LOCAL & GENERAL.

Otago Witness, Issue 1927, 29 January 1891, Page 12

LOCAL & GENERAL.

The new Cabinet formed by the Hon. J. B&Hance was sworn in on Saturday afternoon, the portfolios .being allotted as follows:— Premier, Treasurer, and Native Affairs, Hon. J. Ballance; Colonial Secretary and Attorneygeneral, Hon. P. Buckley; Minister of Lands and Agriculture, Mr John M'Kenzie; Minister of Mines and Defence, Mr R. J. Seddon ; Minister of Education *and Justice, Mr W. P. Rseves; Minister without portfolio, Mr J. G. Ward. The Auckland representative has not yet been selected, the names of Messrs Goldie, Cadman, and Kelly being mentioned.

An accident, resulting from the use of firearms by boys, occurred at Signal Hill on Saturday, whereby Arthur Rose, aged six years, was wounded in the back. Rose, with threefother boys, named Bdmond Godso, Arthur Boydell, and George Buchanan had gone out to shoot birds at Signal Hill, taking with them a pistol, which the older boys took turn about in firing. The weapon was handed by Godso to Buchanan, who is 11 years old, and the latter states that when he received it he thought it 'was at halfcock, and that Godso told him it was so. "While it was in bis possession, however, it, exploded by some means, and a portion of the discharge struck Rose in the back, some fine grains of shot penetrating the skin.. Rose was assisted away and was examined by Dr Gordon Macdonald, who while he has been unable yet to extract or find any of the pellets that had lodged in the body, has no apprehension of serious consequences.

The exodus of Australian belles to preside over ancestral homes in England still continues. The Sydney Daily Telegraph, in mentioning that Captain Trench, who for a couple of years acted as A.D.C. to Lord Garrington in New South Wales, has returned to England, via San Francisco, adds that his fiancee, Miss Nellie Cox, second daughter, of Dr Cox, of Sydney, and Bister of Viscountess Bertie, left that city a few days after direct for England, to be the guest of her, future father-in-law, the Hon. Colonel Trench, until her marriage, which is to take place early in the present year. Captain Trench (adds the Daily Telegraph) is the third member of Lord Carrington's staff who has chosen an Australian bride. Mr Alexander Cameron, one of the oldest residents of Southland, .died in the Inveroargill Hospital on Thursday, at the age of 60. He was a native of Perthshire, and arrived in Southland about 1857.

The valuation of the rateable property in the borough of North-East Valley this year is assessed at £18,159, or about £40 in excess of last year's valuation.

Some 60 labourers left by the Union Company's Wairarapa on the 22nd to work at the Zeehan railway contract, in Tasmania. These, together with the 22 men who left by the Banks Peninsula, mate up a total of 82, and Mr J. R. Scott, has still tbe names of some 80 applicants on his books who are to leave by the next boat. >.

The president of the Dunedin Kindergarten Association (Mrs W. H. Reynolds) has received a handsome donation of £100 to the funds of association from Miss Walker, of Sydney.

Mr Saunders has found out a queer blunder in the School Committees Election Act. Clause 3 provides that the names of candidates may be Bent in to the chairmen of school committees on or bafore the third Monday in April. Clause 4 requires the chairman to post up such names on the third Tuesday in April, and as the third Tuesday in April may occur six days before the third Monday, the act absurdly requires the chairman under certain circumstances to post up the names of candidates six days before he has received them.

The Rev. Mr Smcllie, of Rangiora, has accepted a call from the Wyndham Presbyterian congregation.

