ALEXANDRA.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 144, 10 November 1870, Page 4

ALEXANDRA.

(From a Correspondent.) During the past week we (tbat is, the townspeople) have been enjojdng most splendid weather ; though lam afraid, if it continues much longer, the race owners and agriculturists will be crying out in no measured terms.

Mining is being briskly carried on. Messrs. Kett and party are running off their lose stuff, and preparing for an early start next season. The Ovens Co. and the Manuherikia Ground Sluicing Co. are in full work. Speaking of mining matters, T may mention the return of Mr. J. Drummy, one of the first residents at Alexandra, but for some time past he has been living on the West Coast, where he has (I believe mostly in his spare time) succeeded in perfecting the model of a machine for the purpose of raising water out of the Molyneux. As yet I have not oceu it, but if it realises the wishes of the inventor, it will indeed be a boon to many a miner in this and other districts.

On Saturday night, Mr. Mervyn, MH.R., addressed his constituents — his Worship the Mayor in the chair. The attendance, considering the shortness of the notice, was very good. Mr. Mervyn reviewed his career in the House since his election at some length. But, summing up the whole of his address, I cannot do better than use the words of a stranger who was present, " That Mr. Mervyn wished to make it appear that he and his colleague Mr. Bradshaw, had been the moving power in the House, and that all bills pertaining to the good of the district had either been brought forward or amended by bis or their instrumentality." A number of questions were put to the hon. gentleman, and answered to the satisfaction of the audience. A vote of thanks to the chair closed the proceedings. Last Thursday we were most agreeably surprised by the arrival of Cobb and Co.'s coach via Tuapeka, which has now been laid on for the summer months, aud if the young man who drives it still adheres to his punctual habits, we shall be sure of getting our letters, &c, delivered in reasonable time at least once a week. I cannot say so much for the punctuality of the mail service on the other route. Whether the driver of that coach is anxious to spare his horses the extra six miles, or to get home to the bosom of his family, I cannot say ; but this I do know, that he most persistently refuses to bring the coach via Alexandra.

Five cases of infanticide are reported in the ' 'Melbourne Weekly Times" of September 17. The editor truly says, " Did such a social statistic appear in a chapter of a maudlin romance published in the ' l London Journal," no one would believe it . There is nothing of a ' fabrication,' however, about the sight of the bodies of five dead infants, which had been raked up out of gutters and cesspools. There is a bona fides about such evidence of the state of society, which is quite incontrovertible, for though it may set the reflecting thinking, there is no denying the depths of depravity of which dead witnesses are the historians, At any time during the last twelve or fifteen years, dead infants have been about as common as poisoned pups, even supposing that all those whose beginings were unlawful, and whose ends were untimely, have been discovered, a conclusion which would be very injudicious to come to. The number of illegitimates which are found about the streets is ijndoubtly large, but there is no reason to conclude that an equal number are not ' put away ' without the fact of their having existed ever being discovered "