LAKE COUNTY.

Otago Witness, Volume 02, Issue 2420, 2 August 1900, Page 33

LAKE COUNTY.

July 28. — At the beginning of the current week there was a complete change of weather from frost to the miklnesa of spring. It is to bo hoped* that the clerk of the weather has used up all the frost on hand during the cold winter now closing, and that there will be no paying it out in dribs and chains, lasting up to Christmas, as was the case last year. Wakatipu has to wait for the beginning of its practical spring till the end of August, vegetable growth rarely showing itself, except in favoured positions, before September. Obituary. — Sorrow, mingled with consternation, spread over Arrowtown and neighbourhood on Friday morning last, when it became known that during the night before there had passed away Mrs J . Woodhead, one of the first of her sex to come" into the Wakatipu with the early gold lush. The suddenness of the sad event made it difficult to realise the fact when it was first announced, as the deceased had been about her usual occupations up to within little better than a day before the end came. It seeing that Mrs Woodhead, who had always led an active life, and was credited with an iron constitution, began to feel out of sorts on Wednesday night. Later on symptoms of inflammation "of the bowels began to show themselves. .The sufferer becoming worse the following day, Mi Woodhead, who was absent at Cardiona, as overseer of some county works, was seni for The messenger had no easy task, a3 tiaffic on the road ovei the Cardrona, saddle had been stopped for some time, the track being completely obliterated by the drifted snow, and night having already set in when he reached the worst places. However, he pushed on till he met the object of his auest. Dark night as it was, Mr Woodhead" at once got ready for the start in obedience to the summons. Pushing on thiough the dark, cold night air and trackless waste of drifting snow, the progress made was only a mockery to tha anxious wish for the journey's end. At last familiar scenes were reached upon nearing his home. Seeing a. light in the bedroom, Mr Woodhead made for it. An ominous stillness and loneliness was noticeable in the room, and going to the bed he found his wife — a corpse. Friendly watchers, busy at the time in another part of the house, came to his aid, but it was some time before he could understand the unexpected position of affairs. Deceased was highly and universally respected, being a colonist in the true sense of the-^vvoid. She leaves a family of three sons and two daughters, all grown up and settled in life.

Arbour Day. — The officially - proclaimed Arbour Day (18th insit.) has come and gone. But the fiost minded it not, noi did the trees respect it. It "freezed" and '"frozed" ; it "snew" and it "snowed," and the ice was in the ground. I have heard of a party that went out with pickaxes and crowbars, with dynamite and blasting tools, who laboured diligently and long in the sweat of their brows. And after many hoxirs' toil they made a hole in the ground, two cubits in diameter, and one cubit in depth, and therein deposited a copy of the proclamation of the day, carefully filling up the hole with lumps of frozen earth, and now are anxiously awaiting the fruits of their labour.

An Indication. — Messrs Cotter Bros., merchants at Arrowtown and Bx.llendale, lost a valuable horse through the frozen state ol the roads in the neighbourhood of Skippers. So hard was the ice on the road, at a poiat known as Johnston's Hill, that though the horse was sharp-shod, it could not keep its feet, and, with its pack load, went over the bank, and was killed.

Scholastic. — Upon severing her connection With the Lower Shotover School, Miss Southberg was made the recipient of a handsome travelling bag, which bears a silver plate suitably inscribed. The travelling bag was subscribed for by the pupils. Miss Southberg passed her examination as teacher last Christmas.