At Trieste, on December 2, Countess Carlotta Badini was charged with having caused the death of her step-daughter by a blow. The prisoner, had indulged in an unaccountable hatred of the child, who it was proved had been subjected to a long course of ill-treatment and privation. The jury were unanimous in their verdict of guilty, and the prisoner was sentenced to 16 years' imprisonment. The projected " Pan-Republic Congress" of delegates from all the republics ,of the world, which is to be held at some point in tbe United States during the period of tbe Columbian Exhibition, already presents an imposing committee

list, comprising some 300 names. Among the beads of colleges, and men of letters.- The object of the gathering is stated to be that of drawing the republics of the world into closer bonds of sympathy and of disoussing such legislation as ; shall be for their mutual benefit, and the further progress and welfare of mankind.

.The Paris Figaro, announces ihat the Pope, 1 yielding to the entreaties of M. Luoien Brun and Other leading members of the French Catholic party, has created a new Order of Knighthood to reward the services rendered to the Church and to himself personally. It is to be called the Order of the Servants of St. Peter, and is to consist of Grand Crosses,, Commanders, and Knights. The insignia will consist of a star of six points in white enamel, bearing a symbol of the Trinity, surmounted by the Papal keys,and will be suspended from' a yellow ribbon with a white edging,

. At the annual meeting of the msmbera of the New Zealand Rifle Association, it was decided that a permanent range, should be selected as hear to Wellington as possible, the site to be decided by the council. Capt. Montgomery was appointed the Dunedin delegate tp the council. ' The annual soiree of the Blueskin Presbyterian Church was held on Thursday last in the church. There was a large attendance. The women of the congregation provided a sumptuous tea, which old and young enjoyed. The Rev. A. Finlaysbn, the minister, presided at the meeting. After a brief speech he introduced the Revs. Dr Stuart, John Ryley, and Jory, who addressed -the audience in appropriate speeches. The choir, led by Mr Wilson, added greatly to the pleasure of the evening. The customary votes of thanks and the benediction brought a pleasant meeting to a olose shortly after 10 o'clock. ' It is satisfactory to find that increased attention is being given in many quarters to the important questions of ventilation and sanitation. Messrs Anderson and Morrison, of this city, yesterday deposited an application for the issue of letters patent in respect of a system ot ventilation which they propose to introduce. The system is an eminently simple one, involving the employment of a well-recognised principle in the injection and ejection of air.. By the application of a jet of water a current of air is formed—the force of which can be regulated as desired, and which can be either -hot or cold— and is conducted by pipes into or from a building, the current being turned on or shut off by a tap. For the purpose of ejecting air from a chamber, a cone is fixed in the ceiling and a draught is obtainable of sufficient' strength, as Mr Morrison discovered when testing it, to draw a handkerchief up a pipe out of a person's hand. The simplicity of the eoheme is the point that would seem to be its chief recommendation to approval, besides which its price should prove unusually moderate. There is, moreover, nothing in the apparatus that can get out of order, as neither fan nor turbine is required, and the process can be managed noiselessly, while the water used for tbe purpose of creating the current can be returned to the cistern so that there need be no waste. The scheme has been already brought under the notice ot^competent, authorities, who have expressed their satisfaction with it, but Messrs Anderson and Morrison propose to have a thorough trial of the system at some future date, when the inspection of persons interested will be invited.

The year-book issued by the Statistical Central Committee of the Russian Ministry of the Interior (says The Times, of November 27) is an interesting publication, throwing much light on the condition of the Russian people. According to the work, the estimated population of Russia is 110,628,676 souls, of which about 100 millions inhabit European Russia (without Finland) and the Caucasus. Marriages are constantly on the increase, their number in 1888 being 871,476. In the same year 4,585,741' births were registered, against only 2,593,116 deaths. The increase of population is consequently 148 per 1000, this percentage being exceeded by no other European state. • The number of violent deaths, however, is very high, and on the increase, being 44,427 in 1887, against 42,985 in 1886. Otthese 2575 and 2585 respectively were suicides, and 3738 and 3608 respectively homicides. Of all diseases typhus exacted the most victims, and raged throughout Russia. The numbers for 1887 showed 289,682 cases of the disease, and 15,858 deaths. Immense damage is done to property by fire. About 00 per cent, of the fires were due to incendiarism, and four-fifths of the damage was. caused in the country. As-; founding details are famished in the yeas book of tbe todebtidnow of landed property. It is

