SOLAR ECLIPSE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIII, Issue 26, 30 January 1878, Page 2

SOLAR ECLIPSE.

There will be an annular eclipse of the sun on Saturday morning next, visible in New Zealand:— a.m. Begins on the earth generally .,. sh. 26min. Central eclipse begins generally 7h. Bmin. Central eclipse ... 7h. 14min. Central eclipse ends generally ... Bh. 47min. Ends on the earth generally ... lOh. 29min. On the 17th of February there will be a partial eclipse of the moon, visible in New Zealand.

The Broad Arrow of a recent date remarks: — Those persons who are disposed to underrate the importance of the office of engineer ou board our modern ironclads, should. study the construction of the new barbette vessel, the Temeraire. This complicated machine has no fewer than 34 engines on board, exclusive of the powerful pistons and cylinders that propel the ponderous vessel, and which are equal to 7000 horse-power indicated. But the care of these ponderous engines is only an item in the engineer's duties. There are 30 other engines to be kept in order. There are feed engines and starting engines, steering engines and capstan engines, engines to pump with and engines to hoist with, engius to aid in working the guns, engines to assist in torpedo service, and an engine for turning the magnet machine that gives out the electric light. Eor all these machines are the engineers responsible, and if they should fail in their duty, the captain and other officers could do nothing with the vessel. A letter from an M ll.li. who has been travelling through Canterbury and Otago, extracts from which have been published, giving some idea of the strides made in those districts in agricultural and pastoral pursuits. He says:— l Bpent two days in Christcburch and two days at Oatnaru, when I saw Mr Menlove's place at Windsor. He had 1200 acres in wheat, but 400 acres late spring wheat he had ploughed up to put in turnips, should rain come. He owns about 17,000 acres, goes in for rape, but has not yet to any extent tried turnips. He hag 50 splendid Clydesdale brood mares, and a good entire, which he hires. He has sheep— good Lin=coins and mixed longwools,— a fine stone house and good grounds. There are splendid crops on the Henley Swamp, Taieri, and in some parts near Tokomairiro there are fine crops of wheat. Turnip husbandry has taken a prominent place ou all farms. My brother has been sowing turnips for six weeks, the land beiug stubble ploughed after harvest; he has wrought with the grubber harrow, then he sows Maldon Island guano, harrows it in, then rolis with presser, sowing the seed with it in the manner I told you, and then chain-harrows. The turnips .first sown are good, and he will finish this week, but he commenced harvest to-day. The turnips amongst young grass are excellent. Where lime has been given its effects are rery apparent. Lime is delivered here at 22g Gil per ton/and there are two railway stations on the farm. Freight of guano from Dunedin, 42 miles, is only 3s 8d per ton. I went to Mr Smith's, afc Greenfield, and spent two nights with him; he had over 2000 acres in tuvnjps, aud had 70 horses putting 800 acres more'iu; also 1,700 acres wheat, 700 oats and barley, all looking splendid, He showed me his books, and besides buying 300J acres of land at 25a, auoiher la*vge steam threshing mill, and other large purchases of capital stock, he had £7600 of surplus which he had not managed to spend, besides permanently improving his estate. Messrs Begg ha ye the next estate, Hillend; they have 1000 acres in tuniips, looking vury weii but rather thick. They have 1200 acres wheat, and 700 oars, greater part good, and all quite an average crop in bulk, and the quality will be 4.1. Judge Gillies in a recent charge to the Grand Jury spoke of the absurdity of trying a person for attempting to commit suicide. Ho said, " There is one case of a man being charged with an attempt to commit suicide by hanging himself while in a state drunkenness. It can scarcely fail to strike you as being somewhat ludicrous that we should propose to try a man on account of failing to commit an offence for which, if he had succeeded in committing it, we would have been unable to punish him." A Maine farmer being poorly provided with materials of sustenance for his men, fed them with pork cooked with the rind upon it. A young man of the company, not liking that outer portion of the food, was observed by the host to be carefully removing the outside covering, whereupon the latter said, " Young man, we eat the rind and all here." To which ths youth replied, " All right, old man, I'm cutting it off for you."

During the recent charitable performance at a theatre in Portsmouth (says " Atlas " in the World), one of the performers, a gallant major belonging to the garrison, having been consid«rably chaffed by one of the gallery, finally lost all patience, stopped suddenly in his part, and challenged his tormentor to come down and try the part himself, and see if he could do it better. During the same entertainment another gallant major, who volunteered to amuse the audience between the parts with some conjuring tricks, asked fora lady's watch. A valuable gold one, said to be worth fifty guiueas, was handed to him.. The trick was to pound up a counterfeit in mortar, and hand the' real one back uninjured. Being a novice, however, the gallant major, it is said, pounded the real one up, and handed the counterfeit back. Fancy the lady's feelings 1 The performance was scarcely a success. The Lyell Argus congratulates its readers on the circumstances of tenders having been called for a bi-monthly overland mail service from Foxhiil to Lyell, via Hampden, and the editor thus rises to the occasion: — " Five years ago we saw the mail coach pass through Lyelf, a thriving population settled on our back country, the rivers bridged, schoolserrected, and the church bells re-echoiug from the dark hills arouud, then, aud then only, shall we rest contented. In the meantime we also shall endeavor to improve, and towards that end have purchased £1000 worth of new material which will be in working order in a few days when we shall be enabled to furnish our subscribers with late news aud more of it.