LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Otago Witness, Issue 2330, 27 October 1898, Page 17

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The situation between France and Britain is still grave, and the danger of a war breaking out over the -occupation of Fashoda does not appear to have been removed. From the Yellow Book issued by the French Government it would appear that France still claims to have as much right in Egypt as ■Britain, and sets up the plea that Turkey is the suzerain Power and not Egypt. "We are informed on reliable authority that Mr Thomas Mackenzie will sevei his connection with the Canterbury Farmers' Co-opera-tive Association on the Ist of May next, and

that it is his intention at the forthcoming general election to seek to renew his connection with the Clutha constituency, and with no other. A correspondent writing to the Western Morning News tells a curious story of vast treasure which, it is said, lies under the sea in the Lizard district. Every now and then, he declares, Spanish dollars, more or ]ess bat tered, are found on the beach to the back of Gunwalloe Church, about five miles from the Lizard Head. In 1784- a galleon was wrecked on the spot, having on board, it is alleged, 17,000,000d01, besides bars of gold, which were to be deposited in London for safety during the unsettled state of national affairs in Spain. The greater part of this wealth is still buried deep between the sands and rocks where the vessel- went to pieces, not far out from the cliff. At ebb tide the water is about 6ft deep, but owing to the exposed character of the coast and the fury of the broad Atlantic waves, the sea has never been smooth sufficiently long to give those a chance who have at different times gone to considerable expense and labour to recover the sunken treasure. From, time to time hundreds of dollars have been picked up, and only recently Mr J. Toy, ironf ounder, N>f Helston, found one. On one occasion a few years since Mr Toy found so many that the fact was reported to , the Board of Trade, and a share of the spoil was handed over to the Government. Scores of coins have also been found in the fissures midway up the cliffs, where they have been washed by the waves in a gale. A quarter of a rontury s-gcn Mr Toy was one of -a company who sank a shaft from the top of the cliff through the rock below high water mark, and near which the treasure is believed to be lying, the idea being that after a storm or heavy ground swell the buried specie, ok a large portion of it, would be driven into the hole by the action of the waves. But before the work was completed the sea broke in and the shaft had to be abandoned. Other plans to recover the specie have similarly failed. The discovery of a new constituent of the atmosphere by an American scientist, M> Charles Brush, seems to have been anticipated by Edgar Allan Poe in his tale " The Unparalleled Adventure of one Hans Pfaal." The new gas, called by its discoverer etherion, is said to have a density of one-thousandth that of hydrogen. Now, the gas with which Hans Pfaal fills the balloon in which he journeys to the moon is " a constituent of azote, so long considered irreducible, aiad its density is about 37.4- times less than that of hydrogen." This is surely a curious literary anticipation of the latest contribution to science. The Rev. Newman Hall, D.D., who has been holidaying in Scotland, had an amusing rencontre with the beadle of St. Giles's Cathedral, Edinburgh. Dr Hall one Sunday, while on his way to the church at which he was to preach, passed St. Giles's, and ventured to take a glance into the building at the west door. The gorgeously-arrayed beadle at once pounced upon -him with the remark, "It is shameful that a clergyman should set an example of breaking the Sabbath by going round to see the churches of the city." Dr Hall, in an indignant letter on the matter, concludes : " I have since been told that this pious guardian of the Sabbath receives threepence for every visitor to St. Giles's on weekdays ! " The following paragrapli appeared in the London Times of September 7: — "The proprietors of the Daily Telegraph have courteously placed at our disposal the despatches received from their special correspondent with the Anglo-Egyptian force, and we are therefore enabled to print this morning a spirited and detailed account from his pen of the battle of Omdurman. Our readers will appreciate the kindly feeling which has prompted our contemporary to help to supply the gap in our correspondence caused by the serious injury to Colonel Rhodes and the lamented death of Mr Hubert Howard." As showing the surprising force of some of the gusts which prevailed on Friday, a correspondent informs us that the roof of a wooden byre on the farm of Mr T. Morris, Sawyers' Bay, was lifted bodily and