Late Australian News.

Hastings Standard, Issue 115, 8 September 1896, Page 4

Late Australian News.

(n.z. times.) The Government Analyst of Queensland has found strychnine in the stomachs of both ihe male aboriginals who were found dead in a camp on the 16th August, an event referred to in cables. The poison was administered in a bottle of rum. Some sensational developments are expected, and arrests are likely to be made. A serious accident occurred to a child named Cecil Duffy, aged three, at Tamworth recently. A resident fired an airgun from bis shop at an iron fence 15ft away, and the bullet went through and lodged in the head of the child, who was playing in his mother's yard. The ball entered behind the feft ear and lodged in front of the left eye. The bullet was removed. A new phase ! At West Maitland on August 22 the Rev. T. R. Regg, incumbent of St Paul's was presented with a bicycle which has be, n purchased for the rev. gentleman by a number of parishioners and some friends. A sentence of seven years' penal servitude was passed by Mr Justice Rogers, in the Criminal Court, Sydney, upon Diomisie Delconte, an Italian, who was charged with alluring Catherine Eovida, an Italian girl, from the custody of her mother for unlawful purposes. Delconte had served a term of imprisonment in New Caledonia, and after his arrival in Sydney he took lodgings with Mrs Rovida. By promising to obtain a position as servant for her daughter he allured the girl from her home, and then by threats he induced her to refrain from returning to her mother, and introduced seamen to her for immoral purposes. A deputation of Brighton clergymen waited on Mr Moule, M.L.A., at Melbourne to urge him to oppose the proposed wine bonuses. The deputations explained that they opposed the Government proposal on the grounds that the wine industry was already unduly subsidised, and that the industry was accompanied by the moral deterioration of many of the vignerons, their employees, and neighbors. Mr Moule, in replying, said he certainly did not endorse all the views of those who had waited on him. lie was opposed to the wine bonuses, however, on the ground that it meant an unnecessary " spoon-feeding " of trade. On August 22nd the WilliamstownFootscray Association football match was played. A few minutes before the final several of the players exchanged blows, and the game resolved itself into a free fight. The umpire left the field with the ball before time was up without giving a decision, and the crowd rushed the ground; but the determined action of the police prevented a serious disturbance. At the rooms of the German Literary Institute, Sydney, Dr. .Schwartzbach gave an interesting exposition of the discoveries of Eontgen and the development by other investigators. The discourse was followed by some experiments by M. Schmidlin. who took an X ray picture of a lady's hand. On the plate being developed the position of the point of a needle which had entered the thumb of the hand was clearly discernible. He also showed a number of plates taken at his rooms in the Sydneyhospitals in which normal and abnormal developments were indicated. Votes of thanks were passed to both gentlemen. Alfred Dobell, from New Zealand, ; nd woman of his acquaintance :j.imed Grace Williams, spent a **■ I'dtli* l !" unpleasant afternoon on a recent P-:nd.v.. They walked around the town far i time, and subsequently j calh'" ■: trie house of a man named Thomas Young, a fruiterer, in Exhibition street, Melbourne. Drinks were ! ordered to be brought in, and despite j the Sunday prohibition law were easily obtained. After some general indulgence Young desired that Dobell should leave, but Dobell refused to go, and there was at once a wild scene. The woman Williams had several of her teeth knocked down her throat, it i iil- - 1. by Mrs Young, while Dobell va- 1 by Y'oung, who used a foi'W of ""od with such effect that Dobel' w.. rendered unconscious and ha; 1 . ♦<> be -nnoved to the Melbourne fir*;--," j Cr e one of the resident . -'nd he had sustained a sertou-. dp wound. Constables Holdt-n and 0 Sullivan, who were attracted to ttie house by the noise of the fighting, arrested Young and his wife on charges of assault and lodged them in the Little Bourke street watchhouse. A capture of men supposed to have robbed a till was smartly effected by the Essendon and North Melbourne police with the aid of the telephone. Mr Watson, butcher, Mount Alexander road, Essendon, reported to Seniorcens table Bivis at 4 o'clock that a draper's till had been robbed. The senior-constable immediately proceeded to the railway station, but a train left the platform just as he arrived. On making inquiries he ascertained that four strangers had purchased tickets .to North Melbourne. He then hurried to the signal-box, and the signalman at his request telephoned to the railway officials at North Melbourne, giving a description of these men, and asking that they should be detained. Senior-constable Rivis next proceeded to the local newspaper office, and from there telephoned to the police at North Melbourne' giving instructions to proceed to the railway station and arrest the men. The men were arrested ac-

eordingly, Silver to the amount of about Si was found on them. Thus within half an hour of the robbery the suspected men were arrested some three or four miles from the scene of the occurrence. , . Great scarcity of labor is reported to exist at Newcastle in consequence of the continued exodus of miners to West Australia. Notices some- of the . large colonies that vacancies exist in ._ their pits for qualified men are re- | almost unaaswered. The "J£*, . J

owners are now endeavoring to introduce a new feature. Managers are ap plying for labor underground, even if unskilled in coal-getting. They promise to find tools for the latter, and also supervision tc teach inexperienced men how to work the coal, payment to be made at the nominally current rate of 2s lid pec ton. In one quarter it is stated that some men have expressed a willingness to concede 10 or even 15 per cent of their earnings to their instructor for being taught. Old, experienced miners, however, decline to undertake the task, the principal ground being that where the coal is dirty or hard to get at it would scarcely pay. Another objection is-that such a plan is decidedly antagonistic to the principles of unionism. Some extraordinarily rich specimens were brought into Alexandra from the Goulburn, by Messrs Patten and party. The stone was raised at their property, •Johnston's Creek. Miners who were on the field in its early clays, and who saw these specimens, admit that they are superior to what were seen in former prosperous days of mining activity in the district. Mr W. Knowles, who is one of the earliest pioneers of the Upper Goulburn, Wood's Point, and Alexandra districts, has succeeded in forming two influential syndicates in Melbourne to work two mining leases which Mr Knowles has taken up at Enoch's Point; one at the head of Knowles' Creek and the other between the Jim Thomas and the Railway creeks, called the Reliance Goldmining Company. Very .encouraging prospects have already been obtained, and it is confidently expected that when the properties are opened up good returns will be secured, as the indications are most promising. " Only another trader has been butchered by the Mallicollo boys" was the remark made on board the steamer Amur, which arrived in Sydney on Saturday, August 22nd. The victim was a French settler, M. L. Ossi, who had been a long time among the natives of Mallicollo, knew all about them, and thought he had their good opinion. But in a thoughtless moment he is supposed to have given some of them a dynamite cartridge or two to kill fish with. One of them got his hand or his arm damaged in using the explosive, and his friends had their revenge. They swooped down upon the unsuspected irider and planter, and hacked him to death. After the murder was discovered the news was given to the French cruiser Scorff, and that ship had gone to the scene when the Amur left the group. The same steamer reports that the drought, which for so many months has destroyed vegetation, has broken up, fine tropical rains having set in. The islands are already looking firstrate, and coffee-planting and maizeplanting are increasing.