NEWS AND NOTES.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume 5, Issue 765, 4 April 1884, Page 2

NEWS AND NOTES.

«. B_The Railway Vigilance Committee meets on Monday afternoon. Hawera and Opunake meet in a lawn tennis match to-day at the latter place, A public meeting has resolved to set up [ a county north of Waitara. At New Plymouth race meeting, £3506 was passed through the totalisators. Judging by the amount of smoke arising from the bush to-day, several settlers are having the greatly desired good burns. The new Governor of Victoria was previously connected with the British Embassy to China, and is at present one of Her Majcoty's Commissioners for woods and forests. Mr. J. G. Holdsworth, who has for some years occupied the position of Commissioner of Crown Lands for the Wellington district, has obtained six months' leave prior to his retirement fro.n the scrvics. The sheep dipped at Ilayward's sheep dip trial on Douglas's station, Hawke'e Bay, in Febuary, were examiued on Tuesday by the Sheep luspector in the presence of Messrs Douglas and Hayes, the judges appointed by Mr. Hay ward, and found to be iufected with lice. The Wanganui Herald says of Mr. Walter Johnston that ho " has proved the worst member and the worst Minister the annals of any colony can show. Manawatu will never look upon his like again, and it will probably never look on Mr. Johnston himself again." The new " beauty," for the present English season is a young lady, a niece of the late Princess of Capua, who in her day was one of the loveliest of her sex. Tlie young lady attracted the special notice of the Queen at the last Drawing Room. According to all accounts, she is " divinely handsome." The details of G-. A. Sala's Australian tour have now been definitely arranged, and the distinguished journalist will leave England for the Antipodes in the spring of 1885. lie is much bantered by confreres as to his deficiency in elocution ; and, with the pluck that always characterises him, ho has consented to take lessons from au intimate friend in the mysteries of the Demosthenic art. His style wiU be that of Irving in The Bells. An extraordiuary case of shooting occurred near Brighton, Melbourne, last week. A resident named Hawthorn was asleep in his bed, when the window of his room was gently opened and the barrel of a gun put through close to the sleeping man's shoulder. The gun was then fired, and Hawthorn received a terrible wound in the shoulder. The police were informed of the affair, and the black trackers were sent out and were at work l an hour afterward. They tracked the footprints from the window to the house of Hawthorn's brother, and the latter was at last taken in charge.

Mr. O. B. Stone has resigned the chairmanship of the Auckland Harbor Board. Sporting men and others will regretto learn (says the Wanganui Chronicle) that Mr. Douglas's fine hurdler, Loch Lomond, who recently carried off the double event in Wanganui with a top weight, and afterwards ran so well at Napier, has broken down. He will be turned out into the paddock for 12 months, and after that time, if he can stand a preparation, will go into work again. A crowded meeting was recently held in the Church of Englmd, Dubbo, New South Wales, to supplicate for rain. The case is getting desperate, and a hop? was generally expressed that the Government would set apart a given day for humiliation and prayer for rain throughout the colony. Unless rain comes soon few busiuess men or squatters will be able to tide over the present crisis. Dubbo is not the only bad district, but the whole of the western and north-western provinces are so bad that only the residents and those passing through the district realise the present extremity. The libel case Gibhes v. Samuel came before the Supreme Court at Auckland for the first time on Thursday, when Dr. Leatham and Mr. Black were made joint defendants. An application was made on behalf of plaintiff for a change of venue, it being alleged that a fair trial could not be expected in New Plymouth, where the parties were so well known, and the special jury list only comprised 134 names. Judge Gillies said he saw no sufficient grounds for change of the venue. As the action was one witla special regard to character, it should be tried where the parties resided aud were known, and therefore the reason to hope that it would never come before a jury. The application was dismissed with costs. During the course of argument, his Honor remarked, drily, that the longer the matter was delayed the more likelihood would there be of the plaintiffs coming to their senses and seeing what a piece of folly they were entering upon. It was a piece of nonsense. —Mr. Cooper: It is an important question as affecting the profession. —His Honor: Decidedly; bub I\ never heard of such a thing before.