GENERAL NEWS.

Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 931, 24 February 1872, Page 3

GENERAL NEWS.

Diptberia has broken out in "Wellington, and in one house a child has ittccumbed to it, and two others are dangerously ill. The warnings that have been given by the Press and by medical men, as to the penalty which tbe .people-of Wellington are almost certain to .pay if drainage and sanitary precautions are continually neglected, have neither been few nor feeble. At the late election in the Wairau Seymour beat Ward by a majority of' 39. Mr Joseph Hewson, a gingerbeer manufacturer at Tokomairiro, was lately found insensible on the road near Tuapeka. His horse and spring cart were overturned, and lying near. The man was promptly attended to, but he died the following day from concussion of the brain. The cricket match between Wanga-! nai and Wakefield (Nelson), came off at Wakefield on the 19th, in presence' of a large assemblage of lookers-on, I the Wanganui eleven beating the Wakefield team by 23 runs. Every man went to the bat on both sides in each innings. AVanganui, Ist innings, S6; 2nd do., 47 ; total 143. Wakefield, Ist innings, 66; 2nd do., 54; total 120. Wanganui thus winning by 23. The highest score was 24 by Sellon in the "Wakefield team; Danvers in the Wanganui eleven scoring tbe next highest, which was 20. Dr Samuels, of Wanganui, is at present engaged in collecting Now Zealand plants and shrubs for the Eoyal Pharmaceutical Society, and the Medical Beform Association of England, and will be extremely thankful to any person who will favor him with information and individual experience respecting the medicinal virtues of any of the plants, shrubs, &c., indigenous to New Zealand. We (" Wellington Independent") understand from a private source that the University of Tubingen has confeed on Mr Walter L. Buller, E. M., of Wanganui, the honorary degree of Ph. D., in recognition of his labors in New Zealand zoology. As our readers are aware, Dr. Buller, who is at present in England on leave, is engaged in the publication of an illustrated work on the birds of this country. The Bishop of Nelson recently, as we i("Wanganui Chronicle") think "wisely, if the rule is not drawn too tight, deprecated the introduction into our'literature of vulgar Americanisms and quotations, of the Josh Billings stamp. We published his remarks at the time, as some of our readers may remember. The editor of the '" Hawkers Bay Herald " does not like the Bishop's expurgatory, perhaps they came too near home to be relished, so he shows fight at once. For our ■part, he says, "we confess at once to a keen and unaffected relish for the racy absurdities of writers of [the Artemus Ward type, and if his 'lordship ca-a see nothing in thsir effusions but gross and ignorant expedients for raising a smile by means of bad spelling, &c., all we can say is that men possessed of far higher intellectual qualifications than those with which he is endowed have been able to see in them humour of the highest order." The editor of the *Hawke's Bay Herald" for one, no doubt. A contemporary prints the following letter, which, he says, is from one of his old and prompt-paying patrons : —Please discontinue my paper from the time I have paid up to. I do not stop my paper because I do not want Jt, but to get rid of an intolerable old bore that intrudes himself in my office regardless of time and circumstances, to sit for an hour or two, two or three .times a week, to read my papers, and fwho is a thousand times more able to [take a dozen papers than I am to take !«no. If the nuisance is stopped I shall I take the paper again. The ship Celoeno brought out the cylinders for the Waitara Bridge. With regard to this work the " Taranaki Herald" says:—"The woodwork ffi the bridge is approaching compleraon, and the contractors are only waiting the arrival of the cylinders, when they will fix them, and complete wen- work A couple of months should see the bridge open for traffic" q r It is proposed in Tasmania to inPUCe the « native-born" to settle on the Mauds by offering to them the same inducements as are offered to immigrants from Europe. An animated ifliscussion on the subject has taken pace m Parliament. LTf an ori g'nal idea like a pock ?—When it strikes one.