LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 958, 24 November 1879, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

I Our Wellington telegrams inform us i that the chemists have raised the price of I patent medicines, m consequence of the increased duty. We trust that this will have the effect of people refusing to indulge m these worthless and not unfrequently injurious nostrums. We recommend a much cheaper remedy against most of the ills which flesh is heir to. Eat less, drink less, keep earlier hours, go to bed sober, aud there will be no occasion for quack medicines, even if they were sold at the prices of empty bottles. Again it will prove good news to most of our readers to learn that under date of Novemeber 19th, that the wool sales had opened with much spirit, home buyers purchasing freely at a stiff advance. Greasy, ld. ; Combing washed and scoured, l£d to 3d ; Clothing, ld ; Superior combing, 2d to 3d ;—vide our cablegrams of this afternoons issue. As Mr. Edmund Bousefield was riding after cattle the other day, his horse fell when at full speed, and broke the young man's colar bone. No doctor being disengaged, Mr. Luttrell kindly and with his usual energy started off to Mr. Bousefi eld's assistance and set the broken bone with great skill and success. The accident might have been attended with fatal results, but fortunately Mr. Bousefield's brother was with him and so assisted him to a place of safety.

A meeting was held on Saturday at the Masonic Hotel for the purpose of forming an Athletic Club, when there was a good attendance of the lovers of outdoor sports. It was resolved to form a club, to be called • ' Tlie Turanganui Athletic Club. " A proposal having been received from the Secretary of the Tradesmen's Athletic Club (recently formed) to join m with that club m promoting sports to be held on New Year's Day, a committee was appointed to confer with the former race. Three children, of very tender years, were on Saturday last convicted at the Resident Magistrate's Court at Christchurch, for several petty thefts. The children were sentenced each to throe day's imprisonment, and to receive twelve lashes with a cat-o'-nino tails. The sentence appears to us to be a most brutal one, and one we trust which no officer will be found so inhuman as to inflict. Surely, the parents of children of tender age should, m some way or other, be made responsible for these offences — say by paying seven-fold the value of the articles pilfered. The Ballarat Courier tells the following strange story about Ned Kelly : — " One day last week a respectably-dressed stranger, who refused to mention his name, waited upon a medical gentleman of St. Kilda, and having stated his complaint, said he wanted the prescription for the medicine written so that it might be dispensed by a chemist m the country. Having paid the medico liberally for his services, the stranger departed on horseback, but the docter having his suspicions aroused by his conduct, communicated them to the police. The doctor described the appearance of the stranger very minutely, and on the photographs of several suspected persons, besides those of many respectable citizens, being produced, he picked at once that of Ned Kelly, and said, ' That is the portrait of my visitor.' The patient, on leaving, it may be stated, promised to return and see the doctor again m a fortnight ; but it is most unlikely that he wili do so." A marvellous escape from death is recorded by the Wellington papers. On Wednesday morning, as the down train from Featherston to Wellington was passing the crossing at Belmont, a spring trap, driven by an Italian youth, got on to the line. The engine came into contact with the cart, and carried cart, horse, and driver fully twenty yards on the cowcatcher. The cart was smashed into atoms, the horse, wonderful to relate, was wholly uninjured. When the train was pulled up the youth was picked up and carried into the house of Mr. Fitzherbert, when he was found to have escaped almost scot free. The only injuries he had sustained were some cuts ou one of his legs. The youth who was driving the cart seems to have been half asleep, for he did not appear to have noticed the advancing train at all. If, as is said, happiness consists m occupation of the mind, the average editor (says an American exchange) should be moderately content. With two men sitting on his table reading exchanges while is he trying to write a leader, a book-agent whisperiug m his ear that he'll never get such a chance again because there wasn't but one made, a boy or two hanging round the outskirts with a base-ball item concealed about their persons, a compositor waiting away for a translation of some awful chirography, a couple of patrons Sressing him for a seven-dollar-puff for a ollar-and-a-quarter advertisement, and a ferocious-looking individual sitting just outside the door with a heavy-weight cane, and a crumpled copy of the paper m his hand, waiting for a "chance to see him alone," the newspaper man may be said to be just m the suburbs of occupation, and threatening to be quite busy m time.