Local and General.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 897, 15 April 1871, Page 2

Local and General.

Theatre Royal.—" School for Scandal " was again placed upon the stage last night. The cast was unaltered, and the piece went smoothly and with good effect throughout. Brokers' Licenses. — We understand that licenses under the Land Transfer Act have been duly issued to Mr C. Clarke, Colombo street; R. J. S. Harman, Hereford street; R. Wilkin, Hereford street; J. A. Bird, Cashel street; and F. Thompson, Here ford street. . The Volunteers. — Officers commanding corps are informed that only one return and one parade state for the past quarter have been received by Colonel Packe, and tbat the remainder must be sent in without delay, as no claim for capitation grant will be signed or forwarded until all are Bent in. The monthly inspection of the Artillery, Engineers, the City Guard, and No. 2 Co. Rifles, is appointed to take place on the 1 9th inst. at 7 p m., and that of the Cavalry on the last Thursday in the month at 5 p.m. Weblbtan School Anniversary. — The anniversary sermons in connection with the Wesleyan Sunday schools, will be preached in the Durham street church on Sunday next. The Rev. W. Kirk will officiate in the morning. The Rev. W. Morley, of Wanganui, will deliver an address to the children and their parents in the afternoon, and the Rev. A. R. Fitchett will conduct the services in the evening. On Monday evening the usual tea meeting will take place, after which a public meeting will be held, and addresses delivered by several ministers and laymen. During the evening, the children will also sing several anthems under the direction of Mr Spenßley. Ball and Supper. — A ball and supper took place at the Star Brewery, Ferry Road, on Thursday evening last, in compliment to Mr Joseph Herdman Andrews, of the firm of Sadler and Company, brewers. There was a large and agreeable company, and the proceedings passed off in a highly pleasing manner. The supper was served by Mr John Hicks, of the City Bakery, and gave universal satisfaction. The assemblage was called together on the occasion of Mr Andrews' marriage, and in the course of the evening the health of the newly married : couple was proposed, and drunk amidst rapturous applause. Dancing was kept up to an early hour of the morning, and the 1 company separated after wishing a pros- * perous future to Mr and Mrs Andrews.

