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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XV, Issue XV, 18 November 1880, Page 2

Swimming for girls is strenuously advocated in a letter in the Times from Mr John Macgregor (of the London Schools Swimming Club, School Board for London, Victoria Embankment). He states that hundreds of girls are learning to swim, and affirms tbat many hundreds more would gladly learn if teachers could be had. Aa a proof of this, Mr Macgregor asserts thafc last year a class of thirty girls was begun late in the season, yet twenty-five of tbese were taught to Bwim in six lessons, and six of them won prizes. At present only five of the puhlic baths are available for girls and school teachers, hut vre sincerely hope lhat public attention may be drawn to tbis movement, which promises to be one of great benefit to the community at large, for, apart from all otber considerations, it may be said, as Mr Macgregor concludes, " Mothers and sisters who can Bwim will not let their hoys be unwashed When on land or drowned when in the water." '■■ The will of the late Mr Edward Peace, of Darlington, in addition to various charitable bequests.gives £10,000 for tbe education of the poorer classes in the borough of Darlington. The widow of the Jewish Cologne banker, Baron Abraham von Oppenheim, who in 1870 gave the munificent Bum of £150,000, for the wounded, has just banded over £30,000 for an hospital for poor children of all. denominations, in memory of her late husband. "Twenty, yeai h ago," said the passenger with tbe red ribbon in his buttonhole, "I knew that man whom you saw get off at the last station. He was a young man of rare promise, a college graduate, a man of brilliant intellect and shrewd mercantile ability. Life dawned before him in all the glowing colors of fair promise. He had some money wben he left college. He invested ii in business, prospered, and married a beautiful young girl, who bore him three lovely children. No one dreamed that the poorhouse would be tbeir home. Bufc in an evil hour tbe young man yielded to the tempter. He began to drink beer. He liked it, and drank more. He drank and encouraged others to drink. That Waß only fourteen years ago, and he was a prosperous, wealthy man. To-day whafc is he ? " The clergyman in the front seat solemnly—" A sot and a beggar." The red-ribboned man, disconsolately, " Oh, no 1 He is a member of Congress, and owns a brewery worth £150,000. A firm in New York manufactures a patent metallic shingle, which possesses so many advantages tbat (according to a Yankee paper) no one in want of a good roof should fail to investigate its merits. They are much lighter than elate, weighing hot onefourth aa pucb. -

The latest freak of fashion of London dinner parties is to havo real fruit trees in full fruit in the dining-room, so that the guests may gather their own dessert. Rather a sensational accident happened here on Sunday afternoon (says the Cromwell Argut), and the wonder is that more disastrous results have nofc to be recorded. Our townsman Mr M'Kellar was driving a young mare in a light buggy along Melmore-street. At the foot of SHgo-street something startled the animal, and Bhe swerved off the road. But at this point the bank of the Kawarau river— running some 60 feet or 70 feet below — Is Unprotected, and the driver was powerless to restrain the horse, which, buggy and all, bounded over ihe precipice. Happily, Mr M'Kellar had sufficient presence of mind to spring from the conteyabce a few yards from the edge, otherwise it is difficult to see how he could have escaped with life. The strangest part of the affair ia that tbe horse was recovered with littifl of no injury, notwithstanding his terrific leap The trap, of course, was utterly demolished. The latest curiosity from America is the mysterious dlsappearsnce of a railway train, ft Was on the Kansas Pacific Bailway, and bfetwCefa tw6 and three thousand dollars have beeu spent iv searching fer it,< but ifc cannot be found. About 400 milea west of Kansas city the line runa through a place called Monotony, which was visited some time ago by a terrible Storm and waterapoilt, over 600 feet of track having been Washed away. The adjacent neighbourhood, which consists of a huge rolling prairie, was eight feet under water, and it is conjectured that the locomotive and waggons (it luckily nofc being a passenger train) were carried away and burled Uuder a landship. I* his is the second time pf such an CoCU.rence* In (connection with the annual visit recently paid by the Lord Mayor of Dublin to the Glqnchee prison, there was a dejeuner, at which Dr Miirray, bishop of Maitland, was present. In proposing