stated that 268 per cent, of such property (24 548,813 dessiatinea) are mortgaged to the extent of 632,154,719 roubles, the annual interest paid being no less than 41,409,324 ronbles. For pablio instruction 7,000,000 roubles, and fqr sanitary purposes^ 9,500,000 roubles were expended. Education is still much neglected. In . 1886 there existed only 897 intermediary sohoolo, with 130,287 boys and 80,099 girls. In 39.0Q3 elementary schools, 1,670,115 boys and 455,167 girls received instruction. There has been somewhat of aii improvement in these figures during more recent years, but, according to Western notions the Russian Empire is still as far as ever from possessing a proper system of education.

We understand that the first edition of " For So Little"— a novel by a colonial authoress, has been sold out. ' A second : edition has been brought out by Messrs. Fetherick and Co,, of Melbourne, and' the English publishers ar<j bringing out a large edition immediately. The novel has been most favourably reviewed by most of the best known English papers. The authoress (Mrs Harrison Davis), who is at present residing in Dunedin, received by the last mail a letter from Mr Walter Besant, the well-known author, congratulating her oh her success, and asking her to become a member of the Authors' Society, of which he and Lord .Tennyson are presidents. Mr Besant also offered to give Mrs Davis any assistance he could in bringing out her next novel, which is just about ready. The manuscript, we, understand, was submitted to one of, the most; competent critics in the colonies, and he predicted a success for this unpublished work. _ '

Our Auckland correspondent telegraphs t— " I understand that the Auckland Harbour Board intend retracing their steps with respect to specially taxipg by wharfage dues southern produce owing to the representations made in the local press, and also in that of the south."

It was reported in town on Monday morning that a strike of bricklayers had taken place, but inquiries elicited that this was not the case. The rumour doubtless originated in the fact that a ' number of tbe men employed by Messrs M'Leod and Shaw, the contractors for the erection of the new police barracks, were thrown out of work during the forenoon owing to there being an insufficient supply of bricks on hand but they resumed work in the afternoon. The matter of the rate of bricklayers' and masons' wages was, however, discussed between the contractors and the men. The former are members of the Master Builders' Association, who had decided that from yesterday the wages of the artisans mentioned should be reduced from 12s, the rate fixed by the Building Trades' Union, to 11s per day. The men declined to accept the reduced rate, and Messrs M'Lepd and Shaw, being bound to time in their contract, agreed to pay their men the higher rate.

A large number of prospectuses have been received in the colony of the Sydney Jockey Turf Club's annual consultation on the Champion Race to be run in March. It should be unnecessary to warn the public against sending any money over to Sydney for investment in this consultation, which has been invariably denounced by the Australian press.

The Hon. W. Copley, the South Australian Commissioner of Crown Lands, reaohed the Bluff by the Rotomahana, and will make a tour of the colony to make himself familiar with our conditions of settlement, and particularly with regard to the homestead and village settlement systems.

At the Resident Magistrate's Court, Oamaru, on the 20th inst., A. A. M'Master was fined £10 and costs, for neglecting to destroy rabbits on his run at Livingstone; and William Bisset was fined 30a and costs, for having 30 unbranded sheep at the Oamaru saleyards.

Tbe children of the Mission School, Walker street, to tbe number of 100, with some of their parents and teachers, held their annual picnic on Saturday last, in a paddock at Burnside, kindly lent for the occasion by Mr Harraway, The afternoon was somewhat showery, but during the showers fche party took refuge in a tent which had been erected on the ground, and despite the weather a happy afternoon was spent. Several prizes for running were provided for both boys and girls, and there was also a fall supply of refreshments, lollies, &c.

