INTERCOLONIAL NEWS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4146, 4 July 1874, Page 4

INTERCOLONIAL NEWS.

By the Tararua, we have files from Melbourne to the 24th June, from which we make the following extracts ; VICTORIA. A settler named Patrick Byrne,, of Docker’s Plains, near Wangaratta, has died at the ripe age of 104 years. He has a son who is over eighty years of age. The abduction and marriage of a girl between fifteen and sixteen years of age, occupied the attention of the Police Court at Wangaratta. Henry Hoysted, a young man, was charged by Margaret Larldngs, the landlady of the Willow Inn, with the abduction of her niece, Winifred Louisa Johnston. The father of the girl died, and the mother married a man named Ridgway, and subsequently she died. Some time afterwards, when Ridgway, the girl’s stepfather, was on his deathbed, he handed over the girl to the care of Mrs. Larldngs, but she was never legally appointed guardian, and there were blood relations of the girl living near her. Mrs. Larldngs had warned the defendant against marrying the girl, as she was under age ; but on the Ist of June the girl left for the Catholic school, where she was a pupil teacher, and did not return. It was afterwards discovered that defendant and the girl were married on that day by the Rev. J. Cowperthwaite, Wesleyan minister. For the defence, it was stated that there was no proof of defendant’s having a guilty knowledge of the girl’s age ; but the Bench committed the accused for trial at Beechworth Circuit Court. A second charge against the defendant, of making a false declaration, was withdrawn by the police. Winifred Louisa Hoysted, the girl in question, was also charged with maldng a false declaration as to her own age at the time of her marriage. The usual declaration, as taken, w r as produced, but it -was objected that the oath was not taken until after the declarations had been signed, and that it was therefore invalid.

A sad affliction (writes the Maryborough Advertiser) has fallen upon a respectable citizen residing near the Mariners’ Beef. Quite recently he lost his wife, and on Thursday his daughter, a fine young woman, aged nineteen years, died of diphtheria, after a short illness lasting only some twenty-four horn's. The girl was to have been married in a few weeks, and up to within a few days of the time mentioned she was in the best of health and spirits; Two new cases of diphtheria"were reported the same day, and it seems evident that the hope that it had disappeared from the district is not yet to be realised. Greathead’s remedy has been tried in some instances, but we have not heard of any cures effected by it. NEW SOUTH WALES. The Armidale Chronicle relates the following :—“ A melancholy tale comes to us from Mr. Hargrave’s station at Hillgrove. A poor old shepherd came some little time ago into Armidale, and in conversation with a gentleman stated that he was sent out to this Colony years ago for striking a man on the head with a candlestick. On further questioning as to whether he had any relatives, the poor old man burst out crying, and stated that he had left a wife and four children, and then spoke of them with all the dotingness of a fond parent. The gentleman he spoke to promised to write home to Ireland and try and find out if any of his relatives were living ; and he ultimately received an answer from a prominent merchant in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, stating that the writer was one of the sons of the old shepherd, and that all the others were in highly respectable situations in America, and would be only too glad to receive their old father home. Of course, no time was lost in communicating with them ; and by this Californian mail at present expected will arrive the remittance, with the hopes of carrying the old man home. It will arrive too late. He was taken with a fit, and died a day or two ago.” TASMANIA. In the Supreme Court, Hobart Town, on the 17th and 18th June, a case was tried before His Honour the Chief Justice of Tasmania, in which the widow of the late Edwin Elliott, whose death was caused in December last by the upset of a coach on the road to Hobart Town, sued Samuel Page, proprietor of the coach, for damages. The jury, after a consultation of twenty-five minutes, “ brought in a verdict for the complainant, damages £SOO, viz., £3OO for the widow, and £IOO each for her two children, left fatherless in consequence of the reckless driving of the defendant’s coachman. The case caused groat excitement, and there was a large attendance in Court throughout the day. The general opinion entertained was that the damages would have been much more.” The Cornwall Chronicle says :—“ Wo understand that one of the railway rate collecting bailiffs was seen going along the Mersey and Deloraine railway line last week, making a formal seizure of the whole permanent way, rolling stock, lock and barrel, at the suit of some creditors at Hobart Town, amongst whom is Mr. Thomas Giblin, manager of the Bank of Van Diemen’s Laud. It is therefore probable that should the distraint ‘ not bo previously satisfied,’ the Mersey and Deloraine Kailway will be sold by the sheriff. Who’ll buy!”