GENERAL NEWS.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 858, 7 September 1871, Page 2

GENERAL NEWS.

At a public meeting held at Hoki* tika on Thursday last, it was carried that a steam fire engine should be purchased for the use of the Eire Brigade, with appliances, at a cost of £550.

Under the heading " very latest," a northern paper furnishes the following items relative to Te Kooti:—lntelligence has been received from Capt. Preece to the effect that Te Kooti's track has been discovered at Waipawa river, a branch of the Euakituri. . .

It reported from Napier that Te Elooti has been recognised, fired at, hit t.vice, escaped minus clothes with bullet hole through blanket. Eopata expected to capture him. . . It is not true that Te Kooti is making for the Waikato as was reported. . . . The Arawas who were left behind intend returning. Agriculture, even in the most favoured localities of New Zealand, does not appear to be a remunerative pursuit. A Wanganui farmer, whose calculations may be considered perfectly reliable, in as far as his own case is concerned at least, and he believes it no exceptional one, has been making an estimate of his income and expenditure for the current year, and finds that, after keeping himself and family, he will have £35 to the good. He farms 500 acres of land, and thinks that for himself, wife, and two sons who have to toil early and late it is rather " hard lines."

The sale of the " Grey Valley Times" newspaper plant was to have taken place at the Ahaura on Saturday last. The "West Coast Times" gives the following particulars of its career:— The plant, or at least part of the plant, by which the " Grey Valley Times" was produced may now be said to have had a strange eventful history. Its first production was the " Eiverton Times;" its second the " Waikouaiti Herald." It was then transported to Okarito, where the first " Westland Observer" was itß product. Subsequently it became the medium of printing the " Evening Star" at Westport ; still later the " Daily News" in Hokitika; and finally it was transferred to the Ahaura, where it meantime remains as a printing plant of decidedly unfortunate and unprofitable associations.

A shocking instance of juvenilo depravity came under the notice of the Melbourne Bench on the 15th uifc., when two girls, named Emma Lee and Eliza Doran, aged, apparently, 14 and 12 respectively, were charged with soliciting prostitution. At about nine o'clock on Monday night they accosted a man in Flinders-street, who, finding their character, kept them in conversation until the constable on the beat came past, when he gave them in charge. They said they came from Emerald-hill to look for a situation in Melbourne, and the Bench remanded them till Thursday, pending inquiry about them.