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Grey River Argus, Volume XXI, Issue 2956, 4 February 1878, Page 2

Mails for the United Kingdom, &c, via 'Frisco, per City of New York, close at Auckland at 3 o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, sth inst. Also close for Sydney, per Estonia, at noon same date. We have to acknowledge the receipt of a copy of the New Zealand Postal .Guide for 1878 from the Chief Postmaster, Greymouth. By the Tararua, from Melbourne, arrived five ladies, Sisters of Mercy, who came oat in the Lusitania, and who will take charge of the Catholic High School for Ladies at Nelson. The Resident Magistrate's Court on Saturday was occupied by the remanded case against W. Clarke, late constable at the Ahaura, who was charged with embezzling L 5, deposited with him as bail. The facts of the case, as disclosed by the evidence, were briefly as follow : — Herbert Hughes, a miner near Moonlight, was arrested at Ahaura on or about the 15fch November last on two charges of drunkenness. While being searched at the lock-up he managed to secrete in his boots, out of the money he had in his possession, two L 5 notes. On the following day Constable Clarke asked him (Hughes) if he had any money to bail himself out. He said he had, and produced one L 5 note, which Clarke took as bail. Hughes, in the following week, was brought before the Magiatrate at Ahaura and fined L 3 on the two charges, which he paid. He then went to Clarke and asked for his bail money, when Clarke told him that if he (Hughes) did not give him the 1 5 he would give Hughes six months as a vagrant ; adding that he (Clarke) always got L 5 from those who were up the third tirm. Hughes afterwards wrote to Inspector Feast, Greymo uth, about the matter, which led to an inquiry and the arrest of the prisoner. The accused was committed for trial. At the first meeting of the Greytmuth Local School Committee, John Greenwood, Eeq, wa« elected Chairman, and R. Nancarrow, Esq, Treasurer* The great diorama of the American Civil War will be exhibited in the .Public Hall for the first time this evening. At 11 o'clock this morning, Messrs Girdwood, La-man, and Co will sell at their yards Pteston road, cattle, sheep, pigs, &c, ex Wallabi, from Wanganui. Messrs Mark Sprot and Co will sell at noon to-day, at their yards, Omotumotu, a number of fat cattle. The ordinary general meeting of the Grey River Steam Tug Company will take place at the office of the Company, Talnui street, at 3 p. in this day. Mr O'Dowd, baker, Tainui street, an nounces that he has reduced the price o bread to 81 per 4lb loaf, weighed over th counter for cash, and 9d if booked. In our mining report it wil l be seen that the Wealth of Nations Company has declared another dividend (the 33rd), of two shillings per scrip, of which there are 6500 in the Company, In a lettter to the manager of the Greymouth Coal Company the secretary of the BokitiVa Gas Works, Mr A. Scott, speaks favorably of the result of the trial of the first shipment of coal forwarded from the Company's mine to Hokitika. He states that a fair trial was given the coal at the works— 9 tons 8 cwt 2qr of tha coal *hen carbonised yielded 106 9-iOft of gas. being equal to an average of 11,345't p9r ton, which the gas manager considers very satis- ' facsory. Mr and Mrs Morton T-vares appeared again in the Public Hall on Saturday evening before a fair house. With the exception of "The Conjugal Lesson," the programme had been giveu before, but none of the pieces lost by repetition. Mrs Tdvares announced that after playing at Hokitika, she and her husband will play one night in Greymouth next week, prior to going to Revf ton. It is a sign of the time (observes an Allahabad journal) that the regiments returning to England during this trooping season are to be at once armed with the Martini- Henry, though, under ordinary circumstances, they would have returned horns without rifles,

and would have received a new equipment on arrival. In the 109fch the new arm had been issued to the men, who will be put through the usual drill and preliminary firing before leaving Dinapore The wisdom of this step is obvious in the present state of Europe, for, should anything happen to make the presence of British troops necessary in the Mediterranean, the transports coull land the regiment returniog "home fully equipped for the service, whereas if they were tent home unarmed, as^ has hitherto been the custom, they would only have been an incumbrance instead of a powerful reinforcement. Tint scourge of grapfc.growers, oidium, has made its appearance at the Thames Goldfield, where vine culture has been commenced. On Wednesday a number of town and suburban sections in the Totara, Mohinapua, and Greenstone districts will be put up to auction, at the Crown Lands Office, Hokitika, at 2 o'clock p.m. The Borough Council of Hokitika have voted L3O towards the expenses of giving a suitable welcome to Sir George Grey. The Bank of New Zealand h<w declined to tender for the banking account of the Hokitika Corporation. The following gentlsmen have been notn:nated as candidates for the Mayoralty of the new Boiough of Ross : — Messrs Joseph Gritnmond, William Lockington, and Ca-, mille Malfroy. The West Coast Times of Saturday says : The three bauking; institutions who were asked to tender for the Borough loan of L 35,000 have notified, in a most unmistakeable manner, that they have no intention of entertaining the advance, or even a portion of it. Each institution has adopted its own course of conveying the same meaning. The Bank