carried along a distance of from 200 to 300 yards before it was scattered* in fragments about the paddock, the timber supporting the iron roof being smashed into matchwood. Mr Frederick J. Fraser, of New Zealand, on his way to the Home Country with a patent connected with bicycles, fell into the hands of spielers at Sydney, and was eased of £438 5s in all. He met a man at Randwick, who represented himself as a son of the late Sir Francis Murphy and a station-owner in Queensland. Fraser was induced to give his new acquaintance £10 to invest on a horse which did not win. Another £5 was invested on another unsuccessful candidate. That evening they met in Sydney, when Murphy — for that appears to have been his name, though he is not connected with- the late Sir Francis Murphy — introduced a man named Lester, a member of Tattersall's, who had a commission to back Lee-Metford in the Duff Memorial Stakes. The next morning Fraser gave £50 with which to back Lee-Met-ford, and was induced to draw another £150 from the bank to take to the racecourse, which his companions appear to have eased him of. Murphy was arrested afterwards, and has been committed for trial. The Clutha Free Press states that Mr W. H. Mackenzie, of Kaitangata, in the course of a conversation with a reporter, said that the Home syndicate which has purchased the Kaitangata Company's business is an enormously wealthy one, and, onoe the transfer is settled, intends commencing operations on I a very large scale. Elliotvale and Castle Hill ooalmines, as well ad- the shale deposits at Orepuki, are amongst the properties owned by the syndicate, and it is intended to develop their resources thoroughly. A brick kiln is to be erected at Orepuki, and it is also intended to utilise the shale oil by combining it with the coal-dust at Kaitangata and thus forming what are technically known as " brickets," a familiar fuel for engines, e*c, in the old country. Altogether Mr Mackenzie sees a rosy future before Kailangata, but the silver lining to the present dark cloud need not, he says, be expected to disclose itself fully for six months yet.- Mr Robert Lees, New Zealand manager of the new company, is not expected to reach this country before December 1. January and February are always slack months in the coal trade, and it will therefore be in April of 1899 that the expected boom may be expected to take active shape. Sir James Hector, referring at the meeting of the Wellington Philosophical Society on the evening of the 18th, to the death of Mr John Buchanan, F.L.S., on that day in Dunedin, said that when he (Sir James) came out to New Zealand in 1861, Sir Joseph Hooker asked him to look out for a man called John Buchanan, who sent Home to the herbarium at Kew the best collections of plants that were received from Australasia. On arrival in New Zealand, he (Sir James) accordingly advertised for Mr Buchanan, who immedi-

ately responded, and to whom he was able to give an appointment as draughtsman and botanist. About six years ago Mr Buchanan zetired from the public service. Mr Buchanan's collections of plants made in New Zealand were forwarded from, time to time to Sir Joseph Hooker at Kew, and the whole of the plants he collected up to 1863 were embodied in the "Flora of New Zealand," published in 1865. Of course, since then he had made other large collections. These also were sent to Kew, but duplicates remained here, and were placed at the disposal of the late Mr Kirk, who had made use of them in his work now partly published. Mr Buchanan had left a large collection of specimens, books, drawings, and manuscript notes, all of which he (Sir James) saw on. the last occasion on which he was in Dunedin in the crypts and cellars underneath the Museum. Sir James added that he hoped some little better care would be taken of the collection until they reached a more enlightened age. There might be many unknown facts embodied in these notes, because Mr Buchanan studied the botany of New Zealand at a time when there were no rabbits, and when there had been no great bush fires — when the country was more in a state of nature than it was now. After the experience of the past 18 or 20 years it seems hard to believe that a new era has arrived in Ireland. Yet (writes a correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette), strange as it may appear, such really does seem to be the case. If you walk around the farms and fraternise with the people you soon realise that there is everywhere an intense desire to have done with politics, and to take up the last occupation of an Irishman — the minding of his pwn affairs. '" Give us a rest from politics," is the cry on every hand, even in Tipperary, the hotbed of Nationalism, and the home of faction fights and agrarian outrages. In Nenaagh itself, a very warm little corner in its day ; there