TABLE TALK.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVIII, Issue 203, 31 August 1897, Page 1

TABLE TALK.

» ' Supreme Coukt proceeding. . Board of Education met to-day. Steamer Tarawara left for Sydney. Auckland Harbour Board meb to-day.' The Governor lefb for Wellington to-day," British gunboats are now at Abu Hamed, on the Nile. "A Yorkshire Laas" again at the Opera House to-night. The British intend forcing the Kohafi Pass, on the Afghan frontier. The West pert coal export for the week ended Saturday was 5,750 tons. Wellington people are moving in tho! direction of gectin^fa graving dock at that port. The Government steamer Htnemoa is in search for the rock on which the Tasmania struck. Brave deeds on the part of British officers are reported fiom the Atghaa frontier. Dr. Jeffcoat, one of Dunadin's leading'physicians, died of heart disease yesterday morning. The Arama Estate of 2,200 acres, near Ashburton, is to be acquired nnder the Land for Settlement Acb. The comic operetta " The Gipsies " was: again performed with success at St. Thoma9: Schoolroom, Union-street, last) evening. The R.M.s. Moana, which left.Sydney last night ior Auckland and San Francisco* has the enormous sum of 675,000 sovereigns on board. At Bethlehem, a settlement on the banks of the Wairoa river, Bay of Plenty, a largo number of natives are now assembled, having been called together by Ta Mete Raukawa to discuss a number of questions that are agitating the Maori mind. Tho Tauranga paper says that three waggons are now constantly employed bringing in maize there from Te Puke, bat owing to the bad state of the road only small loads can be taken. In some places great difficulty is experienced in getting; the wheels out of ruts. The Native Land Court now sitting at Otorohanga will sit for several months, as the question of the tit-la of a very large block in the interior of the •' Rohopotae," or King Country, is to be investigated. A large number of natives are assembled ab Otorohanga. Dr. G. H. Haines has returned to Auck* land from Sydney, having come out tor Australia by the s.s. Polynesian from Europe. During his stay in Europe he visited numerous English and Continental hospitals, took tho London paeb-graduata course, and studied bacteriology at King's College and the West London Hospital for some months. Dr. Haines will resume his usual practice in a few days. The ex-King of Tahiti is a free and easy potentate, without any assumption of "side." Mr John Duthie and his party, on their recent visit to the island, were, «ays the " Post," introduced to the king at tho palace with all tho formalites of State, but when later on the party returned to the palace after having seen the eights of the place, his Majesty was discovered splitting^ firewood in the backyard. There are suck curiosities as domeEticated kings. Besides the indentured Indian labourers in Fiji, there are nearly five thousand frea coolies in the country to-day. Being of the agricultural class these free men are rapidly buying and*leasing land in and about Suva, on the Navua, Ba and Rewa Rivers. On the Ba River estates there ia an Indian population of over two thonsand* and the sugar estates of Labaea and Navua have each about 15 hundred of theee people, while Rewa, the chief centra of the Indian settlement, has a population of 3,350. A Maori who played for Poverty Bay in a recent match againsb Hawke's Bay had to be spirited away from his kainga for tha purpose. The native was not unwilling to take part in the game, but his wife and people offered such objection that it waa feared his Eorviees would be lost, and several pakeha enthusiasts, believing that these services were indispensable if tha reputation of Poverty Bay was to be upheld, made a visit to the settlement, and alter vainly endeavouring to obtain tho consent of the wife and people coolly marched the player off with them, put him in a trap, and conveyed him to town, whera he was fitted out with a suit of clothes and carofully guarded against recapture until ho went aboard the steamer. He scored two tries for tha victorious team.