NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVI, Issue 9370, 21 May 1889, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF.

In Australia there are over 100 blind persons reading Dr. Moon's raised type books. During April 58,564 persons visited Melbourne Public Library, Museum, and National Gallery. It is claimed that one-seventh of the population of Victoria belong to the Presbyterian Church. In December last there were 2521 (1776 males, on the register of New South Wales Lunatic Asylums. A huge mangold-wurzel, grown by Mr. W. A. Bennett, of Otamoetai, has been shown at Tauranga. It weighed 341b. Donald Dinnie, the wrestler, was fined £4 -including costs, by Carl ton Bench for an offence against the Health Act. Captain Edwin wired at 1.33 p.m. yesterday : _" Expect frost to-nigh b, and very low tides for 24 hours from next low water." The co - operative system of Illawarra (N.S.W.) dairymen has killed the middlemen, and left all the profits for the producers. Comparatively few of the printers who went out on striko in Brisbane have been able to resume work, their places having been filled. Tho photographic views of Australian and Now Zealand scenery and the natural history collection in the Paris Exhibition are much admhed. * During March, Tasmania crushed 10,408 tons of quartz for 10,5670z of gold. It also raised 205 tons of silver ore, 1437 tons of tin ore, and 7318 tons of coal. On thirty-two pianos seized by the Victorian Government and paid for at an advance of 10 per cent, -on invoiced prices, the State has mads £380 18s. Messrs. Chaytor Brothers, of Makebu, have decided to erect a flax mill at Kaituna. The machinery, etc., will be on the ground ready for a start in a few weeks. The Melbourne City Council has adopted the recommendation of the Finance Committee in favour of a Bill to increase the borrowing powers of the corporation. A polo club is to be started in Wellington, and, as the new Governor is an enthusiastic sportsman, no doubt he will do a good deal towards popularising the game in "Wellington. The Premier of New South Wales has promised to bring the question of the new fruit market before the Cabinet, and he also promised that the matter shall receive careful and prompt attention. Captain Chessell, well known in connection with the Hobart and Melbourne shipping trade, is dead. It was he who built the°first square-rigged vessel produced in Tasmania by private enterprise. A mushroom has been exhibited at Gisborne, which measures within a fraction 12 inches in diameter, and is consequently •about three feet in circumference. It was found in a paddock at Kaiati. The] formation of the Otago Central railway from the Sutton stream, at 33 miles 30 chains, to Middlemarch, at 40 miles from the Wingatui Junction, is in progress, some 60 of the " unemployed " being engaged at this work. It has been ascertained (says a Christchurch telegram) that the ranger at Atiinnri was not responsible for the failure of cases under the Dog Act, telegraphed on May 9th. The informations laid were irregular, but the ranger had not filled them in, or served the summonses, nor inter viewed the local J.P. to get blank forms eigned.