is a peace-which-passeth-understanding air ? which some people would describe as dulness. In reality, it is one of the signs of the new era. Mr It. Gilkison, one of the candidates for the Tuapeka seat, issues an address to the electors in the Daily Times, in which he gives a brief outline of his views on matters poll tical. Santiago appears to have suffered more at the hands of pillagers than from the fire of the guns. The city came out of the hail of shot and shell poured over 4he low ridge at Aguadores and from, the heights of Caney practically unscathed. Save a few houses wrecked in Calle del Gallo, no damage was done by the guns, and the moment military | operations ceased the city resumed its normal aspect of qiiaint mediaeval picturesqueness, unsullied by the harsh traces of modern 13in guns. But although the exteriors of the houses did not suffer from the ravages of war, their interiors in many instances presented wild, scenes of pillage and spoliation. Hundreds of the richest houses in Santiago are pitiful examples of the lust for plunder and rapacity of the Spanish soldier. Plate was stolen, pictures were cut from their frames and slashed to pieces, rich carvings hacked and defaced, and marble staircases blown up with gunpowder. The motor-car (says the London Daily Telegrph) has not achieved the signal and speedy triumph over all other forms of vehicle anticipated for it by its scientific admirers. The scare among cabmen has long since subsided, and the gleam of hope which appeared for a moment in the eyes of the tired cabhorse has died out. It has become evident that the vision of a metropolis in which the sound of hoofs should be as unheard as it is in the streets of Venice will have to be adjourned, at any rate, until the dawn of the next century, and that for some years to come there will still be a certain demand for horses as a source of locomotive power. A Wellington telegram states that a claim for hea.vy damages will be made against the Union Company by the relatives of Lee, who was killed while unloading cargo on the Tarawera. As showing the great care exercised in such cases, the company's officials point out that Friday's accident was the first that has occurred for the past 14- years in handling cargo by the Union Company's steamers at Wellington. The Royal party on board the Osborne were (according to Truth) disgracefully mobbed both at Dartmouth and at Torquay. While the yacht was anchored in Dartmouth Harbour she was closely surrounded from morning to night by shore boats, the occupants of which stared, at everyone on board as if the passengers were strange animals at a show. The Prince of Wales, sitting at the window of the stern cabin, was spied upon to such an intolerable extent that he was obliged to draw the curtains closetogether. These people, moreover, were not even content with gazing earnestly at his Royal Highness, but tbeir comments on his appearance and surroundings were perfectly audible. At Torquay a well-dressed mob closely followed Princess "Victoria, Princess Marie, and Prmce Nicholas, who were soon at the head of a long procession, and these people behaved shamefully, the Princesses being actually driven by the persistent intrusion to take refuge in the hotel gardens. But, as the crowd still followed them, the hunted Royalties were obliged to leave the seats on which they were resting, and there was no alternative but to seek safety in the launch which had brought them ashore, and return at once to the Osborne, which left Torquay directly afterwards. Trustworthy accounts from the Kyber still further discredit the rumours that the Afridis are considering the possibility of renewing hostilities. The leading headmen of the clans located in the Pass deny (says the Simla correspondent of the Times) any hostile intention on the part of the tribe as a whole, but undoubtedly the Afridis generally are anxious to hear the intentions of the Government regarding a renewal of their allowances, which were held in abeyance for a year. If the allowances are abolished altogether trouble may possibly arise, but with the Kyber garrisoned by a brigade the tribesmen would be unable to gain any success similar to that of last year. It is practically settled that a fort on .Suffolk Hill, adjoining Lundi Kotal, shall be constructed, thus materially stiengthening the position there. The other defensive post will be improved. It is not known whether _ a permanent garrison of regulars will be maintained in the Pass, or whether a railway will be built. The suggestion for an increase in the Kyber Rifles to 1500, with three British officers, if adopted, might obviate the necessity for keeping troops beyond Jamrad. In connection with tRe agitation against ritualism in the Anglican Church, now proceeding in England, the London papers record a disgraceful scene in Liverpool on a recent Sunday. A large body of Protestant stalwarts, chiefly Orangemen, paid a visit to the church of St. James the Less, tha vicar of which is the Rev. Septimus Firman. The service proceeded as visual until the lessons had been read. Then the clergy and choir proceeded to the vestry. The bell was rung as if for another service, and some of the choirmen re-appeared, arrayed ip scarlet robes, but-

