THE OTAGO WITNESS. Dunedin, Saturday, December 19,1857.

Otago Witness, Issue 316, 19 December 1857, Page 4

THE OTAGO WITNESS. Dunedin, Saturday, December 19, 1857.

The Eclair, from Canterbury, with the English mail to September 16, arrived here early on Wednesday morning. The European news received by this .mail is, like the previous one, unimportant. • The British Parliament was prorogued on the 28th of August, and has been sitting, to that unusually late date, in order to force through the Divorce and Marriage Act, which has been the most exciting subject of discussion during the late session, the speeches upon the bill being the most voluminous and numerous that ever were, delivered upon any one subject. The Marquis of Lansdowne has been created Duke of Kerry, and Lord Robert Grosvenor and Mr. Macaulay have been raised to the peerage., The earlier months of summer at home had been marked by weather of a stormy character, and towards the end of the summer

the weather waa warmer than it had beea known to be for- many years. Mr. Babinet, the astronomer, has announced to tber, French Institute, that in consequence of. favourable changes in the currents of thej ocean, a series of years of heat have beea, entered on, of which the past year has heen the commencement. The harvestweather in England had been all that could be wished for, and the most of the crops had been safely secured. In many parts of Scotland harvest operations had been 1 * interrupted by heavy falls of rain, andha^ caused much of the grain ' stooked ' in th& fields to sprout. The " Mark Lane Express" states that a large portion of the latfr potatoes are diseased throughout the United Kingdom, which will be in favour of wheat prices. The wool sales, which closed in August last, show an advance upon former sales of 2d. per lb., and it is anticipated that at the November sales prices will be fully maintained or probably advanced. From the neighbouring colonies we have late dates, and from India via Melbourne we learn that Delhi has been captured, and head made against the rebels even before the arrival of reinforcements. The Melbourne grain markets maintain about the average prices. From the various Provinces of New Zealand, the intelligence is of much the same character, perpetual local politics. The Wellington constituency have elected a Superintendent and Provincial Council of diametrically opposite viewsMr. Moorhouse has been elected Superintendent of Canterbury, and the new Provincial Council contains scarcely any of those gentlemen who have held seats in the Executive Council. The Nelson diggings do not appear to be doing more than just affording sufficient inducement to keep them alive. We are again indebted to our contemporary the Colonist for the following information connected with the subject of immigration. We have made enquiry at the Government Office, with a view to ascertain the correctness of the statements made by our contemporary on this matter, but we learn that the Government have received no communication from their Immigration Agent ; although the Colonist speaks of a letter received from Mr. Adam, dated the 14lh of September last. It would really seem as though Mr. Adam considered it unnecessary longer .to -keep up the delusion of his being a "servant of' the Government, and has therefore thrown off the mash and shown himself to be what was all along suspected by many — the agent of a commercial firm, sent home at the expense of the community, rather than the servant of the public. Immigration. — "We learn by the mail just to hand (Sept. 16) that the StrathdUan was all ready to sail from Leith direct on the 30th September, and that she was a full ship. The Palmyra, to leave London on the 20th of October, had 150 Government emigrants engaged, besides a considerable number of passengers who pay their own passages. The Robert Henderson, a fine new ship, just launched at Aberdeen, 1000 tons burthen, was to leave the Clyde for Otago direct in November, and was expected to bring out 370 souls. Accidents. — It cannot be too often pressed upon the attention of the public that sailing in small open boats upon the waters of this harbour is extremely dangerous, especially to inexperienced persons. During the last few days there have been two boats capsized, but fortunately no lives were lost. In the first case, the accident, happened to Captain Ridley and his son, who were coming from Portobello, when the boat capsized not far from Port Chalmers. Captain Ridley, being a good swimmer, succeeded in saving his son, a youth, who would, but for the assistance, have undoubtedly perished, as the wind was blowing so fresh that boats from the ships lying at the port would not have reached him in time to be of any service. On Monday, the 14th, a similar accident occurred about half way down the harbour. Mr. M'Kinnon, accompanied by his wife and child, Mr. De Lacy, and 3 other persons, left Dunedin jetty in a boat for the purpose of visiting the new Brewery. They reached their destination in safety, but on their return an attempt was made to beat up. It was blowing a strong breeze, and the boat having 100 much sail, she capsized ; fortunately, some of the party who had succeeded in getting on the keel of the boat, which was bottom upwards, assisted Mrs. M'Kinnon and her child to climb up - r and in this perilous position they were drifted ashore near the property' of Mr. M'Lean, where they landed in safety. A barrel of flour and several other articles which were in the boat were lost. From the columns of our contemporary we copy the following paragraphs, not forgetting the time, however, when similar information used to be handed to us for publication, for the perusal of all interested, whatever their political creed :—: — Climate at the Bluff and Dunedin. —The following table, giving the quantities of rain thit have fallen during the last six months at the Bluff and Dunedin respectively, will disabuse many of art i impression as to the excessive wetness of the climate f at the Bluff. These results have been obtained^ from observations made with the greatest care and^ regularity. The two rain guages employed arealsql I identically the same, both in dimensions and structure:— | Bluff. Dunedin. June, 1857 .... 0. 65 in. .. 1. 76 in. - July 2.48 2.77 August 0.59 1.20 September .... 1.15 0.79 ' October 1.79 3.02 November .... 1.83 3.07 8.49 ... . 12. 61, Thus showing that one-half more rain has fallen at Dunedin. than at the Bluff, since the beginning of June, , i~

Adbitjonal Minister- fob Otago.— Among the passengers per Strathattan, from Leith, is the Eev. Mr. M'Neil, one of the three additional ministers to be, sent out to join this Presbytery. Our Celtic friends will be gratified to learn that the rev. genTieman will be able to preach in the Gaelic as well as the English language. We trust that a strenuous effort will at once be made to place the Sustentation Fund on a liberal footing. <■