The Westport Times AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. In the cause of Truth and Justice we strive. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1871.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 896, 5 December 1871, Page 2

The Westport Times AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. In the cause of Truth and Justice we strive. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1871.

The schooner Northern Light, Captain James Farrell, left Melbourne for Westport on the 23rd alt., and after a fine passage of eight and a half days, anchored in the roadstead on Saturday. The wind being too light to attempt the bar accepted a tow from the steamer Kennedy on Sunday about mid-day. During tli2 passage Captain Farrell reports having kept company for three days with the brigantine Stranger, which on parting company was steering eastward for Cook's Straits. The vessel commenced unloading yesterday, and wheu the cargo is discharged she will proceed to Melbourne direct, should sufficient passenger inducement offer. Intending passengers are requested to apply early to John Corr, agent. At a meeting at the Post Office Hotel yesterday evening, it was decided to hold sports on Boxing Day and races on January 1 and 2. We learn that the sales of land by natives in the Province of Hawke's Bay, since the passage of the Native Lands Act, are 320,000 acres, which were sold for £87,012, about 8s an acre. A sudden death, resulting from a life of intemperance, occurred at the Timaru Hospital, on the 20th ult. An elderly female, named Mundy, bettor known as " Scotch Maggie," was taken in ailing, and died shortly after admission. Dr Carr is continuing his mesmeric and phrenological seances in the neighbourhood of Wellington. Kereopa, the murderer of the Rev. Mr Volkner, has at last been captured by a party of natives sent out by Ropata. He was lodged in the gaol at Napier on the 27 la ult., and immediately cut his throat with a razor he had concealed. The turnkey who observed the Act knocked him down, and the wound was sown up. Ro pata has been paid the reward of £IOOO for his capture. At the R. M. Court, Westport, yesterday, Robert Mead was charged before S. Thorpe, Esq., J.P., with having violently assaulted a woman named Margaret Reid. Sergeant Kiely asked for a remand, in order that the ease might be heard before two justices. The case is set down for hearing to-day. Joseph Shaw, for drunkenness, was fiued 205., or in default 48 hours' imprisonment. The usual monthly meeting of the Hospital Committee will take place this evening at the Court House at eight o'clock. The now Sta np Act which came into operation on Dec3in'oer Ist altered the stamp on cheques, drafts, and orders, hitherto liable to a penny stamp, to twopence, and the mode of cancelling the stamp is altered, so as to correspond with that introduced in 1870 for cancelling adhesive stamps on bills, i.e., the maker must so sign his name across the stamp that " part of the signature may be left on the left side of the stamp, part on the stamp itself, and part on the right side of the stamp. No date need be written on the stamp." Pa sons having forms bearing the impressed stamp of one penny can make them available by affixing a penny receipt stamp, and signing across the latter. Tho twopenny stamp on receipts will be cancelled with initials and date in the manner hitherto adopted. An omission to comply with the above requirements makes a cheque valueless, and entails a heavy penalty on the maker. Yet; we should scarcely think in common jintice in tho event of an information being laid the penalty would be enforced, or a conviction pressed for, as the Act has come into operation so shortly after its being made law as to render it impossible fo* persons, especially tb.036 in outlying districts, to mako themselves acquainted with the intricacies of the enactment

A boat, supposed to be the one in which the Judds started in their ill-fatal fishing excursion, was found on the 22nd ult., on the beach between Otomui and Ohau.

Yesterday was quite a busy day amongst the shipping, the wharves all being occupied with vessels busily discharging, The b.s. Kennedy arrived from Nelson on Saturday night;, aud towed in the schooner Northern Light from Melbourne on Sunday. She left for Greymouth yesterday at throe p.m. Tlie steamer Murray, from Nelson via Motueka, arrived here at- two a.m. yesterday, leaving th- following tide for Greymouth j and w:is followed half an hour later by the p.s. Charles E I ward, also from Nelson. The litter boat sailed yesterday afternoon f< r Hokitika, and is advertised to leave here for Nelson to-morrow evening, to be followed by the steamer Kennedy on Thursday evening.

Captain Leech, Harbour Master, was amongst the passengers from Nelson in tho steamer Kennedy on Saturday. The ketch Amateur recently purchased by Mr Reuben Waite, i 3 now named the Pioneer. She is loading at Stanley Wharf for the Big River, via Karamea, and is to sail this morning.

Some slight alterations are in progress at the Post Office, Westport, having for object the connecting of the two buildings used by the representatives of the Postal and Telegraph departments. The management of both offices hiving been recently amalgamated has rendered necesiary the alterations referred to.

Another new reef is reported to have been discovered at the head of Larry's Creek, 18 mile) from Reef ton, and in the direction of the Lyell.