mounted by white garments trimmed with laoe. These proceeded to the altar, and prepared the thurible far incense, while several young men and boys hastily entered the vestry. A procession, numbering about 20, attired as acolytes are at Roman services, then appeared, a cross being borne high in front, and the vicar wearing a biretta and chasuble, on the back of which was a cross. The procession was greeted with storms of hiss«s and cries of "You ought to be hung" and "Judas." Meanwhile, incense was freely used, and the protesters sneezed and otherwise marked their disapproval. After the sermon the vicar celebrated mass, with the assistance of the acolytes, whose swinging c.f the thurible provoked discordant cries of "Fire up." When the tones of a bell we^o heard a voice from the gallery cried, "Ring the bell, Sammy," and as the service proceeded the indignation of the mob increased, until there was general manifestation of derision, and even the intonation of the Lord's Prayer was laughed at. ■ At the close of the service, when the procession to the vestry was taking place, an ugly rush was made towards the vicar, but the police closed in and prevented any bodily harm being inflicted upon him, though they could not prevent insults being hissed into his ears. Dr Burnside Foster sounds an alarm in the North American Review on one possible result of the new American foreign policy. Tn 1849 the fell disease of leprosy was unknown in the Sandwich Islands, but two Chinese sailors introduced it in that year, and now it i* estimated that 10 per cent, of the Hawaiian population are lepers ; while thousands have died of the curse during the last half century. Dr Foster insists that precautions must be taken to stamp out the disease, and to prevent its dissemination in the United States by the large number of passengers who wiJl go to and fro. He suggests a department of health and the appointment of a commission of bacteriologists- to study the problem, and win for America the glory of striking leprosy from the calendar of human afflictions. Fifteen hundred lepers are segregated at Molokai, and probably three times that number of infected persons arc- at liberty in Hawaii. The death occurred in New York, on August 28. of a young woman whose name is given as Wanda Vouspeno, aged 20, and who is described as Viscountess Spierenberg, a niece of the Queen Regent of Spain. Death was due to privation and starvation. It is asserted, says a Dalziel's telegram, that she left her family at Vienna a few months ago because her parents wished her to marry an aged man who had the reputation of being a roue, and was accompanied in her flight by a man to whom she was attached. After a few months the man appropriated her jewels and fled to London, where he is now said to be. Wanda engaged a small room and tried to earn her living, but found it impossible to secure a situation. Baron Lange, of the Austrian Embassy, met her in Broadway and recognised her, whereupon she fainted in the street, and a crowd gathered. The Baron called a carriage and sent for physicians, and Wanda was removed to her room. The physicians did all that was possible for her throughout the night, but without avail, and the girl, as stated, died of starvation. The friends of Mr William Hunter, formerly sharebroker of Dunedin, and now a resident of Hobart, will regret to learn of the death of his son, Thomas Hunter, who died in the Cue Hospital from the effects of injuries received while working in the Day Dawn mine at Murchison. A number of members of the Marine Engineers' Institute of New Zealand assembled at the Sailors' Rest on Saturday afternoon for the purpose of making a presentation to Mr Joseph Sparrow. Among those in attendance were Messrs M'Caig, Crawford, Scoullar, Gillies, Mills, and Robertson (secretary of the Dunedin branch of the society). The presentation took the form of a gold Maltese cross, inscribed with Mr Sparrow's name and the date ori one side and four letters on the other indicating that he was an associate of the institute. Mr M'Caig, in making the presentation on behalf of the society, said that he had received a letter from Mr Hislop, the general secretary in Wellington, stating that at a meeting of the institute the honour of associate had been conferred upon Mr Sparrow, and asking him (Mr M'Caig) to present that gentleman with a medal as a token of the esteem in which he was held by