A concert and dance, in aid of the funds of the Stirling Athenaeum, was given in the Stirling Schoolhouse on Friday evening, when, despite the inclement weather, there was a capital attendance. Mr C. L. Smith was in the chair. Tbe programme was well arranged, and each of the following who took part in it were very Buooeßsfu4 & the items which they eon*

'tributed :— Misses Sharpe, Rooney, Clark (Balclutha), Mr King (Benhar), Messrs Paterson (Dunedin), Tait, G. Matbeson, A. Sharpe (Balclutba), B. Parker, T. Bell, and J. Crossan (Stirling). The concert concluded with the comic operetta " The Blind Beggars," in which Messrs Tait and Matheson took part, and were heartily applauded. The dance which followed was continued till the early hours of the morning. Mr James Parker, of Stirling, kindly lent his piano for the entertainment.

City brokers acknowledge (writes the London correspondent of the Argus) a marked and sustained improvement in the quality of the butter shipments from Australia and New Zealand. They cay, at the same time, that finality in the matter of improvement has not been reaohed. In the case of isolated samples of which they complain they declare that the quality is variable, and that there is a want of uniformity in grading. The complaint of one importer may furnish a useful illustration. He states that in a shipment to him the butter at the top of the keg was of the first quality. At the bottom of the keg it was discoloured, rancid, and the product of a former year's production in the dairy. Purchassrs, as a consequence, insisted upon having every keg and every package sampled, and a single unsatisfactory package in a shipment is now sufficient to reduce the selling price of the whole. The Melbourne and Sydney butters are admitted to be equal to the best Normandy, which sells for 112s per cwt, but to reach this price the shipment must be carefully selected, neatly and cleanly packed incases, and forwarded in the ship's cool chamber. Retailers have a weakness for butter in cases, and will readily pay 112s per cwt for it, but for butter of identical quality in keg they decline to give more than 108s per owt. The second qualities of butter realise 96s per cwt, and for these there is a limited market. There is a practically unlimited market for the best qualities reaching London in prime condition. Danish butter, which dominates the market, is selling at 1363 per cwt.

The first scholarship, of the value of £40, in connection with St. Patrick's College, Wellington, has been awarded to Nicholas B. Moloney, of the Christian Brothers' School, Dunedin ; the second, of forty guineas for one year, to Charles B. Sellars, of Hokitika. A Wellington boy (G. Grimstone) came within three points of the second. There were 40 competitors from all parts of the colony.

, In the Westport Coal Company's report to be issuad to shareholders Bhortly, the directors state that the profit and loss aocount, after deducting expenses of management, rates, taxes, and all charges, shows a profit of £1102 6s sd, to which has to be added the balance of £7290 0s 6d brought forward from last year, making the amount to credit £8392 6s lid. The profit made during the first six months was very satisfactory, and if the second half of the year had .been equally favourable the company would have paid a fair dividend, but the strike has ,cost the company fully £20,000. In view of {these facts and the probable necessity of some jexpenditure on the Granity creek property during the present year, the directors recommend that this balance be carried forward.

The number of letters despatched from New Zealandffby the last San Francisco mail — the first since the introduction of the 2|d letter rate— was 33,391. The number for the four 'previous months were: December, 22,710; ,November, 27,106 ; October, 24.Q48 ; September, 23,228. The increase at the reduced rate is considered very satisfactory, but the small number posted in December is attributed to the holidays, and that correspondence was delayed in order to take advantage of the cheap rate.

' Archbishop Carr, of Melbourne, cabled to Bishop Morari on Monday night stating that be was to leave for New Zealand on the following day (Tuesday), accompanied by Bishop Moore |oMßallarat, and Dr Higgins, auxiliary Bishop of Sydney.

