NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 12696, 26 October 1904, Page 6

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Wakanot due from. London. " Aotea arrived from Britain. * Zealandia' left for- the South. - ' . Considerable losses among stock at MacJean (N.S.W.) are reported as the outcome of the blackleg disease. .\ >■,i ; •■•■„; -.; .- ■■ ,• - ■ ■ The damage • done to roads, etc., in the Feafcherstone Comity during the late storm will cost more than £300 to put in repair. A little girl, Diana Hickey, whose parents are members of Bland Holt's Company, was ; drowned is the Yarra Rivar, • 'Victoria, re- I centiy. ~ , ', ! ', Two old ship's guns, used in the early | days at Lyttelton .to signal ships and to '' fire the ;mid-d«y ; gnn,' have been presented , to the .nuseum. Though there are >ove.;; 3000 sob-cols in 2Tei?.' South Wales only about 20 complaints of undaiy severe corporal punishment aire received each year. . . - _. Butter is now coming into the Moturoa Freezing Works, Tar*a*ki, freely. The Rimutaka, ie&vmg Wellington this week, will take 4658 box« 3 from Alotnroa.;. . For a seaport town, according to one of the speakers ia the- Legislative Council, Wellington is the most sober, decent, and law-abiding city in Australasia.; ' : ■;. i Last.; Wednesday Mr. A. E. Bayliss, farmei, of '■ Belvedore, Wairarapa, nad the mis-fortune to '"lose'a horse, worth ' £30, through being, kicked by another horse. . Ifc is probable that' the Queensland " Gojverhment; will shortly introduce a Bill empowering them to sell inferior land at less than the ; present minimum price of 10s an acre. r - ' A' boy named Emmet Hickey, at Wellington (New South Wales), fell from a tree into '; the river, where the water was only six inches deep? and sustained fractures o£ both arms. . ■ * ' , \ The grain season in the North Canterbury district is reported ■: to 'be very :■* Backward owing to the s ack of sunshine. The recent heavy rains have spoilt a wide area of wheat and oats which now cannot be worked. i

A young married lonian named Martha Rafter' wm committed for trial at the Newtow*- Police Court, Sydney, on a charge of having fraudulently gilded a shilling-piece, with intent to juake it pass for a sovereign, jit Newtown, on the 14th List. During the hearing of the evidence the woman swooned two or three times. • • ' ■

A message has l>een received in Sydney, intimating that the; M.M.s. Armand • Behic is to leave Marseilles to-day foi Sydney, via ports. She is duo in Port Jackson on December 5. The Armand Behic' will thus be the first of the M.al; steaniirs 'to . leave Marseilles 1 for Australia since the.beginning of the great strike there. i The ..New South , ales -Public Service Board, in the last annual* report* suggests that, in view of the prospective reduction in the status of the Works Department, owing to, local government and' other matters, the Department should b placed under the control of a- non-political body of three members, whose duties should be" :onfined to carrying out works authorised by Parliament.

Senator '• Higgs, sinking at Bairnsdale (Vic), said that ui.,der the ru> of the Labour party he hope." to see Australia.become a great and important country that " would provide an asylum lor all the people in other parts oi the world who could not make a living in their own country, or who were oppressed and downtrodden.' Within the next two years, he said, the peop'e of Australia would be asked to declare for "socialism or anti-socialism."

A deputation of Brisbane storekeepers re- | cently waited on the Treasurer, Mr. Kidston, : to _ protest against the proposal to charge stamp duty on cash sales of over £1. The deputation pointed out that such c. proposal would cause a great deal of inconvenience to traders. Air. Kidston replied that if the imputation would siiow him r. more convenient way, of collecting stamp duty 01% cash' sales than his proposal, he would consider t; if not, he would go on with bis scheme. .■> ■•••'.■ . Some ' successful experiments are being made in the HitVi district S.W.) in the matter of anit-bush cultivation. Salt-bush has time and again proved its fodder capabilities in time of drought, but has during the last dry period died in mt'tny parts, and now in some instances efforts to cultivate the bush- from seeds are to be ; made.. - On Muagari.tli Station a gowd'area _ has been eoWii; with fairly succesuiu'. results, while ' some, 'smaller settlers have been experimenting with succesi, ;