NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11999, 23 June 1902, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF.

(J, Suez mail arrives to-day. Elingamite from Sydney to-day. The 'Frisco mail leaves on Friday. Zealandia for Sydney this evening. H.M.s. Lizard arrived from Sydney. " -Waimate arrived from London and the Cape. The Herald Summary will be published (on Thursday. A seam of coal thick has been discovered at Cooktown, Queensland. The Tasmanian Government intends to abolish the Council of Agriculture in that State; In Victoria during the past 14 years the mortality has been 11.4 per 1000, and in Melbourne 17.1. The Premier of Queensland has refused to grant the pastoralists of that State an extended tenure. Hundreds of barracouta have recently been cast on the beach between Turakina and Rangitikei Rivers. The Melbourne City Council has decided to float a loan of £50,000 to complete its electric supply scheme. The New South Wales Government Savings Bank report for the past year shows a satisfactory rate of progress. For the past 13 months the cost of carrying the wives of members of the Federal Parliament over the railways was £700. The period within which the Native Land Claims Commissioners have to report has been extended for a year from June 30. A charge of 2d per head is now made at night to all persons who are not passengers for admission to the Feilding railway platform. Foxton is without a Mayor. The Mayor resigned, and none of the councillors would consent to assume the responsibilities ot the office. A league has been formed at Adelaide to urge the construction of a transcontinental railway to Port Darwin on the land-grant system. The North Sydney Council has drafted a Rill for presentation to Parliament to regulate the erection of advertisement hoardings in public places. Through a workman turning the wrong ralve, the gas was shut off from New Plymonth the other night, and the whole town was left in darkness. The bulk of the Maori population from Waihao, Waitaki North and South, and Temuka, will take part in the Coronation celebration procession in Timaru. The citizens of Launceston, Tasmania, have resolved that the post office tower be completed "as a lasting memorial of the coronation of King Edward VII." A woman who pleaded guilty to bigamy at the Darlinghurst quarter sessions, Sydney, alleged that she had been drugged and tricked into marriage by a man having designs on her property. " , Diphtheria is still rather prevalent in Wellington. Two new cases were reported to the Health Department last Thursday, also one of scarlet fever (which is decreasing) and two of measles. Of nine violent deaths recorded at the four chief centres of the colony during the month of May, four were suicides. One of the suicides was by shooting, one by poison, one by strangling, .and one by explosion. Those who have been advocating that Mr. Tom Mann shall contest the Wellington seat at the next election now find that such a course is impossible, Mr. Mann not having resided in the colony for the necessary period. In the Supreme Court, Adelaide, the Chief' Justice ruled that the term " children" in a will did not include illegitimate children, except where the circumstances, or the necessary implication, were such as excluded any other meaning. The Agricultural Department is making arrangements to meet all the demands likely to be made fpv eggs for breeding purposes next season. Last season it supplied 19,000 eggs, and during next summer it will probably be called upon to supply 25,000 or 30,000. The seal of the Victoria College, Wellington, is to be lozenge-shaped, with a representation of the figure of the late Queen standing crowned and holding a sceptre. The motto will be " Sapientia magis auro desideranda" (" Wisdom is more to be desired that gold"). If the seal cannot be made in the colony, an order for its manufacture will be sent Home.