LATE INTERPROVINCIAL.

Westport Times, Volume VIII, Issue 1165, 7 April 1874, Page 2

LATE INTERPROVINCIAL.

The Cromwell Quartz Company (Otago) the other day finished u crushing of 54 tons, which yielded oOOoz of retorted gold; they were driving towards the Reliance, with tho reef rich and strong. The men in tho latter company think they have struck tho same reef, but cannot yet tell, till tho shaft is squared up. Two shocks of earthquake were felt on March 25. At Lyttelton the first occurred at 12.10 a.m., the second at 12.15. It was thought that tho direction was from east to west. A correspondent of the Lyttelton Times, writing from Irewoll, says that the shocks were felt at 12.10 and 12.15 a.m. The earthquake was also felt at llikaia and Seljvyn, but the time is stated to have been midnight. "iEgles," in the Australasian, says: —" From information received, I believe that a bank of Victorian origin, carrying on bnsiness in the colonies to the westward, is going east for the first time. We shall soon hear of the extension of its transactions to, and tho opening up of branches in, New Zealand. Its enterprise deserves success. A contracting firm have proposed to bring over to Auckland a thousand English navvies, who have recently been engaged on railway works in Tasmauia. There was another enormous sale of waste land tho other clay at the ordinary bi-weekly sitting *of the Canterbury Waste Land Board, amounting to 10,8S1 acres, realising £2J.,7G2.

The first consignment of Jarrah sleepers for the General Government, arrived at Lyttelton on the lGth, in the Fleur da Maurice, from Basse, which also brings 18,000 ft of timber. The City of Christchurch has just been assessed for the year, and shows a total of £112,950, being an increase of £IO.OCO over that of last year. The Auckland correspondent of the Otago Daily Times states:—"A petition was sent in this morning by the other life prisoners to the Governor of the gaol, urging that the murderer, as they call Sullivan, may not be put into the same part of the building with them. It is probably as an informer that Sullivan is most obnoxious to these gentry, but his life will certainly be neither secure nor pleasant among them. There is a story told here which is, I believe true, although it has not yet appeared in print, to the effect that he once had a very narrow escape in Dunedin gaol. While overlooking a poi of boiling pitch, another of the prisoners stepp3d behind him, and would assuredly have had him in head foremost, but for the intervention of the Warder. Some such fate will await him if among the prisoners in Mount Eden."

The Otago Daily Times says :—Mr J Bathgate, the new Resident Magist"ate, seems to be painfully conscious that the eyes of the public are upon him and has even gone so far as to deliver one of his eloquent addresses to the reporters. Upon this occas'on his address was a short one, and to the point. The R. M. was kind enough to instruct (he reporters as to their duties, and to impress upon them the necessity of reporting his remarks with the utmost cave. His Worship's lectures to Bacchanalian new chums, his profound remarks on the sin of thieving, the judicial tears ho sheds over the fallen ones of the opposite sex who come before him, the manner in which he tempers justice with mercy, and the longtime lie takes to do it, are all worthy of record ; but then we have not the space. " John" Again.—" We hear of a robbery of a peculiar kind at luvcrcargill. As the story is told, it seems a contractor went into a Chinese store in that town with the object of securing the employment of Celestial laborers! While there he was generously invited to smoke the ' calumet of peace' in the shape of opium, which had the effect of rendering the unwary employer of ' John' insensible. When he came" to himself he was minus a valuable diamond ring which had been taken from his finger." (