LICHFIELD

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 2609, 2 April 1889, Page 2

LICHFIELD

Local Chaxch.s —Mr W. Harray, one of our oldest settlers, has disposed of his butchering business to Mr 1). Gordon. Mr I [array has taken up snnelaud in the Te. Poke distiict, which he intends to farm. We. all wish him success in his new capacity as a farmer ; his loss will lie felt nspeci ally by tile Church committee, of which he is a very energetic member. Woi'.ks at PvrKTi-iii;:.—Mr 'Rich, our local manager, has been getting a largo amount of work done lately, be has had about thirty pack horses at woi k, carting grass seed from the Huuga to tho 3,000 acre clearing on the top of tho rantor which he has devised a pal.euv, pack saddle which only weighs about Nor !l!bs, a answers the. pin pose very successfully. II.: has also about sixty-live men at woi k in t ie hush sowing grass seed. The sheep the company got through froin Napier, (about, l-ldUO) have been distributed over the block in charge of shepherds who live away from all civilisation. The wild dogs are beginning to increase, and unless something is done quickly to them T am afraid that I'atatere will not be the only district they will favour. Mr Rich has about twenty acres of land laid down ill wattle, and very healthy they look, it >.- a wonder that the fanners in the Waikato do not go in more for the cultivation of wattle. If lam not mistaken good bark is quoted at about, £10 to A,'ll a ton. Licblield is suited in every uav for wattle growing, and wattle will in tiiua form one of the most profitable productions of I'atetere. .

GAMi-:.5.--.l > hea iants are very plentiful now, so that sportsmen will have plenty of birds when the season commences to waste powder aud shot over. Quail are increasing very fast up here. Tki.kckai'H Extension'.--Re tho proposed Lele,graph station here, that was first made public through the columns of Tim \Vaikato Tisiks and that Oxford is so indignant at. Oxford cooly proposes that tho telegraph line should be made to that place instead of to Lichfield because Oxford is the terminus of the Rotorua tourist traflie, and also that the telegraph would benefit more settlers there. Surely the Oxford people don't imagine that Oxfoid is always to be the terminus of the Rotorua traffic ' What about the railway the Government have made, and which will be running in about eighteen months or a little more ; also the new hotel that Mr Isaacs has built about four miles from Oxford and that will divert a considerable amount of tourist as well as goods traffic that otherwise would have made Oxford its terminus? Why should'nt Mr Isaacs try and get a branch line when he opens on tho same plea as Oxford '! And again, L think Lichfield has just a few more bona fide settlors than Oxford has or ever will have, and that's not saying much. Why, the manager of the Company here sends away and receive more telegrams in a month, than the whole inhabitants of Oxford receive or send in a year When the railway is completed to Rotorua, Oxford will be only a side station, while Lichfield will be what it as at present, the terminus of tho railway, and also of the traffic businoss of Taupo and Waotu.