LAKE WANAKA.

Otago Witness, Issue 1920, 4 December 1890, Page 18

LAKE WANAKA.

Albbrtown, December I.— We have had a flying visit and a speech from Mr Fergus. Your intelligent readers who will read Mr Fergus' published speeches and compare them with those of other M. H. Ha find Parliamentary candidates, willatonoe notice that Mr Fergus is a past grand master in piling on the butter, and apparently hit> auuiences are invariably raised into tbe seventh heaven of delight, and pass votes of confidence at once. We always heard that his success depended on his personal popularity; now we have realised it. •Revaluation of Lands —A few months back the agricultural leaseholders in the electoral district of Wakatipu forwarded to the Government a petition asking that the Settlers' Revaluation Act be applied to them. It has not yet been done, but. as the Waste Lands Board has recommended It, Mr Fergus informed a Cromwell deputation that doubtless it would be done during next session. This is a simple act of justice. It seems grotesquely ridiculous that one class of settlers should be benefited by this act, and another class left out in the cold altogether. The Mount Barker block is tho only agricultural lease settlement up this way, and the occupiers have already much overpaid the value of the land itself, without counting the disabilitiei under whioh they labour— such as a dry olimate.no market, dear labour; and the prices of groceries and dranery are much higher hero than elsewhere. The Mount Barker block was opened for selection in November 1877, when, according to the Land Acts then in existence, the price of the laud, if not bought out, was 21 years' payment of 2s 6d per aore per year. On the Ist of January following a new act came into force, whereby the price of land was reduced to 17 years' payment of 2s 6d per acre per year. This looks as if this land was rushed into the market at the eleventh hour in order to extort extra 17s 6d per acre from each unwary purchaser.

Unknown.— l met a swagger the other day who gave me further particulars concerning the death of the man on the Devil's Staircase road, at Lake Wakatipu. He ctated that one of the station shepherds saw this man in the hut at the Staircase, and he eeemed very ill and was breathing heavily. The shepherd offered to bring him provisions, but the man declined, and the shepherd then offered him a horse to go to 3? ranktou. but the_ man Btatcd that he wc.uld be able to proceed on his journey shortly, and that he was all right. It would appear that while in a dying condition he managed to scramble along to the Wje Creek, nine miles distant, where there are two huts, which at this time were uninhabited, so that the man was doubtlesß exhausted for the want of provisions. Apparently he had been down to the lake, a few chains distant, and coming back to the hut lay down to die, with his arms under his head. It would seem that he died calmly and peacefully. My informant stated that he came by the day bafore the body jwas found and noted the awful smell, but had no idea what was the cause, and when he heard tjie particulars he nearly fainted. Geysbr.— Mr Harold Connolly, of Makarora, tells me that about four or five miles beyond the small lake in the Hunter Valley at the head of Lake Hawea, and on a saddle between the Hunter and Makarora rivers, there is a large salt-water spring, perhaps a couple of heads in size. It shoots out of the ground to a height of perhaps 20ft, generally in a continuous stream. Sometimes it will throw up a jet and pause for a moment, and then another and more powerful jet will appear, and scatter the descending water in all directions. The water has a peculiar clearness, and the stones in the stream are of many different colours, green predominating. The water runs into the Makarora Valley, and I have thought it singular that none of the residents, while proceeding to the Haast, noticed that one of the streams had a saline tasbei

Babbits.— ln this neighbourhood is the Hopwood Valley, the stream from which runs into the head of Hawea lake. In this valley the wekas are of very large size, frequently 3ft long from the tip of the beak to the claws. The country is overrun with rabbiti, which have completely eaten out the grass, and barked and killed all the small trees. Mr Connolly tells me that the rabblters there, of whom he was one of the party, were unable to do any execution. The poison would all ditappear, but the number of rabbits did not diminish, and consequently the carcasses were very few, and were only skia and bone. I suggested that as the feed was so scarce, that the few that died ate up all the poison, while the others got none. Mr Connolly said that the stomach and intestines did not reveal such quantities of poison, and he thought that the barks on which they were feedtDg were an antidote to the phosphorus, and as they were so poor, and the animal heat consequently so low, the phosphorus would not act.