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Otago Daily Times, Issue 15301, 15 November 1911, Page 19

Tlwy w«e nothing if not sporting in Uw gold-digging days. Hence it was only to bo expected that some great match® would bo arranged at ditferent • times. One of bho racsi exciting o{ these.wad-a billiard match for £50J a «ido arranged between Mr Lam-b, a veteran player of Victoria, and Jlt Towns«nd, ft gentleman amateur of Otago. Tho match took place in tho Prinoo» Tlttctre, and lasted from 8.20 p.m. on August 4,1862, t0.6.10 a.m. on tho sth. Lamb eventually von wiUi tho score 1000 to 916. The report of tbo match was very complete, running to a column and three-qiiariera of space. A few days later Mr ToWneend participated in fiTOthcr valuable match. He matched his Victorian horse Falcon (bay gelding) to run Mr Juliua'4 Kauri Gum (a Novv Zealand horse) oven: a distance of thren miles for £600 a-side.. "fho match took jJieo on August 8, 1862, on the Dunedin Ilaceoourse at Silverstrcam,' and was won by Kauri Gum by n dozen lengths in the time of 7min sJsec. Thus in a few days Mr Toivnsend dropped £1100 in match money besides such bets as ho would havo had nt stake.

It seems difficult to tmlmio that the following paragraph was written half a ccntury ago. As a matter of fact, it wn.« published on July 21, 1862:—"Wo are informed that n company is about to bo established for tbo purpose of deeptea Ikihin? on, and in proximity to, somo of the banks known to exist outeido the Ifeadi, which nhournf with fish of the most esteemed kind, TWo is little doubt that, economically worked, and under oxpcricncid management, tho speculation will turn out n most successful on*. An abundant supply of good fish, at a modmto cost,' will not only prove u great boon in itself, but will probably liave tho effect of reducing tho price of butchers' meat.'' llow tho times change! Tho Satitrdav Reviow in 1862 wrote England is cursed with two ne'er-do-weels, who are incessantly getting into scrapes from which thoy can oiily be extricated by a vast expenditure, who call upon her to waste moro and moro of her treasuro upon thein without a lingo of shamo and load her with reproaches whenever she hints at tho necessity of their making an effort at fiolf-support—theec black sheep in our colonial flock are New Zealand and tho Cape of Good llouo. , . . Tha valuo of tbeso two colomos, either na markets or as fields for emigration, is very incoiuiderablo and from their geographical position they will obvionsly never add much to tbo (xjlitical importonco of tho Power that posssasea them." '