Untitled

Daily Telegraph (Napier), 5 January 1881, Page 3

The Palmoraton oorrosptmdont of the Otago Daily Times writes :—On Saturday morning Sergeant Mooro arrested a man named John O'Brien for a most desperate assault on tis wife, at the unemployed section, of the Shag Valley and Waihemo branch railway. From information gathered by the police, and a statement made by a man named Edwards, it appears that had the latter not interfered the prisoner O'Brien would no doubt have had to answer the spfious charge of murder, for he would undoubtedly have killed his wife had Ed wards not taken a tomahawk away from him just as he was in the act of making a blow at her. When O'Brien was thus frustrated in his murderous attempt, he went behind his own tent, and immediately after doing so Edwards saw a shovel flung from that direction which struck the woman on the right side of the head, just above the ear, and felled her, inflicting a wound about two and a half to three inches long. The prisoner had also, previous to this, beaten her with a large piece ox firewood about the body, causing some fearful bruises in several places. O'Brien was ultimately sentenced to two months' imprisonment with hard labor in Dunedin Gaol.

An American contemporary, writing of the state of affairs in Ireland, says :—" The Berious measure advocated by the Times Wmlast put in force in 1871. The Habeas Corpus Act was suspended in a district in Ireland, and power was granted to the Lord-lieutenant to issue his warrant 'for the arrest and detention, without trial of any person whom he had reason to suspect of belonging to the Ribbon Society.' The effect of that Act was magical. The district named in it became as quiet as any part of Ireland. The Act expired in 1873, but its effects continued down to a late period. The long line of secret societies covered by it extended over a period of. a hundred years. Toward the end of the last century the ' Houghers,' so called from their system of proceeding by houghing cattle extended their operations to the ham-stringing of British soldiors, by stealing behind them and severing the tendon Achilles with a heavy butcher's knife. They were followed by the 'Terry Alts,' 'Whiteboys,' and 1 Lady Clares,' and these by the Kibbon. men and Molly Maguires the latter society ohanging its locality from Roscommon to America about 20 years ago. The Ribbon i Society continued to flouriph in Westmeath, I Meath, and King's County until the law I made a vigorous orusade against it." The following quotation from the report the Salmon .Commissioners in Tasmania, shows how successful has been the effort to stock the rivers of that colony with salmon : —Last October, as has been the case about that period for the last five years, smelts, dressed in their beautiful, bright migratory scales, came down the water race which supplies the ponds, evidently making their way to the sea. Their numbers, however, on the last occasion were far greater.than any previous year—in fact they came down in millions ; and the rush continued for at least a fortnight. Many of them notwithstanding the efforts of the assistant to guide them into the Plenty, found their way into the ponds; but their restlessness and anxiety to get to sea were such that they always immediately escaped when an opportunity was afforded them. The trout, on the contrary, which happened to be present, never showed any anxiety to leave the ponds. Several capturds of salmon, of 41b to 71b in weight, have been made by fishermen with nets ; and a fine specimen, upwards of 71b, was taken at Storm Bay, at a locality about twenty miles seaward of the mouth of the parent river, the Derwent. Fish (Salmondoe), as to the exact variety of which various opinions have been entertained, of fully 20lb, have been caught with rod and line. In addition to these,a fine specimen Scdmofario of 281b, was found dead in the Huon River.

The first step towards the re-establish-ment of the Russian naval station at

Sebastopol has just been accomplished by

the removal thither from Nicolaefr" of the great floating dock and the machinery of several of the workshops of the dock-yard. Aslsoon as the newnaval barracks are finished the greater part of the naval brigade at Kicolaeff will follow, and in the course of a few years Russia hopes to be •as strongly established at Sebastopol as she was previous to the Crimean war. Of course, the shattered city cannot be re-constructed in a day, and it will take some time to remove traces of the most terrible bombardment the

world has perhaps witnepsed; but in a ceuntry like Russia, where Government i labour is cheap and plentifnl, and funds can be obtained without the obstructive medium of a meddlesome Parliament, the

ultimate restoration of Sebastopol to its original grandeur is not an impossible I matter, and the only thing that may delay | the task may be the belief that the impendannexation of Constantinople will deprive the Crimean fortress of its raison (lfef>re. Of course we English patriotically Relieve the time to be fair distant when the twoßeade.d eagle shall fl\ap its wings over thepalaceß anu.t;?sques'of Tsargrad; but aSI nations do not tfimk ! alike, and Russia imagines the conquest of Constantinople to be nearer than is generally believed in Western Europe. I cuidon Examiner.