Australian Notes.

Bruce Herald, Volume IX, Issue 859, 1 December 1876, Page 3

Australian Notes.

In an appealing leader on the resistance to the landing of the Chinese at Trinity Bay the ' Cooktown Herald ' observes : — " We Europeans in the North jare in a cruel position. We are : threatened with a danger not the less real because there seems to be no means of grappling with it. We are being beaten by an enemy we cannot touch — we are fighting with our hands tied. We cannot, as they are doing in Trinity Bay, join in resisting the law, for if the law is overthrown, all the horrors of mob rule threaten our very existence as a community. We can only appeal for help to our fellow-Europeans of Australia, and ask them to join us in petitioning the Home Government not to sacrifice Australia to the convenience of the merchants trading with China. Mean-r while it must be our endeavor to follow out the course on which the Parliament of Queensland has ventured. Tax the Chinese, throw impediments in the way of their gaining mercantile predominance, seek out the secret, of their organisation, encourage the slaves of the great com-; panics to throw off the yoke of their masters ; in short, call in that law under whose : shelter they have made their inroads as our weapon of defence." From Cooktown we learn that the aborigines have been committing outrages on the Endeavor River, and that several horses had been speared, one of which was; dead. The ' Herald ' says that Mr Shaw was ou,t looking for cattle, and

he found a horse, minus his hind quarters,^ with nine spears in him, the fleshy portion ' having been carried away for the purpose of a hi ppophagic feast. A gentleman writing from Somerset to a resident in Brisbane gives the following facts, which the ' Telegraph ' publishes — He says that during the past montir two divers have been drowned while at work in their diving-dresses, and that two swimming divers have been devoured by sharks. These disgusting brutes are now so numerous as to produce a perceptible falling off in the quantity of pearlshell obtained. One of the divers is described as losing his life in a singular way. He was walking along the bottom, which was very level and free from coral, when his life-line became entangled round a large piece" of cup-shaped coral, the only obstruction for a considerable distance. The boat to which he was attached was drifting with the tide as he walked on^ and, the life-line getting foul, the boat was anchored as it werei The strain thus brought on the life-line would appear to have drawn the diver dbwn to the coral, thereby creating such alarm as to cause him so far to lose his presence of mind that he cut the line. He might just as well have cut his throat, as by his thoughtless act he transferred the boat's strain from the rope to the air-pipe, which was soon pulled out of its socket in the helmet. The letter adds that it waa some time before the body was recovered. Ifc was on its back, and a knife was firmly clutched in the right hand. The other driver mentioned in the letter as dying in his dress appears to have died from heart disease, as, when hauled up, the dress and air-pipe were found in perfect order, and the pump acting properly. The first diver was a native of the Cape de Verd Islands, and the latter an Eromanga man. No blame appears to have attached to the boats' crews. In the neighboring colony the hot season is setting in with severity, and the weather threatens to be unusually heavy. AtWarwick (says the ' Brisbane Courier,') in shady positions the thermoneter has commenced to range at 80 to 86 degrees, and considering the time of year this is pretty well for Warwick. At Toowoomba, they have already managed to score 92 degrees in " cool " spots, but at Dalby they think nothing of that, and point with pride to their mercury running up from 96 to 100 degrees. A Chinese address was presented to the Governor of Victoria on the occasion of the opening of the Avoca railway, by Mr Too Chin, of Percydale, of which the following translation appears in Victorian papers : — " To his Excellency Sir George Bowen, Governor of the colony of Victoria. Most honorable Governor, — We, the Chinese residents of the Avoca district, welcome the representative of the illustrious Queen Victoria. What the good father is to the family the good Governor is to the people. We are told, honorable Governor, that you are a just and a good ruler. We thankfully acknowledge the freedom from oppression that we enjoy under your rule. Eeligions are many ; reason ia one. Men are all brothers, so taught our great Chinese Governor Confucius, and every man should govern himself and his family according to that sacred maxim, and should render to the Emperor, as the father of his people, that filial obedience which preserves domestic peace, social order, and national society. Hence on this day of rejoicing we humbly Jay our most respectful obedience at your feet, as the worthy representative of your great Queen, and of the law, order, and justice which native born-subjects and foreign aliens alike receive throughout her vast dominions. Finally, worthy Governor, our earnest desire is that you may be happy on earth, and that when you exist no more you may ascend to the sky." A notice will be seen in our telegrams from Penrith (says the ' Sydney Mail ') of a murder by a father of three of his children, at Collyton, Eope's Creek, not far distant from South Creek, on the Western line. The murderer is one William Luxford, a bushman. On Tuesday night while he was (it is believed) suffering from temporary insanity, he went to the bed where three of his children slept, and while they were slumbering cut their throats. The names and ages of the children are as follows : — William James Luxford, 13 years old (his eldest child) ; George Luxford, aged 7 years, and Alfred Luxford, aged 4 years. After murdering the children, their father laid them side by side on the floor. On the Wednesday Luxford confessed at the police station at St. Mary's to the murders of these children, and surrendered himself into their custody. In the afternoon an inquest was held before Mr J. K. Lethbridge, the coroner for the district, when, after evidence had been adduced, the jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against Luxford, who was committed to take his trial at the ensuing sittings of the Central Criminal Court, and he was yesterday brought to Sydney by the police and conveyed to Darlinghurafc gaol. Since tbe death of his wife some two years ago Luxford (who is in the prime of life), though generally well behaved, had been idle and, it is said, utterly regardless of the welfare of his children. Although offers had been made, since the death of the mother, to take care of the children, the father, it is alleged, refused to let them go, and kept them in a wretched state at his home.