LAKE COUNTY

Otago Witness, Issue 2454, 27 March 1901, Page 29

LAK E COUNTY

Match 23. —The equinoctial weather has come true to date this year, an occurrence that does not happen very often. On Tuesday last the trouble began. Wind was followed by rain, and the ram by intense cold. As can be imagined, the effect upon harvest work was not a favourable or.c, threshing especially suffering. This, together with the shoitness of hands, does not tend to promote the happiness of fsrmers, and is further aggravated by the shortening of the days. Crops, though good all round, are not expected to exceed the average. As four or five thicshing mills are in full work we shall not have long to wait for accurate results. A Funeral Dirge —A widow, poor and lonely, lost her little pony; it died of ngo and trouble on a field of stubble, at a distance from its home, where in peace it thought to roam. A friend, who felt so sorry, started the horse to bury, and did it, too, right willing, but charged for it 10 shillings. TII9 v/idow quick saw through his trick, and said: "I do not owe it! Pay you? Not if I know it 1" ''Look here, marrn, if my bill is not respected, by jabers I'll have your horse resurrected!" The horse did not resurrect worth a cent. Hard Hit. —lt was only last week that Mr D. M'Bride, owner of Kawarau Falls station, had the misfortune to break several of his ribs through a fall from his horse, of which he is gradually recovering, when on Saturday last four stacks of oats in the straw were burnt to the ground. Thers was an insurance of £300 on two of the stacks. No clue can bo found as to the origin of the fire, but there is 210 reason to ascribe it to incendiarism. Removal. —Mr G. Stoddart, who for a long r.uniber of years has been in business in Arrowtown, and "has taken much interest in public j matters, has decided to try Ashburton for a charge Mr and Mrs Stoddart havo made a large circle of friends, whose good wishes follow them to their new home. Troubles Never Cease. —The Skippers Bridge, which has so long been the trouble with Skippers people, and the ratepayers generally, has become an absolute grievance to them since it is finished. It has now been fit for traffic for some weeks, and 13 occasionally used, but not having been formally taken over by the County Council, is not yet declared open for public traffic. Upon more occasions than one the timber, etc., barricading the passage has been swept away by the Shotover, though there was no flood high enough to account for the disappearance of the barricades. It is said that orders have come up from headquarters to padlock and chain Lhe passage If this order is executed it will be bad for the old bridge, for the Shotever is sure to play up with it and sweep away, if nothing more, at least a part of the planking. Skippers people have shown, one would think, a laudable amount of patience.^nd when after three years' building th© bx'iage is at last finished, and they are not allowed to use it, it is a little too irritating for ordinary humanity to stand the strain. What the new bridge means to the residents will be seen when it is stated thafe it makes a difference of 10s in the price of every ton of coals delivered at Skipper 3 Point, ■ and of general merchandise in proportion, while . the saving in time in crossing to Skippers cannot be much less than half an hour. Noxious Weeds. —The Queenstown Borough Council has applied the Noxious Weeds Act as a remedy for Cape broom and other seeds that threaten to become a nuisance. The terraces surrounding Queenstown, over which the town is gradually spreading, offer a certain amount of impediment to traffic, on account of the steep* ness of the grade, and seeds of different kinds are taking possession of many of the streets, so that it is time something was done to stop the nuisance.