NEWS AND NOTES.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume IV, Issue 462, 6 April 1883, Page 2

NEWS AND NOTES.

It is proposed that the Wanganui Harbour Board should apply to Parliament for a further grant of land as an endowment. In reference to Longhurst's case a rumour is that the Cabinet is divided on the question, Messrs. Atkinson, Dick, and Walter Johnson being said to be favorable to the prisoner's release, and the other Ministers opposed to it. The New York Herald *tates that a Chinese coin 3000 years old has been found by gold miners digging in a claim at Cassias, British Columbia. It is supposed to have been left there by Chinese mariners wrecked ou the coast long before the Christian era. Preparations are in progress for the corning exhibition of the Art Society of Auckland, which promises to realise the expectations, both of artists and patrons. Local artists have not been idle during the past year, and several amateurs have overcome their natural modesty and resolved to exhibit their maiden productions. There has been considerable talk of late about the desirableness of starting a butter and cheese factory in. this district, and the "willingness ot farmers to join in an undertaking of the kind. Mr. G. V. Bate has now taken the practical step of calling a meeting of those interested in the venture. The meeting is to be held at the Borough Council Chambers to-morrow week. We notice that, in a letter published in the Post, Mr. Greenwood, the engineer of the steamer Hauraki, refers to the discussion in the Chamber of Commerce, in which the loss of trade to Wellington was attributed to the want of railway communication with the Waimate Plains. Mr. Greenwood considers that the real cause is that the Auckland merchants pay half freight from Auckland to Waitara, which is a great conaidoration to storekeepers. A most extraordinary item of intelligence reaches us from ths Cape, to the effect that our erstwhile most popular Governor, Sir Hercules Robinson, is by no means appreciated by the inhabitants of South Africa. They complain that he devotes all his time to horse-racing and gambling, and entirely neglects the business of the country ; and it is further said that his presont subjects will be only too glad to see his back, while Sir Hercules only regrets that he ever left New Zealand. After this (says the New Zealand Tiuies) we shall not be surprised to hearthat Sir Arthur Gordon is most popular in Ceylon. The Auckland Star suggests the following in reference to race horse handicapping: — " Let all recognised clubs in the colony appoint delegates, each club being entitled to a delegate for every £100 given in prizes during the previous season.. Persons qualified for the position of handicapper might then be nominated, and the decision be left in the hands of the delegates. The appointment might be made for ono year only, so that should the handicapper not give satifaction, he he could, without trouble, be sent to the right about. It seems that they can grow apples in Nelson. The Colonist leavna that, from one tree o£ ~K.ing of the Pippins, in tbe orchard o£ Mr. W Roddington. at Lower Wakefield, no less than 53 bushels of sound apples were picked off at the gathering, whilst seven, bushela were blown off by the wind and thus rendered unmarketable. The tree in question is 30 years old, and covers a space of 105 feet in circumference. Sixty bushels from one tree is the largest yield we have heard of in Nelson. With such trees apple growing should be more remunerative than the culture of hops. There ig a gentleman at Wanganui who objects to anonymous lett n rs in newspapers and this is how he expresses himself. " What more damnatory sooial nyctalopy than to sneak up the back stairs of a printing office with a letter — or a society dagger if you like — the perfection of antistrophe, the shade of the inimical, the apostrophe of truth, exhibiting the belcbingß of intnition, the the vulgarity of inuendo, the animus of profanity, the teachings of apocrypha, and which throws mud like a gutter Arab, with no principles of lex non scrlpta ; entering the seat of judgment with ex»anguinous mean aia pons asinoruw, and quotes pars 2>f"o loto, and then pronounces a seuteuce ; but a Roman would have said of such, ' Picnica fides, ne sulor ultra crepida?n.' " Mr. Lochiel P. Cameron is the distinguished author of this phillipic.