GRANTS TO OUTLYING DISTRICTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 769, 25 August 1866, Page 14

GRANTS TO OUTLYING DISTRICTS.

A letter, of which the following is a copy, has been forwarded to Major Richardson in reply to his letter of July the 30th, published in our issue of the 13th instant : —

Provincial Secretary's Office,

Dunedin, 13th August, 1866. Sir — I have the honor to acknowledge your letter of the 30th July. You consider, if I rightly understand your views, that the financial decisions of the Council, as regards Town Municipalities, are unjust, unless assistance of a similar kind be extended to outlying districts : to -which I observe you now add "goldfields populations." The Government share your desire that juftice should be done to all interests alike, and have no doubt, a3 you remark, that the feeling of the House will be on the same side ; but it is equally clear that the state of the finances must largely influence the Council ; in arriving at a decision on this point, which the Government cannot agree with you to be merely one of simple justice.

I have, &c, Feedk. J". Moss, For Provincial Secretary. Major Richardson, M.H.It.. Wellington.

A Frog Found in a Cla.t-bed.— A live frog was discovered on Tuesday last, in a bed of clay, in Bisbopwearmouth. Some laborers, engaged in digging clay in a field iv Oates street, in the west end of the borough, at a depth of about 14ft below the surface, turned up a spit ot dry hard blue clay, which broke to pieces, and from it hopped out a frog. The little prisoner, thus suddenly released from the place where he had been confined, soon became extremely lively on being exposed to the air. At first his color was lighter than usually found in frogs, but his hues soon began to darken as the light affected him. Whether he may have been confined in the place he waa found for days, months, ur years, it is certain that he was in the midst of the clay lrom which he hopped xH.—Sundcr la ud 1 mes.