the members of the institute, towards which he had always shown a friendly feeling. Mr Sparrow, in returning thanks for the presentation, referred in terms of appreciation of the high honour that had been conferred upon him by making him an associate of the institute, and expressed a hope that that body would have a long and prosperous future, and would be the means of drawing employers and employees together. The Rev. Rutherford Waddell, D.D., preached at St. Andrew's Church on Sunday night one of a series of discourses on " The Dream Cities of Man and the Citj* of God," and dealt with " The City in Process of Realisation." In the course of his remarks he pointed out that according to Scripture the city of God would never be evolved from the existing order of things, but that the forces of evil and good would continue to exist and grow side by side until at length there would be a great supernatural conflict between the two_, resulting in evil being slain, and in God manifesting Himself in a manner which would make it utterly impossible for anyone to doubt His existence. The preacher further contended that while the efforts of Christians could not of themselves result in the realisation -of '" the oity of God," vet that was no reason for relaxing their efforts against evil, as it was by combating with the forces of evil that character was formed, and men^and women were fitted for -a future life. Mr E. Tregear mentioned at a recent meeting of the Wellington Philosophical Society, in reference to the Gisborne "kumi controversy, that he had only that day come across an interesting point. Mr F. W. Christian, he said, had left here a great deal of work to be edited by the Polynesian Society, and while reading the proofs of the vocabulary of Nukuroa, an island in Micronesia — hardly a word of which was not pure Maori — he (Mr Tregear) saw that the islanders' word for a lizard was " kumi." That word, added Mr Tregear, was therefore known to Polynesians in the early days. He thought there was no doubt that the kumi was not merely mythical. In the course of further discussion, Sir James Hector mentioned that a son of Archdeacon Maunsell told him that some years ago in the north one of his Native lads was frightened almost out of his life when in the bush by some animal, from the description of which the conclusion was arrived at that it could only have been a kumi. According to a return just issued by the Finance Committee of the London County Council, London's municipal debt on March 31 last was as follows : — London County Council, £20,093,773; School Board for London, £9.554.061 ; Metropolitan Asylums Board,

£2,215,371 ; Metropolitan Police (proportion) £325,123; vestries, City Commissioners o Sewers, and District Board of Work* £5,114,697; Boards of Guardians, £2,795,653 j other local authorities, £794,125; — total ne( debt of London, £40,892,803. The rateablt value of the metropolis on March 31 last wa< £36,092,082. Hence the total debt is equal tq rather more than one year's purchase of it( rateable value. The £40,892,803 is exclusive of the debt of the corporation of the City of London, which, although borrowed for municipal purposes, is secured upon special funds, and not upon the rates of the city. Our Wellington correspondent telegraphs: 1 —I learn that the Minister for Lands haa forwarded instructions to Dunedin to purchase, on behalf of the Government, the re-cently-discovered specimen of the Notornis ilantelli. If the specimen is secured, it will be placed in the Otago Museum. During a recent visit to Pitcairn Island, on which reside the descendants of the Bounty mutineers, Mr Hamilton Hunter, stipendiary magistrate at Suva, made a thorough and exhaustive inquiry into the state of affairs politically and socially at Pitcairn. It is understood his report will be to the effect that the island is too small for the population, and that owing to intermarriage the state of morals on the island is the reverse of what it should be, and that it is to the benefit of the Pitcairners that some portion of them be removed to some other island where they will not be so confmed. A special meeting of the Anderson's Bay School Committee was held on Monday evening to deal with the applications for the position of first female assistant teacher. There were 52 applications sent by the Education Board, and eight were marked as the most suitable. After consideration of the testimonials, it was decided to recommend the board to appoint Miss M. E. K. Taylor, at present second assistant atfthe Mosgiel School. Mr Charles Edwards, the examiner appointed by Trinity College, to conduct the practical examinations, is at present engaged in the North Island, and is working his way south. On this occasion the results will ba made known within a few days of the conclusion of the examination in each