Kroukowski, the Russian "Fra Diavolo," 'who has just been convicted at Lontsk, was in some degree (says the Paris correspondent of the Daily News) a boulevardier, and 10 years ago ran the rig there of a spendthrift Croesus. His parents belonged to the circle of the late Prince Demidoff, and when Kroukowski ran through his fortune in Paris and at the gay winter resorts of the south of France, he determined to organise a gang of bandits, and to terrorise and plunder the province of Volhynia. His first recruits were his men servants, who allowed him to enrol them in a gang having robbery for its object. Peasants were then constrained to accept his leadership. He conceived the scheme as a boy in reading Schiller's "Die Rauber." "Social justice" was on their banner, and they pillaged the country houses of the nobles, letting the villages alone. Kroukowski had a genus for disguising himself. It often enabled him when hemmed in by troops to escape through tbem. When Russia was made too hot for him, he got away to Galicia to begin afresh. He was there closely pursued. One day he was on the point of being taken. He was in a Russian officer's uniform, and the idea struck him of going to call on the Austrian officer who was pursuing him. As the orderly was taking up his card he jumped on a saddled|horse and galloped off. He was once offered bj the father of a fair prisoner a large fortune if he would marry her and reform ; but having a passion for a c village girl, he refused. It was at a rendezvous with this girl that he was taken, after fighting like a tiger. As he had never killed anyone, a -capital sentence was not passed; but the prisoner was condemned to penal servitude for life in Siberia.

A remarkable and interesting lithographic production, the work of the International Music Publishing Syndicate, of London, is to ba seen in the windows of Meases Charles Begg and Co., in Princes street. Itcousists of a genealogical tree on the development of violin-making, chronologioally arranged from the roots upwards. Around the tree, in the form of a square, are the busts of 12 of the greatest musicians and most accomplished exponents of the art of violin-playing who have ever graced the musical platform of the world, comprising alike masters and pupils. The central figure at the top is that of the immortal Nicolo Paganini, in strong contrast to whom the central figure at the bottom is the classical bust of the Hungarian, Joseph Joachim. One or two of the others are celebrated outside the domain of violin virtuosity, — notably, Louis Spohr, the composer of 11 Jessonda," "Le Alcbymist," and " The Last Judgment " — but there is not one who has not engraven his name indelibly on the history of music. With one exception, August Wilhelmj, none of these notables have crossed the line. Their lives and works are sketched in Grove's "Dictionary of Music," Burnev's •• History of Music," and Fetis' " Biograpbie Universalle dcs Musiciens."

A number of representative citizens met in the Harbour Board offices on Tuesday, and presented to Mr A. H. Koss a purse containing 105 sovereigns on the eve of his departure for the North Island, where he has deoided to settle.

A public meeting of residents and employers' in the Kaikorai riding and Green Island district was held on Mond»y evening to consider the beat means to be adopted to stop tbe pollution

of the Kaikorai stream. There were aboat 80 persons present. A number of speakers addressed those present. A very strong feeling animated the meeting again 1 ; t tolerating the nuisance any longer, and further subscriptions were promised to assist in suppressing tho nuisance. In the meantime it was resolved to appoint the following committee to endeavour amicably, if possible, to effect an abatement of the nuisance ; —Messrs A. Lee Smith, James Loudon, J. M'Lean, H. Harraway, J. Bayley, J. Runciman, and W. Gatfield.

The Association of Fire Insurance Companies a little time back sent Mr Meddings, Inspector of Telegraphs at Chriatchurch, to inspect the Reef ton electric light works and connections, and he having reported unfavourably as regarded insulation, switches, and cut-out, the insurance companies have notified that, unless these are made safebefore 14th February, they will cancel all policies. The Electric Light Company have sent Home for the material, which canctot reach here before three months. A requisition to the chairman ot the county council is being signed asking him to convene a public meeting to disenss the advisability of forming a local insurance. One local man has offered £5000 to £6000 as a nucleus, provided that sufficient support is accorded to the proposal.

Sir W. Fitzherbert has not improved lately, and his condition is now serious. Mr W. N. Blair is recovering again.