FntE. — At half-past two o'clock yesterday afternoon a gorse fence on the property of Mr Williams, near the Crown Hotel, South town belt, caught fire and communicated to a small stack of straw and some pig-styes. The pigs were saved with considerable difficulty by Mr Smith and others, who were in the Crown Hotel. Information of the fire was at once sent to the Superintendent of the_ Fire Brigade, Mr Harris, who, after taking steps to prevent the ringing of the fire -bell, proceeded to the spot, followed immediately afterwards by a detachment of police under Sergt. M'Knight. Ac one time an adjoining house was somewhat in danger, but ultimately the flames were extinguished without damage being committed to anything beyond the fence and the pig-styes. Brown Trout in the Maitai. — A Nelson contemporary has the following : — An evidence of the growth and multiplication of the brown trout inthe Maitai river was discovered the other day, in the shape of a well grown fish weighing 3 Jibs, and measuring 20£ inches long, and 11 J inches in circumference, and being full of spawn. It was found in a dried-up pool, above the bridge, near the Maitai brewery, where it had been left by the river when it was high. The success of tbis last experiment should encourage the efforts to stock our rivers with English fish. We hope the salmon will speedih* follow. Skylarks from NELSONj^Tbe Colonist of April 7 says :— We observed another lot of eight beautiful skylarks, shipped on board the Taranaki, on Tuesday last, are to be turned out at Christchurch. Mr W. Robinson, who is expected next week in Nelson, will take back withljim a dozen more to stock the Cheviot HJUBJ Mr Wakefield has now supplied New^Plymouth, Wellington, and Canterbury, and it is his intention to send a dozen to Wanganui ; and tbe same number to Napier, Auckland and the Southern Provinces. As Nelson is. pre-eminently the country for skylarks, we do not feel the loss, and in time shall receive from our neighbours a good return in birds that we are deficient in. Strange. —In a romance published by Alexander Dumas in 1850, called The Thousand and One Phantoms, the following curious passage occurs :— " Hoffmann (one of the characters in the story) bent his way to the Louvre, but he had the grief to be told at the gate that the French, now being free, did not allow themselves to be degenerated and made effeminate by going to see the pictures of slaves, and that even supposing the Commune of Paris had not already roasted them at their ammunition foundries, they knew better than to feed those rats with the oil of the paint, seeing that those rats might one day become the food of patriots, if ever the Prussians should come and besiege Paris." An Epitaph. — The following is from Harper's New Monthly :•— Grief and business have seldom been more thoroughly mixed i than in the following obituary advertisement. The residence of the defunct we omit, and the name we have changed, therefore it will not worrit his friends : — " Othniel Sitgreaves, we are sorry to stait, has deceased. He departed this last Munday. He went 4th without any struggle, and sich is life. He kept a nice store, which his wife now waits on. His virchews was numerous and his wife inherits them. We are happy to stait that he never cheeted, spesbully in the wate of makerel, which was always nice and smelt sweet, and his surviving wife is the same. We niver new him to put sand in his sugar, I though he had a big sand-bar in front of his house, nor water his lickers, though the Ohio river passed his door. Piece tv bis remanes He levts 1 wife, 9 children, 1 kow, 4 horses, a growcer's and otber quadroopeds to mourn his loBS." England and Russia. — *'iEgles," in the Australasian, writes as follows : — " Bearing in mind the sinister aspect of affairs between England and Kussia a few mails back, is it not rather suggestive tbat the Haydamak should have been so near at band ? This war ship drops in promiscuously, apropos of nothing, and on her way to nowhere particular. Of course her somewhat indefinitely explained errand is now pacific, but had the Black Sea treaty difficulty not been promptly accommodated, her presence off Sandridge would have been much less agreeable. I don't tbink that she would, under these circumstances, have waited to be boarded by the Health Officer. It ia remembered as highly consolatory that an English Minister has promised to defend the colonies with Great Britain's last soldier, last ship, and last shilling. Would it not be more to the purpose if, in case of war, we could rely upon the first soldier, ship, and shilling ? The last might come just a day or two too late." Balloons,. — The Revue des Deux Mondes gives some interesting information about the balloons which bave left Paris during the siege. The first balloon sent by the Postoffice left, it says, on tbe 23rd of September. Between tbat date and the end of November 30 balloons have been sent from Paris, each witb, on an average, two passengers, 200 to SOO kilogrammes of letters, and a couple of pigeons, The greatest distance travelled by these balloons, except the one which fell in Norway, was about 200 kilometres. Many of the pigeona have not returned, and it is not known what has become of half of tbe balloons which have been sent. They are usually made of strong calico, covered with two or three coatings of a varnish composed of linseed oil and a little oxide of lead ; they are filled with the gas used for lighting tbe streets, and when full occupy a space of about 2000 cubic metreß. The balloons are made at the Northern and the Orleans railway stations. At the former white calico only is used, and the balloons are sewn together by maohinery; at the latter they are sewn by hand, and the material used is coloured calico. There is, says the writer in the Revue, sufficient material, machinery, &c, at these two places to turn out a new balloon daily, and the postage (20 centimes per four grammes) amply covers the expense.

