NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9115, 25 July 1888, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF.

£70 was found recently on a drunken man ■ at Napier. ,/: The t " Golden Chariot" was shipped to Sydney yesterday by the s.s. Wairarapa. In Melbourne it is said that four-fifths of the gamblers in the fantan dens are Englishmen. " '■"

The visitors 'to a Southern rink were photographed by magnesium light a few evenings ago. The only occupant of the lock-up last evening was a boy named John Best, charged with sleeping out. During she recent Melbourne war scare manoeuvres a few loaded torpedoes were lost, and have not yet been recovered. A woman in receipt of a weekly allowance from the Bay of Plenty Charitable Aid Board was seen at the last Foresters' ball at Tauranga. ■ The steamer Fijian, which sailed from Lyttelton for Brisbane lately, took away two hundred and twenty - five tons of Oamaru stone.

It is fully expected (says the Wellington Press) that a majority of the House will negative the renewal of the San Francisco Mail Service contract.

The Government have appointed His Worship the Mayor of Christchurch one of the Commissioners to represent New Zealand at the Melbourne Exhibition.

The methods of rabbit extermination, together with the correspondence relating to them, which were submitted to the Rabbit Commission at Sydney, filled two large waggons. , < There" sire many indications of an early but premature spring in country districts, owing to the extreme mildness of the winter, the willow trees in various places being already out in leaf. v "The centralising tendencies of the .supreme fossils who exhibit themselves in the Capital for a few months during each year, has once more been made apparent," Bays a contemporary. It is astonishing, says the Wellington Post, the number of new residences that have shot up of late in the city and suburbs, and the fact would lead to the belief that brighter times are dawning. "We are sorry," groans a Wairarapa paper, " that Mr. -, oculist, anrist, specialist, and the devil knows what else besides, should have left Marton without squaring his advertising account." The Melbourne Stock Exchange was floated recently. The issue was 60,000 shares. The applications received were for 1,200,000, that is, the applications exceeded the number of shares exactly 20 times. Two thousand two hundred and sixty teachers' certificates have been issued under the Education Act. At present there are 1619 certificated teachers at work—9os males, 80 married and 634 unmarried fern ell 6S. The Ballarat School of Mines authorities have resolved to call for designs for a new building, to cost not more than £20,000. A new and more commodious school has been found necessary, owing to the large increase in the number of students. A remarkable incursion is now taking place in the Thargomindah (Q.), district; thousands upon thousands of cats are advancing from the north and are infesting .the bush. It is supposed they are following the plague of rats which recently passed through our district. ' The latest on dit about the Wanganui absconder, Dudley Eyre, is that when he was in Auckland on his levanting trip, he met a member of the church to which he belonged in Wanganui, dunned him for £3 arrears of pew rente, got the money, and added it to This spoil. . There iff a butterine factory in Sydney. Nothing is used but the choicest beef kidney and \ caul suet, in the selection of which the greatest care is exercised. It I»ust; be fresh—tallow is quite useless for */he purpose. The factory is open for inspection, and the product vended on its own merits. • > -,>.;-'. ... -. :.-.■■

' An apprentice in a coachsmith's shop in the Wairarapa district had a remarkable .escape recently. Whilst drilling some machinery the sleeve of his shirt caught the revolving drill spindle stud, and before he had time to cry out, the whole of his garments were stripped off him, with the exception of his boots and socks and a paper collar. . ;. ,' ■ • ,-; , On Friday last (says the Kumara Times) Mrs. James Morgan presented her, husband with two boys and a girl. One of the triplets has since died; but the parents, who are comparatively young, have now fourteen olive branches living out of sixteen born alive. Mr. Morgan is mining manager for the ' Long Tunnel Gold Mining Company. * " ':-■■ ■?' >.h* yi '.. : '' '="' ' : ' ; '"' . One intended feature of the Melbourne Exhibition; has had. to be abandoned. It was proposed to display the motto, " Victoria welcomes all nations" over the principal entraace, but it was pointed out that the words "except the Chinese" would in .the interests of truth require to be added, and so the welcome to the nations is to be abandoned. V-S'""" V ;■';'/ .-•..--!. ._'"'

The death is announced of Charles P. Hicks, one of the promoters of the celebrated "duffer " claim at . Makara, in the Wellington district. Since his disappearance from Wellington Hicks has been to China and. wandered about the Australian mining districts, finally marrying and settling down at Silverton* ■ where he died about a month ago.