MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

Inangahua Times, Volume III, Issue 78, 16 February 1877, Page 2

MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

American editors are proverbial, for their politeness, as we presume it would be considered a breach of etiquette to inn form a visitor tbat his room was preferable to his society, one of the craft has vented a " mechanical broad hint," which intimates to the persons acted upon it ia somewhat about time to retire. He writes : — "We have tried the Bogardus kicker* we have kept a kicking mule iv our, room, we've used bull dogs, and kept shot guns and still people who bave nothing else to do wiU came when we are buy, and insist on baying us stop work* and listen to them " blow their horns" for aa hour or two at a stretch. We have invented a chair which is a success. It is made of iron screwed to the floor of our desk, and the seat is so arranged with steel springs that it ' lets go' every ten minutes after it is wound up. One winding will let her go three or four times; as it bas the power of a three-year old mule, no matter who sits on it, when it goes off it 'lifts' 'em and flies back to its harmless position.. It went through its first operation yesterday. A little chap, with side whiskers, from Cincinnati, came in to talk to us. He took his seat in ' our chair,' and commenced telling us about our l ' flings ' at the swillhouse below his native city. We wrote away, while he knew not things was working. His ten minutes was up. Flip ! tbe machine acted, and he was flung right through space, say fifteen yards of it, into a treacle mash tub, kept kindly at tbat distance to gently receive our visitors. He came out, ran down the street, but all the little boya were after bim. and insisted upon 'licking ' him, which we in our mildness, and in another sense, had refrained from doing." Frank Leslie's illustrated paper says that the collection of goods lost and found on tbe exhibition ground at Philadelphia would stock a mammoth store for a year to come. The- collection comprises pooketbooks, bustles, garters, scarfs shawls switches, fans, eye-glasses, furs, umbrellas, parasols, and wearing apparel of almost every description. At least 500 lost babies have been found and returned to their owners. The inconveniences arising from the neighborhood of high hills (says tbe Westport Times) wero pretty clearly shown on Saturday morning last. On the Mount Koch fort Eailway the previous night had closed in with thunder, lightning, hail, and rain and during the night the rain came down in torrents. Certain workmen were C3mped a little beyond Waimangaroa, and did not appear to expect anything more than the usual incon. venience of stormy weather when a mountain stream came suddenly down, and the men awoke betwixt two aud tbree o'clock to find themselves all afloat and in perfect darkness, with no means of light, as the matches were wet. Tbey had to clear oat, and that as carefullyas possible, in order to keept out of the paddocks and deep holes. And thence in various stages of undress they proceeded to wake up their better-housed neigbors on higher ground and obtain shelter from the inclement weather. In the morning there was an extensive prospect of seething and surging waters, and the place that once knew them now knows them no more. They have pitched their tents at a higher altitude. .

wm^mmmmmmaajmmmKmammtmKa^maaaaaaW^^ttf^^t^Kttt^iK^m In the case of Roberton V. Ross, lately heard in Dunedin, the jwors appeal to have made the not unreasonable application for the payment to them of something more tban the bare 20s allowed them by clause 64 of the Juries Act, 1878. In reply, Judge Williams is reported to have gaid, on Friday, that he was afraid there was no power for granting their request. The Act was very precise on the subject. It not only said that 90s waa to be the remuneration for a special juror on one case, but he that shall receive no greater remuneration- The only cours* he could suggeat for the jurors in future was to move Mr Stout, or some other gentleman in another place, to get the law amended. His attention had been directed to a decision in Victoria in a case where there was an agreement to pay the jury a .guinea a day. The Court afterwards held that it was entirely illegal, as being against pubhe policy. A large block of buildings, the property of the Hon Mr Waterhouse, at his station at Wbarekaka, was destroyed by fire. recently, and a quantity of machinery waa consumed. The wonder of the age. — New they exhibit a man at Uarnutng Centennial. Exposition, said to be the greatest wonder of the age— of course. The long suffering publice is informed that 7,000,000 pinholes, have been punctured into las flesh and that each pinhole brought forth a tear of pain. 7,000,000 tears. He is a Count, and was captured by tbe Tartars., For three years the poor wretch was, tortured with hours of pinholding and friction with Indigo. He is now rapidly amassing a fortune by exhibiting himself in a state of nature in front of a stove.

Writing of New Zealand in a recent issue, the Melbourne Argus remarks that the beat statesmanship in the colony has directed its. efforts to transform it— in the language of comparative anaiomy-from an invertebrate to. a vertebrate organism. This is being accomplished socially commercially, and geographically, by a railway ayatom, which when completed, will ran like a backbone from Auckland to Wellington in the North Island, and from Nelson to lurercargill in the Middle gland. A correspondent writes to the Poet : — Tn. jour issue of yesterday you state that a certain hotelkeeper had invented a " new" pastime for his customers in the shape of a maggot fight. I merely trouble you in order to draw you attention to the fact that the pastime ia not a new one. History tellauk that maggot fighting and racing was one of the favourite amusements of George IV. On • one occasion be and Colonel Brady 11, of' Uiverton, Lancashire, had a maggot nee, the. Colonel staking a large portion ; of his property against a sum of money put down by his Majesty. It was & steeplechase, and the maggots were started off hot plates, but Colonel Bradyll uia.ie his plate too hot, and his maggot died. Consequently he lost hit, property, and the result wa* that his son, who. I believe, is now living had to take an. appointment in the Admiralty. Chessmen of peculiar design, have lately beea maaufactured by. a Melbourne jeweller. They are made of silver, tbe white pieces, being frosted, and the black o^ydised. Thfr figures are characteristically Australian, the kings and queens being represented by blank. • fellows and their lubras, the bishops by emus, and the knights (with their peculiar move) appropriately by the kangaroo. The castle in a mia, with an aboriginal squatting in the interior ; and the pawns take the shape of the native bear. The following paragraph from, the Belfast Northern Whig- of November K)>will interest our teetotal friends :— " On Wednesday evening a meeting waa held in the, Court-house,. Bally nahinch, for the purpose of hearing MrCapper, of the British Temperance League. There were present on the platform the RevGr. H. Shanks, BonrdmilU; Mr Harding,, Napier, New Zealand ; TC«v -Tohu, M'llreen, Balljuahinch ; and Mr Capper After-some music from the Ballvnahinch Good Templar Flute Band, the Rev John M'liveati took the. chair, and called on Mr Harding, from New Zealand, who made, some very interesting remarks on the temperance movement in that country." The L ; verpool Conner reports a oaae in. which a baker was fined £25 for adulterating his bread, 20.72 grains of alum having been found in one loaf. The defendant pleaded that many bakers could not bake, without alum, and would use it without theknowledged of their employers. The stipen* diary magistrate declined to giveeredence to. such a statement, and warned the defendant that if he- came again he would be liable to be sent for trial at the session of assizes. Hedid not think the penalty of £25. was equal to. the offence, "a man should be fi-ied thousands of pound* if he was getting his living at the expense of the health of other people. '