FANCY PIGEONS AND POULTRY.

Press, Volume LII, Issue 9110, 22 May 1895, Page 5

FANCY PIGEONS AND POULTRY.

Mr Bailey, of Ohristchurch, who was a passenger from London by the Bimutaka, brought out some pens of fancy pigeons and poultry. REFUND OF SHOOTING FEE. The Nelson Acclimatisation Society hat c passed a resolution providing for a refund of 10s to each person paying the stipulated fee of £1 for a license to shoot imported game. LIABILITY OF BOTELKEEPERS. A commercial traveller named Fothergill lost £40 front his bedroom at the Rutland Hotel in Wanganui. He sued the landlord for the recovery of the amount. ThejS.M. held that reasonable precautions had not been taken by the plaintiff to secure the money, and gave judgment in favour of the landlord. CALLING THE SHEARERS' ROLL. At an Executive meeting of the New Zealand Workers' Union at Waimate yesterday, a resolution was passed asking the Government to legislate in the direction of preventing station-holders from calling their shearers , roll at public-houses during shearing time. This cu3tom is prevalent in the Mackenzie Country and other places throughout New Zealand. EOADS AND RAILWAYS. The North Otago Daily Times says :—Over 6000 bales of wool were carted into Oamaru this season. This, we believe, is the largest number of bales carted in any season. Large quantities of grain were also carted in. All this means that the taxpayers of the colony have to maintain both roads and railways, while one should be able to do all the heavy work. RETURN OF A PROSPECTOR. Caples, the well-known prospector and pioneer, who was reported missing, returned to Reefton last week from the Marnia Country. He had been absent since the middle of February, and is in better health than when he left, which fact he attributes to frequent bathe in the Maruia hot springs, of which he speaks in warm praise, and he thinks it a pity a good road is not made to them. He found many quartz reefs, but none payable. He also discovered alluvial gold in many places, but in too remote localities to be of any use. POWERS OF AN EXECUTRIX. At Wellington yesterday judgment was reserved in Chambers on the application of the Farmers' Co-operative Society of Canterbury to compel the Registrar of the Land Tiansfer Office, Wellington, to place on the register a memorandum of a mortgage from Mrs Hay, of the Chatham islands, to the Society. The mortgage was refused by the Registrar on the ground that Mrs Hay was exceeding her powers as executrix in giving the mortgage. THE PREMIER AND THE CREATION. The Wellington Post says:—We have frequently pointed out the absolute unreliability of the Premier in dealing with figures, and his habitual recklessness of assertion in dealing with facts. His interview with Te Whiti affords a striking example of both characteristics. He told the no doubt astonished Maoris, and the probably scandalised clergyman for whose presence he had contended so strongly, that it took seven days to make the world. The Maoris are great students of the Bible, especially of the Old Testament, and this conflict of authority between Moses and the Premitr must have sorprited them not a

little. They would turn to Genesis, and there read, " And on the seventh day God ended His work which Hβ bad made, and He rested on the eeventh day from all His work which He had made." Respect; for the Premier's word would scarcely be increased by this reference. When Mr Seddon was about altering and improving the Biblical account of the Creation, we can only wonder that, having the fear of hie colleague,-the Minister of Labour, before his eyes, ne did nob declare that the world was made in five and a half days, the afternoon of the sixth being observed aa a half-holiday. In this way a valuable precedent for, and argument in favour of, the Shops and Shop Assistants Act and Saturday closing, might have been established. THE GALATEA NATIVE TROUBLE. A Wellington Press Association telegram states that another detachment of twenty Permanent Artillerymen left for Auckland yesterday. They will join the thirty men sent from Auckland at Rotorua, and the whole party will proceed to Galatea.—A Gisborne telegram says that the Hon. J. Carroll proceeds to-day to Galatea via Napier to allay the irritation which has recently occurred, to determine what police shall be stationed in the locality, and to inspect the progress of the works now being carried on in the Uriwera country. THE COLONIAL TREASURER. The following extract from a letter received by a correspondent signing himself " Victimised Farmer" is quoted by "Nemo" under the heading "Notes by the Way " in the Dunedic Evening Star of Saturday:— " London, Match 27. 11 Your Treasurer Ward seems to be enjoying himself in the City, and is flying about at a great rate. . . . Yesterday I got a card of invitation from the Percevals to meet him on Tuesday at the Imperial Institute, but fear I shall be unable to attend. I have, however, met him on several occasious in the City, and on one of them he astonished some of us by saying that his Government are limiting advances to tettiers to £500, and don't really wish to advance any, their object being merely to bring down the rate of interest. If they raise their loan (and Ward is highly elated at the condition of the market) can they legally nee the money for anything else ? I have never seen the Act. Ward seems a sensible man, of very moderate opinions." A PECULIAR FISH. The Bay of plenty Times thus describea a fish which has been forwarded to the Auckland Mueeum:—" The fish was 16in long and 4in deep, and the bacfc was perfeotly poluhed oxidised silver, being a bluish black; the underside was white, and marked with little round black spots half an inch or so apart, and with horny spikes about an eighth of an inch long. The gills were barely discernible, being but minute slits, three-quarters of an inch long, jusb in front of the root of the lateral fin, while the mouth was also small, being, when forced open, barely as round as a shilling. Neither Europeans nor natives have been able to name the creature yet."