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New Zealand Mail, Issue 661, 24 October 1884, Page 16

An earthquake shock travels about twentyfive miles a minute through hard materials ; but soft substances, such as sand aud gravel, or clay, retard its rate of progress, and, of course, in water it gets on much slower still. A San Francisco paper says that there are about 250 lepers in that city, and the number is increasing. It also declares that San Francisco has become the dumping ground for Asiatic cities.

The news of the change of Government in New Zealand was followed so quickly by the cablegram announcing your Assembly’s vote of want of confidence in the new Ministry (writes the London correspondent of the Dunedin Evening Star) that people know Dot what to think. Sir J. Vogel was not popular in London, and such observations as have appeared in the papers about his coup d’etat have been the reverse of complimentary. The Daily News openly expresses profound distrust of the policy of “ this stock-jobbing knight,” and considers New Zealand folk must be delightfully simple and confiding to rely on the guidance of such a notorious speculator.

Mr Scott, the purser of the s.s. Murray, shot a white kaka (New Zealand parrot) at Ivaramea, on the West Coast of the South Island, about a month ago. The bird has been stuffed and mounted. It is a great rarity, as kakas of that color are very seldom seen. The color is, properly speaking, not pure white, some of the feathers being tinged with pink and yellow. It may not be generally known that at Karamea kakas are so plentiful that the settlers make use of their bodies for manuring the hop gardens. A girl fifteen years of age, daughter of respectable parents resident in Fielding, has eloped with a young man named Ward, who has been For the last few months buahfelling near Fieldiug. Ward is, we (Advocate) understand, a married man, and was at the time of the elopement engaged to be married to an elder fister of the young woman whom he persuaded to fly with him. The pair travelled by different trains to Wanganui on Wednesday last, no doubt, to prevent suspicion arising. Humor hath it that another couple who were engaged at one of the hotels have gone off clandestinely in the same direction. Truly, Fielding is becoming quite a romantic spot. At a meeting of the Hearn-Harrington Match Committee held on Thursday last (says the Riverton Star), a telegram was read from Hearn agreeing to the date of the match being altered from December 27 to January 2 next. The first deposit of £25 was made, and the articles have been signed and forwarded to Wellington, addressed to Mr Hirst, AI.H.R., with a request to complete the document and receive Hearn’s deposit. The agreement states that it shall be a straightaway scullers’ race over a course of 31- miles in length. Hearn’s stipulation for a straightaway race is one that an effort will be made to alter. To get such a course a start would have to be made some two miles up the Pourakino, aud as a consequence the contest would be out of sight of the spectators for more than half the distance. Harrington is agreeable to a course from the bridge round the rocks at the Narrows and back to the starting point, which would have the advantage of enabling spectators to view the contest from start to finish. It is hoped when Hearn arrives in lliverton he will consent to this alteration in the course.