centre. A peculiar contretemps is reported by tho Taranaki Herald to have occurred at a meeting of shareholders recently held in the Taranaki district. The appointment of an auditor was under consideration, and as the result of a ballot taken a certain gentleman was elected by a fairly large majority. The newly appointed auditor thanked the meeting for the honour done him, and he proceeded to criticise the balance sheet for the previous year, contending that instead of a slight deficiency, tho statement of accounts should have shown a larger loss. Thereupon the chairman rose and insinuated in polite but plain language that it was a remarkable fact that the previous" speaker, who had audited the accounts, should now find fault with them. The meeting then rose in its might, and a pretty clear indication was given that the auditor's resignation would be cordially accepted. Several resolutions fixing his remuneration at 5s and Is 6d per year were introduced, and as an ultimate result the gentleman resigned and another auditor was elected. At a meeting of the Wellington Philosophical Society last week Mr G. V. Hudson again brought forward his proposal to alter the standard time by putting the clocks on two hours at midnight on 30th September, and putting them back again two hours on 28th February. The effect of the proposal would be that in the five summer months an increase of two hours' daylight would be available for recreative purposes at the end of the day. Mr Hudson pointed out that the increase of two hours of daylight at the end of the day in summer would prove a great boon to the bulk of the working community, and especially to those who "were confined indoors all day, and who thus required as much recreation as possible in the open air. It was claimed that only by altering the time in the manner suggested could the habits of the community beperfeotly adjusted to the changing seasons. Milkmen and others who have to start very early at present would suffer under the proposed arrangement, and the kerosene, ga<s, and electrio lighting companies would lose heavily owing to the reduced expenditure on artificial light. The remainder of the community, however, would save what these classes lost, so their interests should hardly stand in the way of the interests of the majority. In connection with this scheme Mr Hudson pointed out the advantages that would accrue to children if the time for examinations were altered from December to June, thus allowing the children to have the long summer evenings for play in the open air. The same advantage would result to many clerks in offices if the yearly accounting period were altered from December to June. Just before the Rev. Dr Elmslie went Home (says the Ohristchurch Press) a lecture on J. M. Barrio was given in St. Paul's Schoolroom by Miss Freeman, B.A. In n letter just received by the mail from Dr Elmslie he thus refers to a very interesting visit which, with Mrs Elmslie, he paid to Thrums. Dr Elmslie says: — "But what brought Girton College most vividly to my mind was our visit to Kirriemuir, alias ' Thrums.' We called there to visit the friends of Mrs Bowmaker, and after luncheon they drove us out, through and around the far-famed town. It's a queer, quaint old place — with its ups_ and downs, angles, corners, and nooks, as if the whole thing had dropped from the clouds more than a century ago. But to me it was beautifully interesting. We saw the house where J. M. Barrie first saw the light, the window from which Lecky first made her observations, the Auld Licht Kirk (recently rebuilt), and the veritable manse of 'The Little Minister.' But most interesting of all, one of our party who was a Barrie, a cousin of J. M. Barrie, took me into Barries house and introduced me to his sister, Miss Barrie, and to her uncle, Dr Ogilvy, the brother of 'Margaret.' They were very proud of tha interest we evinced in them. Dr Ogilvy is a retired Free Church minister, a cheery, chatty old man. ' There are two sets of Ogilvy's,' he remarked. ' The one is said to be daft, and the other foolish. We neverdecided which is daft and which is foolish, and so we try all of us to look as wise as we can.' " .

In some parts of Norway corn is still used as a substitute for coin. The Clutha Leader records the death of one of the very earliest settlers in the Clutha district, Mrs John Lindsay, of Finnegand, at the age of 82 years. She arrived here in the Gala just 38 years ago, and almost immediately settled in the Clutha. She is survived by her husband and seven grown-up children. In the- Siok Room. — In olden times the preparation of Invalid Beef Tea was a tedioas process ; now the Liebig Co. do the evaporating, and all you have to do is to put the Extract into boiling water and stir. Thousands have been brought aafelv throuah illness hv itst timely aid.