The Arrow Observer, AND LAKES DISTRICT CHRONICLE. Arrowtown, Thursday, April 18, 1878 Local and General News.

Lake County Press, Volume VII, Issue 356, 18 April 1878, Page 2

The Arrow Observer, AND LAKES DISTRICT CHRONICLE. Arrowtown, Thursday, April 18, 1878 Local and General News.

At the Volunteer Demonstration on Monday Capt. Heywood (Invercargill Artillery, takes charge; and 119 men and ofiicers accompany him from Invercargill. Capt. T. Chalmers Eeid will represent the Wakari Dangers, and Lieut. Muir the Dunedin Artillery on the occasion. The total number of Volunteers expected to bo present is about 400We learn that the Macetown Public Crushing Battery was started last Saturday, and works smoothly and well—the work generally reflecting great credit upon the contractors, Messrs Kincaid and M'Queen, of Dunedin. The Gladstone Company’s stone is the first being operated upon, and confident expectations are rife that the yield will be a magnificent one. The stone from the Tipperary will be put through on completion of the above crushing, and as it appears to be of equal richness, similar hopes are entertained as to the result. Other companies wishing to test their reefs have now an excellent opportunity, and there can bo no excuse for further delay. Mr G-. B. Douglas has been appointed manager. The residents generally express themselves pleased that the appointment has fallen to a local man, and one in whom they have every confidence. We have reason to believe that the holding of District Court sittings at Arrowtown Las been decided on, and that the dates of such sittings will shortly be announced. Mr J. P. Armstrong lectured in the Library Hall on Saturday evening last, his subject being “Early Days in Victoria. The audience, we are sorry to say, was a sparse one; but this was, doubtless, owing to the fact that many who would have been present had been up all Friday night at the Good Templar dance. Those, however, who wore there bad, as we anticipated, a most enjoyable evening. We would direct special attention to an announcement in our advertising columns regarding a sale of mining property at Macetown. We understand that the only reason the proprietors have for selling is that they have taken up a large area of land for agricultural purposes on the Mount Barker block, and aro about to settle on it.

John Eddington, a farmer at Green Island, near Dunedin, has been committed for trial upon a charge of criminal assault on one Annie Burgess. '1 be reductions in the Government engineering staff, it is anticipated, will effect a saving of £IO,OOO a year at a moderate computation. The ‘ St. Arnaud Mercury ’ has been threatened with a libel action, in which the damages are laid at £2,000, for stating lhat when a certain gentleman sang into a telephone his voice sounded like a groan. A telegram from Sydney to the Press Agency_ states that a motion has been tabled in the Assembly for the release, from the Paramatta Asylum, of a lunatic supposed to be Arthur Orton, of Tichborne celebrity. Mr Connell, of the firm of Connell and Moodie, was thrown from his horse at Sawyer s Bay on Monday morning last, and received a slight concussion of the brain. A cable message from London, dated the 12th inst., says The murder of the Ear 1 ! of Leitrim has been debated in both Houses. During tho debate reporters were excluded for three hours, owing to aspersions being made as to his lordship’s private character. At Wellington a barmaid smashed a water-jug over the head of a man who had spoken disrespectfully to her. M r Crawford, R.M., said it served him right, and mulcted the young woman in costs only. She created some amusement in Court by telling the plaintiff’s counsel that she was not modest —but respectable, In reply to an inquiry the Lyttelton Harbor Board have received a telegram from the Government to the effect that no warning has been received from Home to protect the harbors of the Colony. The ‘ Cambrian Hews ’ says that at the Merionethshire quarter sessions the rector ofLlanfairpwllgwyngvvyllgogertysiliogosigogoch was charged by the Dolgelly Local Board with obstructing the highway near that town. Llanfairpwllgwyngwyllgogertysiiiogosigogoeh is a parish in Anglesea, near Menai Bridge. Trustworthy statistics regarding the recent famine in India show that out of 1,668,000 inhabitants in the district of Bellary, 14,000 died of starvation in March alone, 1877. In that of Cydarah, out of 1.300.000, there died in February, 11,422; in Kurhaul, out of 950,640, those that starred in January numbered 6.253. Out 26.000. in Madras, there died in February 105,175, and by the end of June over 500,000. Bombay lost over 165,000 in the first three months of the year, aid it was anticipated that before relief came a total of 2,000,000 would die.