MAIL ITEMS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4163, 24 July 1874, Page 2 (Supplement)

MAIL ITEMS.

ENGLAND. It is at length definitely settled that the pilgrimage made by the Roman Catholics of England last year shall be renewed this summer ; its destination only will he altered, as, instead of Paray-le-Monial, the arehiepisoopal city of Sens will he its destination. A widow, named Lenoir, who died recently in Paris, lias bequeathed 10 millions of francs to found an asylum for old and infirm people. She has also, pursuant to the instructions of her husband, who died five years ago, left to the state a collection of jewellery and snuffboxes, valued at £IO,OOO. In the Bankruptcy Court, London, on the 2nd of May, the case of Mr. Warner Sleight was brought up. The debts were £3,997, and the assets only £l2 ss. On examination, the bankrupt stated that he had been for nine years a member of the bar. He should think Iris average professional income during the past five years had been about 450 guineas a-year. There was a settlement executed on the occasion of his second marriage ; it was in the costody of Messrs. James, Curtis, and James, solicitors. He had had considerable dealings with Mr. Dobree, pawnbroker. The tickets relating to the goods pledged were in Mr. Dobreo’s charge. In consequence of the arrangement which was pending with creditors he had considered it unnecessary to apply to Mr. Dobree for an account. His expenditure was capable of explanation. He lived in a house at an annual rental of £l5O ; he kept a couple of carriages, six servants, and sometimes three horses. Ho was not prepared to deposit a sum of £2O for the expenses of a meeting of creditors under the 28th section to take a proposal into consideration. An application having been made hy Mr. Evans for additional accounts and information, the bankrupt addressed the court in vindication of Ms conduct. Since the commencement of his difficulties he said that ho had paid to one trustee or another the sum of £403, but with no good result. He was ready to pay 20s. in the pound, but the hostile proceedings of the trustees were only calculated to crush him. He trusted that ho might bo allowed to pass his examination without further delay. His Honor, whilst regretting to find a member of an honorable profession in so unfortunate a position, said he felt hound, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, to accede to .the application of the trustee. The sitting was accordingly adjourned until June (1, the bankrupt in the meantime to present a cash and deficiency account, also an account of all his dealings with Mr. Dobree, and to supply particular's in reference to certain policies and the marriage settlement. Ginx’s Baby.— On May 12, Matthew Cannon, a wretched-looking boy of nine years of age, was brought before the magistrate at Worship Street, to bo dealt with under the Education Act; to bo sent to an industrial school. The School Board officer had found the prisoner wandering about Spitalfields, picking rotten fruit and refuse for Ms food. Ho was then in a most deplorable condition, Ms hair matted and as long as a girl's, while Ms body was scarcely covered with the most filthy rags. The School Board officer now produced tho boy’s father, a niftu 77 years of age, in full possession of all his faculties, and still strong. The man, it was stated, had had five wives and twenty-seven children. Twenty are still alive, and in different parts of tho world. Eleven are in Australia, and four in America. There was one at homo younger than tho hoy in the dock. Tho father, a laboring-man, was, it was stated, too. poor to pay anything for tho child's support, and Mr. llannay scut the child to the Eoman Catholic Industrial School at Ilford. SCOTLAND. A now graving dock COO feet long was opened with some ceremony at Greenock on Wednesday. Thu estimated cost is £BO,OOO. We have reason to believe that the Duke of Richmond, in Ms capacity of President of the Council, has in preparation a measure for tho abolition of patronage in the Church of Scotland. Tho largest plate that has been rolled in Scotland from a single pile was rolled at tho Blochairn Iron Works on Saturday. Tho dimensions are 23 feet G inches long, 4 feet •wide, and 1 inch thick. The weight of the pile going into furnace was 44001b5, nearly two tons. Breach of Promise Cashs.— At the Sheriff Small Debt Court lately (Sheriff Lees presiding), Robert Gardner, Bell Street, to appearance about seventy years of age, sued Elizabeth Caird, alius McAulay, alias McLachlan, about fifty years, for the sum of £l2, being restricted damages occasioned to him hy defender’s failing to keep her promise to marry him. Tho damages wore made out in pursuer’s statement as follows ;—Breach of promise,

£10; cash lent at various times, £5 10.". ; price of a gold ring, £1 10s. ; half-a-dozen forks and knives, 1 Os. ; lady’s hat, £1 ss. ; to porterage for removing the pursuer’s effects from Bell Street to Clicapside Street, 12s. ; paid session clerk’s dues for proclamation, &c., 15s. ; amount outlaid for marriage supper, £3. Total, £23 125., reduced to £l2. Both parties, it appeared, were members of the same Good Templar Lodge, and their acquaintanceship there led to an agreement of marriage, which was to have been fulfilled shortly. Some mistake, however, had occured in the registration papers, owing to which the ceremony had to bo delayed, and meanwhile puisuer found out that defender was a married woman. On this, pursuer said that she had “come forward” to him on false pretences ; he did not know that she was a married woman, and he thought that he was entitled to damages. Ultimately, the Sheriff ordered the defender to return the gold ring and the knives and forks to the pursuer, and continued the case for a fortnight to see if this was done—in which event there would bo no damages allowed. IRELAND. At the Ennis Petty Sessions, on Friday, a man named Kilmartou was fined under an obselete statute for keeping greyhounds without the qualification of a freehold estate of the value of £IOOO. Five magistrates adjudicated, but two—Dr. Cullman and Mr. Keene—dissented. A new exhibition of Home Rule sentiment (the Manchester Guardian says) occurred at the annual meeting of the Dublin and Meath Railway Company on Saturday. None of the English directors were re-elected, and Irishmen were chosen to fill their places on the Boardi FOREIGN. “ The deep and the rolling Zuyder Zee” is to be drained at the cost, it is said, of £20,000. M. Ferrand, the contractor who made so large a fortune during the war, has been condemned to three years’ imprisonment, a fine, and to restore £4OOO to the French Government. Ferrand, who was strongly recommended to the proper Minister by M. Gambetta, as a safe and disinterested person, appears to have cleared about £BO,OOO in the course of a few weeks by the purchase and sale of cattle. According to a Vienna paper, the King of Italy “ threw into the fire” an address “of a treasonable character,” sent on the occasion of his jubilee by a committee of the inhabitants of Trieste.