MAEREWHENUA NOTES.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XVII, Issue 998, 26 February 1887, Page 3

MAEREWHENUA NOTES.

Since my last the excessively hot weather has given place to frequent showers; and, though no ereat quanti;y of rain has fallen, vegetation haß benefited, and the water supply has kept up fairly. During the last three, days the heat has been intenst, and the water is fast decreasing. ■ ■

The workings in Lonn Gul y are not turning out well, on the average. We have there the extremes of hard ami soft ground. The harJ consists of cemented wash and cement in quantity on the gravel bottom ; so thai a, jet of water from a hose will take almost, no effect on it, and it has therefore to be abandoned.

Harvesting i» well forward. On the sth we had the tail-end of u Rale here, and the farivers nest day—l hear wi:hout exception—following the example of aouie residents in heal hen lands I read of when a boy, who, when tliey thought their coJs were too long in answering their prayers, punished 'hem by beating and shott supplies of food—they (the farmers) retaliated on the Clerk of the Weather for the damage done by the wind by working all doy Sunday. There is something seriously at fault here: The delinquents, as 1 consider there, included Bcotuh, as Wfll as Euglish and Irish. There is still p'en-y room (or the utmost efforts of the Salvation Army, in addition to those of the quieter and slow-going older churches.

The residents at Livingstone are intending tot like full advantage of the Bmall-area occupation licenses.regulations of ibe Mining Act of ISS6. About a dozen appiicaiions are already posted—to be dealt with on ihe 25th instant. I hope they may prosper. I fear, however, there will be serious trouble hereaneut hereafter. The Act seems to me, and also tho regulations, to be exceeding y meagre in information as to cocditions, -itc. For instance, what remedy for damages to fences or crops by cattle in so loosely held a tenure ? There is one thing in its' favor: the amount of revenue it will yield, if it be a success and becomes general, will prove a very valuable addition thereto. , To the passer-by the state of our schoolgates would lead reasonably to the conclusion that the school committee are either defunct or insolvent. Quadrupeds, of all kinds have had full inwress for many montbs past to what should bo a nice little paddock of English erass'; and it lias therefore (the English grass) become a nuisance to the sohool teaoherinstead of a pleasure and a convenience, by attracting pigs and other cattle around his dwelling and about his door.