NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XL, Issue 12212, 6 March 1903, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Tbisco mail leaves to-day. ■' A Suez mail arrives to-day. Talune arrived from the South. Hanroto due from the Islands. < Ventura from Sydney this morning A vigorous attempt to arouse public inter ,st in tWmployed question xsbern^^ *• by the Melbourne Trades Hall Council. J At Charters Towers, Queensland two boys, while bathing in the Burdekm River, {Tito a swift current and were drowaed The sum of £18,111 has been paid in probate on the New South Wales portion of the estate of the late Mr. Abraham Booth, a crazier, who resided in Victoria Tie Victorian Minister for Railways has adopted thfpropa.als made by the Departmental officers for reducing the expenditoie bv £4000 a year on non-paying lines A great maw of the native children at Tongoio, Hawke's Bay, are suffering from mealies. Ths Health Department has had the local Maori schoolhouse fumigated. The number of volumes in the Wellington Technical School library is 1445, as follows: arts, 425 architecture and building construction, 226 mechanical, 273; general, 521. Recently a huge blast was fired at the Cane Foulwind quarries. Sixteen hundredweight of dvnamite was used. The resulting displacement of stone was estimated at 15,000 tons. ~ _ „ Two cows were killed at Mr. E. Kemp s, Kumeroa, by lightning. The boy had just turned the animals out when a blinding hash struck both animals and killed them instantaneously. TTT Already 232 ex-members of the Wellington Naval Artillery have intimated their intention to join the Old Wellington In avals Association, names having come from all parts of New Zealand. At Sydney Fredk. Matthews, 65 years of fege, had two teeth extracted. On returning borne his wife opened the door, when he fell into her arms and expired. Death was due to heart disease. • . The other day, while Mr. Michael Breen, teen., was walking in his own paddock at Cahowindra, New South Wales, he was struck by a. limb of a falling tree. He was ■so injured that he died. While the .wet season has been perfect for crops in this district (says the Cromwell Argus) it has also very much interfered with the working of the ground. However, there are magnificent erops„of turnips, rape, potatoes, etc. A West Coast paper remarks that the quartz mines at Reefton have, during the past 21 years, produced gold valued at £1 778,077 7s 6d, and paid in dividends £509,037. The quantity of stone crashed to produce this was 761,934 tons. At a recent court case at Northam, West Australia, in which a farmer named Hillman sued a man for larceny, one of the witnesses stated that he had been offered £10 to burn down Hillmans farmhouse. By a singular coincidence, the farm has since been burned. Of the different districts throughout the iWairarapa, Eketahuna is said to have made the most progress lately, this being largely due to the steady growth of the dairying industry.' Buildings are going up on all sides. [At the local cattle sales the dairy cattle fetch some of the highest prices ruling in the Waiirarapa. [ An outbreak among cattle, supposed to fee anthrax, is reported from Bray brook function, a few miles from Melbourne. •Eight cows have recently died from disease, and all dairies in the district have received orders to cease selling butter and milk. The disease is believed to have been brought into the district by starving stock. A number of boys went on a fishing expedition at Tilbuster Creek, New South Wales, with a pea rifle in their possession. The weapon was laid on the creek bank, and on being picked up by Claude Solomons, one of the party, the weapon went off, and the bullet penetrated the brain of Stanley Smith, aged 10. Death was instantaneous. Recently 50oz of amalgam belonging to the Queen Cross mine were stolen from the syndicate mill, Charters Towers (Queensland). ; The bulk of the amalgam is kept in an iron safe, and a small quantity in a wooden locker under the observation of the watchman. The thief crawled behind the locker, prised a board out, and got away with the amalgam. The gas caused by the fire in Block 12, Broken Hill, continues to give a good deal of trouble at the Proprietary Mine, and on nearly every shift lately men have been knocked over bv the poisonous effects. In Block 13, the other morning, seven men had to go home incapacitated by the gas, and many others from the' same cause have lost part's of their shifts. As an indication that the sawmillmg industry in the Forty-mile Bush is coming to an end, passengers to the North, says the Masterton Times of a few days ago, noticed 'two sawmilling plants being loaded into trucks for transport to other locations. Various parts of the Bush, at one time busy centres' of the sawmilling industry, are rapidly getting " cut out." It is reported that many of the kanakas under engagement in the New Hebrides are deserting their employment, causing much inconvenience to the Freeh colonists, who are in great need of labourers. The French accuse the Presbyterian missionaries of harbouring them, and are very bitter against those whom they describe as "the implacable enemies of French influence in the Hebrides." The question of whether a stud is a button was before the District Court, at Melbourne, last week, when Herbert Clark and Co. were charged with making a false entry with regard to imported studs, which were described as buttons, which are duty free, while Studs are dutiable at 20 and 25 per cent. The dictionary was quoted by the defence to prove that studs are buttons, but the Court held otherwise, and imposed a fine of £5. During the drought many oak trees have been felled by stock owners along the course of the ■ river'and creeks in the Singleton district,' New South Wales. It is feared that, should the weather break and a flood comes down, the accumulation of fallen timber will, when carried along by the water, bring such an. amount of pressure to bear upon the bridges as to greatly strain their stability.