steamers and steam apparatus, and at last, on Wednesday, the 21st, they ahandjned her, and we got possession. I had been down previously, and had all arranged, lor I saw they could not do it. Well, on thenext morning, Thur.-diy, the 22nd, she was brought in safely and put into d' cfc. So you may imagine how all the people looked. It was done so quickly that the pa|.er3 eould scarcely get word, as no word was sent in, for ' olyious reasons,' as we do not like to make any display now. I did not receive any letters from you for the last four mails, so do not know what you are doing; but it seems to me you are losing a great de il of time, as there are plenty of vessels now down, and going down daily, and I am sure it woul 1 be better for you to be making some money than lying idle. As an idea for yon, I may say the firm net about £SOO by one night's work."