of New *iouth Wales simply ignored the Council's communication, and made no reply. The Union Bank evidently considered that, as a matter of courtesy to the Corporation, an acknowledgment of the receipt of their application ought to be forwarded, but beyond thai they did not press the faintest opinion upon, or intention of, either applying for, accepting, or declining the loan itself or the Corporation's banking account. The Bank of New Zealand, who, by the way, are the bankers of the Council, left no misunderstanding whatever as to their intentions in the matter. They contented themselves, if not the Council, with simply stating that the bank was " not desirous to tender for the account." The following letter has been receive! by a gentleman connected with the Press of Wellington city from a well-known Colonial celebrity, who has beea lo3t to the view of the public of these parts for some years : — "London, November 30, 1877.— Dear Independent — Although you may not have heard of the ex-comic vocalist, I must not say that I have b^en idle all these years. By a catalogue I post to you, you will see that the great auctioneers, Christie, Mauson, and Woods, are selling my collection. I have travelled extensively the interior of China and Japan, learnt both languages, and had many curious adventures, which I may give some day in a book. I wa3 brought up by my father to the study and sale of old China, but unfortunately I fooled my time way on the stage. I have made far more money at my legitimate profession than in the palmiest day of my vocation as a vocalist. I return back to China and Japan in January. I mean, if all go well, to go a thousand railes up. the Yellow River in China to explore for old porcelain. I have sold at present in London old porcelain to the value of LIO.OOO, and have a large collection yet not sold. I am so full of business that I have to bo brief. Remember me to all old Wellingtonians.— Believe me, yours faithfully, Charles R. Thatcher." The following story, told by " in the Australasian, redounds to the smartness, if not to the honor, of Victoriaa policemen. We reserve our opinion, however, of its truthfulness :— The natioDal resemblance of Ah Poo to Ah Fum gets him into difficulties sometimes. A Chimman was on his way to a New South Wales Gaol to serve a sentence of a month. The weather was hot and the journey long, and the trooper — honest fellow — called with his charge at a wayside tavern. Perhaps, under the circumstances, he absorbed more than his fair shire of " the good tha gods provide." Upon looking round for his prisoner, that person had in the most inconsiderate manner disappeared. Hete was a difficulty ; but the representative of the majesty of the law was equal to the occasion. He espied a yellowskin peacefully harvesting a crop in a neighboring field. To capture him and place him in the police cart was no sooner thought of than carried out. And it was^only on his discharge that that Heathen Chinee could make known that "Me no savee what for me along of lookup — one month." The Thames Advertiser learns that Colonel Coope, the special correspondent of the Globe, who was captured by the Russians at Tef lis, and subsequently sent into captivity by them, ia no other than William Jesser Coope, who for some time resided here and had the legal management for a very brief period of several companies formed under h ; s guidance. Captain Coope came out to this Colony as a retired officer, with the usual claim to land under the Waste Lands Regulations . He had formerly been attached to the 7th Fusiliers, and served with the 57th Regiment in many engagements in the Crimea and elsewhere. He resided on his land for some time, and after speculating unsuccessfully at the Thames, he disposed of his farm and returned to England. The circus business must be very profitable, when such a large outlay is required aod can be paid for transportation from place to place. The following appears in a Melbourne exchange :— " Wantad to charter a steam or sailing ship for a trip from Auckland, New Zealand, to Callao, South America to carry Cooper and Bailey's menagerie and circus, consisting of about one hundred tons of freight, twenty horses, six elephants, six camels, nine ponies, fourteen cages, seven waggons, &c, &c. Must be competent to accommodate forty first-clas3 cabin passengers, and twenty Bteerage. Steamer must be from 700 to 1000 tons register, and ship from 1000 to 1500. It is generally understood in Christchurch (says the Rangiora Standard) that the eminent and accomplished actress, Miss Ada Ward, who lately arrived in Ni w Zealand, is about to enter into a matrimonial alliance with a gentleman fairly placed upon the official rungs of the Civil Service ladder. In a kind of address which Miss Ward made I before the footlights of the Theatre Royal last week, the lady stated that it was her intention to return shortly to Canterbury, with a view of settling finally there. She ab the same time took: the opportunity of lashing with startliDg vigor the theatrisal representative of the Press, whom she stigmatised in terms such as would make a thinskinned man hop from Dan to .Beersheba. The journal in question, it is thought, might explain away the grave accusations brought against its staff; it has hitherto remained singularly silent, however, and yet the charges made against it were aB gross as they were rashly and unwarrantably delivered. An Otago paper mentions that a "truck load of donktys " had arrived at Lawrence, ftom the Hon. Mr Larnach's station, but it does not publish their namoS.