NEWS IN BRIEF

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11869, 22 January 1902, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF

--T w -. , o r>- -** ---•' * -"V -v. - y. . AvvV'' '.' \ : A'_ / Zealasdia left for the South. •••.•. Ovalau arrived from the Islands. The British barque j Savernake has been ■ wrecked at < the Islands. From the 13th to the 18th inst., inclusive, 23,384 cases of locally-grown fruit • were received in Auckland. ■ The Highbank and Methven (Canter- : t bury) schools have been closed on account . of the ' prevalence ,of scarlatina amongst scholars. • , ' -- A fungus of the puffball genus, turning the scale at 51b, and measuring some 16in by lOin or llin, was found near Oamaru last week. • - ■ • Tasmanian agriculturists have splendid . crops to harvest this year, and, in fact, ". such a season as the present is unusual, even in Tasmania. The Post understands that the Timaru . Presbytery are to be petitioned with a view to forming a second Presbyterian • Church in -'Timaru. . i An ' officer of one of the Union Com- - pany's steamers trading to Nelson was . weighed at Nelson the other day, and scales no less than '27st ; 51b. ' . There were 204 patients under treatment -in the Oamaru Hospital during last year—• • the largest number yet received into the . institution in a similar period. • At the Ahaura S.M. Court the other day, a well-known hotelkeeper near Reefton was fined 20s, with 29s 6d costs, for refus- • ing to supply a traveller with meals. V Mundaring Weir, ] West Australia, the • head of the Coolgardie water scheme, is said to be almost completed, and has already conserved 1,000,000,000 gallons. , Under the heading, " Beneath the Southern Cross," the Rev. H. Whitelaw, who re- , cently visited New Zealand, gives his im- . pressions of the colony in the • Kilmarnock Standard. J The average number of heads and eggs of small birds paid for weekly, by the Waimate County Council (South Canterbury) is 20,000, yet the birds appear to be as plentiful as ever. "There is a New South Wales gaol regulation to the effect that no newspapers, or letters containing news, or any news whatever, whether verbal or written, shall be admitted into a gaol. There were 19 bankruptcies -in Napier last year, as compared , with 13 in 1900. . The secured claims amounted to £641 6s 9d, the unsecured debts totalled £6768 2s lid, and the assets realised £2307 13s 6d. . • The broken weather of the last few weeks has retarded the work of slieep- • shearing all over the Waimate district • (South Canterbury), and many sheep are . yet , unshorn in this usually early part of the. country. A Tar&naki ' Maori was refused an old • age pension on the ground that he had . £400 worth of property. , A statement put in also showed that his wife had £3000 , worth of property, and other property Talued at £53. The* water hyacinth is becoming a rapidly-growing scourge in the Clarence River, New South Wales, and a corres- • pondent there states that unless steps are taken ■ toward its eraaication, thousands of acres will before long be rendered useless. During the past year several important additions were made to the Cromwell Hos- " pital, Otago, the chief one being the erection of a fever ward, built of stone. Some 82 patients were under treatment in the institution during the year, and six deaths v occurred. ,)