Population of the City op Nelson. — The Examiner of April 8 states : — By the census lately taken we find the population of the City of Nelson to be 2674 males, and 2750 females, giving a total of 5424 souls, or 228 fewer inhabitants than when the census was taken at the end of 1867. When the last census was taken there was an excess of 338 males over females, while now the latter preponderate by seventy-six. War Trophies. — Tbe Staats Ameiger states that up to the cad of 1870. the war trophies of the German armies had amounted to 11,160 officers and 333,885 men,unwounded prisoners, 4640 guns, and 115 eagles and colors. Of the prisoners 232 officers and 25,490 men belong to Alsace and German Lorraine, and 78,995 are unable to read or write, while 6250 can only read ; 48 officers and 586 men have died, and 38 officers and 48 men have deserted. The Tauranga Mail Service. — The Thames Evening Star, of March 30, is glad to learn that the Government have made arrangements for the continuance of this service which are likely to prove successful. The cause of delay has arisen from the fact that Mr M'Lean would do nothing until he had obtained the concurrence of every friendly native chief concerned in the matter. By this means he has taken it out of the power of any of them hereafter to stand upon their dignity (?) and refuse assistance, "because action was taken without having consulted them." We believe that the means to be adopted for carrying on the service for the future, are as follow : — The contract from Katikati to Tauranga will remain in the hands of Mr Warbrick ; that from Katikati jto the Thames will be let directly to the natives with Hopihona. at their head. The question thus becoming one essentially of self-interest, the friendlies are not likely to let a good thing in the way of money be lost to them through any action of Te Hira's. In fact, the native greed will be set against the native obstinacy, and is pretty certain to overcome it. Ducrot's Account or his Escape. — General Ducrot has written an account of his i escape from the Prussians after the disaster |at Sedan. He lays stress upon his refusal to ! sign the capitulation, and says that, being a prisoner, it was suggested by his captors that he should proceed in his own carriage on , parole with bis two aides-de-camp to the railway station at Point-a-Mousson, and there ! deliver himself up. He duly arrived there, found the station in the hands of the Prussians, reported himself to the officer in charge, and thereby, as he contends, redeemed his word. He was ordered to enter a train about to proceed to Germany, but could not find a vacant seat. He called attention to this, and asked for an additional carriage. The ■ reply was that the train was already too long, and he i must proceed by the next, which would start in two hours. He then asked if he might visit a friend in the town, and received permission, no pledge being either asked or given as to his return. At his friend's house he and his aides obtained peasants' dresses, and a country cart with a load of potatoes. The swords and uniforms were buried under the potatoes. In a blue blouse and trousers, with a pipe in his mouth, a peasant's hat on his head, and with bare feet thrust into sabots padded with a bit of straw, General Ducrot rode on the side of the cart with his legs dangling. An aide-dc camp, similarly attired, led the horse, and another sat on the potatoes. In this way the party passed safely through the Prussian lines, and reached a place in which they could reappear in their natural characters. A Little Bit of " Histort." — The following is from the San Francisco News Letter : — One day an honest miner up in Calaveras bit himself with a small snake of the garter variety, and either as a possible antidote or with a determination to enjoy the brief remnant of a wasted life, he applied a brimming jug of whiskey to his lips, and kept it there until, like a repleted leech, it fell off. The man fell off likewise. The next day, while the body lay in state on a pine slab, and the bereaved partner of the deceased was unbending in a game of seven-up with a friendly Chinaman, the game was interrupted by a familiar voice which seemed to proceed from the jaws of the corpse — " I say, Jim !" Bereaved partner played king of spades and claimed " high," then looking over his shoulder at the melancholy remains, replied, " Well, what is it, Dave ? I'm busy.!' "I say, Jim 1" repeated the corpse in the same measured tone. With a look of intense i annoyance, and muttering something about " people that could never stay dead morn a | minute," the bereaved partner rose and stood over tbe body, witb his cards in his hands. " Jim," continued the mighty dead, how fur's this' thing gone?" "I've paid the Chinaman two and a balf to dig the grave*" "Did he strike anything?" The Chinaman looked up ; "Mo strikee pay dirt ; me no bury dead 'Molican in 'em grave. Me keep him claim." Tho corpse sat up rigidly : — " Jim, get my rovolver and chase that pigtail off. Jump his sopulchre, and tax his camp five dollars each for prospecting on the public domain. These Mongolynn hordes hey got to bo got under. And — I Bay — Jim 1 if any more serpents come foolin' round here, drive 'em off. 'Taint right to be bitin' a feller when whiskey's two dollars a gallon. Dern all foreigners, anyhow," and the mortal part pulled on bis boots. Such, dear reader, was the origin of the coolie movement. Sir Robert Chambers once provoked an expostulation from Dr Johnson by throwing | snails over the boundary wall of his orna- | mental enclosure into tbe flower garden of an obnoxiouß neighbour. " Sir," exclaimed the dictionary maker, " your conduct is unmannerly and unneighbourly." Justifying himself, as he pitched another handful of the mulluscs over the wall the baronet replied, " Sir, my neighbour is a Dissenter." " Oh," replied the doctor, bis sense of humour and political intolerance getting the better of his | regard for neighbourliness — " if so, Chambers, I toss aways as hard as you can."

Sporting. — We understand that a match has been arranged to come off within a month, for £50 a-side, two miles, over eight flights of hurdles, lOst up, on the Christchurch course, between Ivanhoe, with Mr Phillip Ball, and Albatross with Mr P. Campbell up.