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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume II, Issue 58, 11 March 1867, Page 2

Our Melbourne files are to the 28th uit. We learn that the Intercolonial Exhibition of arts and industry was formerly closed on the 23rd uit.. with no other ceremony than a brief address from the Rev. Dr. Bleasdale, in which he announced that during the four months the Exhibition had been open 270,440 persons had visited it, or an average of 2,360 per day, and the money collected amounted to £9,600. The Exhibition was to be open for a day or two the following week to the children of such schools as had not availed themselves of the opportunities aiforded them.

A rather uncommon case is reported in the Wellington Advertiser of the 27th uit., the short facts of which are these. A boy named Aaron Selig was apprenticed to Messrs. Jacob Joseph and Co., merchants. Both parties are Jews, and the youth says that by direction of his father he refused to attend at his employers' store on Sunday, upon which Mr. Nathan, partner in the firm of Jacob Joseph and Co., brought him before the Court for disobedience of orders as an apprentice. Counsel for the plaintiff urged that the boy had a holiday on Saturday, and that the other employes of the same religious persuasion, worked on Sunday, when work was performed in the store, although the doors were closed out of respect to the feelings of the general community. The counsel for the defence urged, on the other hand, that under the Masters and Servants Act his client could not be made to work on Sunday. His Worship merely reprimanded the defendant.

Of allthe miraculous feats that Bartine, the acrobat, performed, his departure from Wellington was the most remarkable. He was known to be a rather ' "curious customer" when the hour for settling accounts came, and as his last performance took place on Saturday evening, and several steamers took their departure next day, some of his creditors thought it advisable to wait upon him at once. The members of the City Band, after considerable trouble, succeeded in "bailing him up" in his room at the Empire Hotel, and demanded their money. He amiably decliued to give them anything except drinks "all round," and if they did not choose to take that, they might go— farther. One of those present suggested that it would be well to punch his head; but he recommended them not. He was able for any man in Wellington; but it would-dis-arrange his- plans if he was taken to.the "lockup." The band departed disconsolate, and ou Sunday afternoon Mr. Bar-

tine took passage on board the Rangitoto, rejoicing, no doubt, in the law that rendered arrest for debt on Sunday impossible. Unfortunately for him, however, the steamer was detained until Mouday, in consequence of the arrival of the Rakaia, and on that morning the City Band obtaiued judgment against him, and procured a warrant, armed with which the secretary and Sergeaut Monaghan proceeded on board the steamer, which was now in the stream. The coufidiug acrobat suspected nothing until the emissary of the law was close to him on the deck, when the truth flashed across his mind, and he rushed to the rigging. Too late ! Before he had his baud on the second rattliu he was seized, and had to pay up nearly the whole ofthe amount claimed against him before he was released. The Odd-fellows, emboldened by the success of this scheme, tried the same ; but the wary bird was not to be caught a second time. No sooner did the sergeant's head appear up the gangway than Bartine was running aloft like a cat, and perched himself in the top, altogether callous to the persuasive eloquence tint was addressed to his sense of honor. A sailor was sent to bring him down, and a short aud exciting race took place, which ended in the landsman sitting at the extreme end of one yardarm, and threatening the seaman to pitch him overboard if he ventured near. The hunt was abandoned, the sailor came down, the policeman returned on shore, the Oddfellows were " done," and the Rangitoto steamed out of port with as arrant a swindler as ever existed " sitting up aloft," and surveying, no doubt with exultation, the scene of his most recent labors. — Wellino*. ton Advertiser, 27th uit.