WALROA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume V, Issue 1516, 3 October 1868, Page 6

WALROA.

(FEOH OCE ovrw COKEE9PONDEITT.) September 29, With r«gard to the site of our Stockade here, erected for the protection ofthe settlers during the late war, and referred to by Metiers. Wul or and Uochraneat our .Rifle Yolunteer Ball, a rsport of which appears in in this day'» Hi:u ald, there were two assertions made by the editor, in reference to which X wish to make a few remaika.

In the first place, the editor informs ue that Lieut. Warburton nalectcd tbo site of the Stockade ; and in the socond place he seems to eay that the Provincial Government had nothing t3 do with such mattera.

I know 1 hat when we vrero takiug steps to erect a stockade for mutual protection we did not apply in the men 111 Mount Hden Stockade for assistance in any way; neither did wo apply to Lieutenant Warburton to select a Bite for us But on tho 20th June, 18C3, we held a public meeting—passed a number of resolutions —selected a site for a stockade—and appointed a committee to carry out the arrangements connected with the object of tho meeting. On tho 6th July that committee wrote to liia Honor tho Superintendent (Kobert Graham) requesting thnt a stockade, on the dimensions given, might be erected on the site selected, and asking what assistance Government would give, &c. On the 13th of July his Honor sent an answer to our latter informing ua that he had dispatched Mr. Snodgraaa with instructions to carry out, as far as possible, our wishes in the matter of protection.

Mr. Snodgrass came and got the stockado erected, hut not on the site agreed on.

Would the Editor kindly inform us who employed Lieutenant Warburt n to Efalect the site ?

[Messrs. Walker and Ooclirano, it seems, wero speaking in reference to the settlera' stockade on McNiechol'a side of the liver. Cur remarks applied to the Galloway Bedoubt, upon the opposite side.—Ed. N. Z.H.j

Royalty and Red Tape.—jKed Tape is a great institution in the Old World. Here is a sample of it in Russia : One day the Empress Catherine suffered from a bad cold in tho head, and her physicians ordered her t > rub her imperial nose—not against that of one of her Btalwart favorites as was her custom —but with a lump of (allow. But aa there was no tallow in tho palace they sent into town and bought a bit—the Empress was cured of hor cold in the head, and all was over. This took place in 1.799. In 1850 tho Emperor Nicholas, turning over carelessly the book of domestic accounts kept by his house minister, saw the following : ' For curing his Majesty of a cold, tallow, ten roubles." Ae he knew that ho had no cold tho day before, the Emperor suspected a swindle, and, to clear tho matter up, he examined carefully from end to end the book of accounts. What was his amazement to find every day repeated the same item : " For curing the cold of his Majesty, ten roubleß." He of course demanded an explanation of this amazing expense, and it waß found that since the days of the Kmpress Catherine, or half a century, under thrco different Emporors the house accounts were charged with ton roublas daily, tho price of tallow moant for imperial noses which had no need of them. A similar story is told of the English Court. Ono Queen Somebody—possibly Charlotte; and t may be Victoria—was unwell, and it became necessary to'rub her head with brandy. A bottle was bought and used, and Her Majesty's rum seller in ordinary wp.b ordered to supply ono daily. Some 20 years after a bill was brought in for seven thousand threo hundred and odd bottles of brandy, as many of gin, and about twice as much of ale and other varieties of spiritual confectionery.