the Bishop's health (the Freeman states) the Lord Mayor " took the opportunity of acknowledging the obligations which everyone iv Ireland felt, and which the meiiJbefS of the Mansion-house especially felt, the couutry was under for the wonderful, the extraordinary generous assistance which in her distress Ireland had received from the Australian colonies. When he to!d them thafc of the £180.000 which had been collected for the Mansion-house Committee—And which, he wati fioify to say, had been nearly all spent— some £90,000 bad been sent by the Australian Colonies, they could judge for themselves of the extraordi nary generosity which, in this crisis of Ireland's history, had been shown by their friends at the Antipodeß. The iiiitti i migbt t c put in these few simple worda : that had it not been for this generosity many Irishmen would have died from starvation. This was not the first time that Australia had shown her generosity. During the Lancashire cotton famine Australia had contri buted Bonie £50,000 ) but on this occasion she bad even surpassed herself." The average yield of wheat for the ten years ending 18?8, was according to "Dr Hector's Handbook of New Zealand," for this colony about 2d bushels per acre ; Tasmania, 19 bushels ; Victoria, Queensland, and New Sputh Wales, from 12 to 13 bushels ; and South Australia, 9 bushels. In 1869, however, Tasmania headed the list w.th one bushel per acre more than New Zealand. According to the American Law Journal, the American law makes the master liable for the resulta of accidents which have results from.— l. Negligence in subjecting the servant to the risk of Injury from defective or unsafe machinery, buildings premises, or appliance. 2. Negligence in subjecting hira to the risk of injury from unskilful, drunken, habitually negligent or otherwise unfit fellow-servants. 3. Negligence, where the master, or bis vice-principal personally interferes, and either does or commands the doing cf the act wbich caused the injury. A man out West bas invented a device to prevent market men from palming off old eggs. Tbe invention is thus described: — He proposes to arrange a rubber stamp iv the nest of overy hen, with a moveable date. Tbis stamp ia arranged with a pad, which is saturated with indelible ink. When tbe hen lays an egg, as is well known, she kicks slightly with her hind leg. An electric disc is arranged so that her foot touches it, when the stamp turns over on to tbo ink pad and then revolves, stamping the date on the egg. The hen then goes off about her business, the farmer's hired girl removes the egg, and replaces the stamp, which ia ready for another. On each ;evening after the hens have retired to their downy roost with the roosters tbe date of the stamp is changed to the following day, and the good work goes on. In this way there can be no cheating. You go to the grocery and ask for fresh eggs, and the groceryman says he has some eggs of the vintage of March I, 1880, for inatauce. You look at them, and there are the figures, which cannot lie.— American Paper. Th« folic vring extraot from the Otago Daily Times vrill be read with interest by many:— Tbe shareholders of tho National Ifire and Marine Insurance Company of New Zealand— our first local company— must be gratified at tbe result of the seventh year's operations, seeing that notwithstanding very keen competition in the business, and decline in what may be termed the insurable interest of the country— viz., exports, imports, buildings, and stocks generally— the Company maintains its position and dividend paying qualities. The half-yearly division of profits in this Company comes regularly— it great matter for those wbo invest for a return, and this seems more than ever assured, inasmuch as the directors propose to make the capital and reserves up to a round £150,000. This ia comfortable, not only for nhareholders but the insuring public, who have an office with good assets under their own eye to deal with. Such security might be tendered as satisfactory in any part of the world where the Company cares to open business, Aobam, the town in Austria which is reported to hive been nearly destroyed by earthquakes, is the CEp'tal of Croatia, in Austro- Hungary. It is described as being finely situated at the foot of a richly-wco:3ed range of mountains, about two miles from the Save. Tbe inhabitants— about 20,000 in dumber— are principally Croats, who carry do an insignificant trade in wood, corn, and tobacco. Agram is the residence of the Governor of Croatia, of the miliatry Cotn-niander-iu-Chief of the Croats, and a Catholic Bishop. Ifc possesses a royal academy, with a public library, and various other educa tional institutions.