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Waipawa Mail, Volume I, Issue 20, 20 November 1878, Page 2

Tiie English Mail.—The San Francisco mail steamer arrived at Auckland last evening. A telegraphic summary of news will be found in another column. Auction Sale.—We direct attention to Mr W. L. Coward's sale of stock, which takes place at Waipawa this cl ly at eleven o’clock. Particulars will be found in our advertising columns. Sale of Onga Onga.—We desire to draw attention to the sale of 51 sections in the township of Onga Onga, which will take place at the Criterion Hotel, Napier, on Friday next. Mr J. Turley is the auctioneer. The township is situated on the Ruataniwba Plains, and there is little doubt but that it will become the centre of a large agricultural district. Already there is a considerable amount of agricultural settlement in the district, some 2000 acres being under crop on the Ruataniwba Plains, and it is probable that four times this acreage will be turned over during the next year or two.

Entertainment. Madame Cora and Val Vose gave entertainments at the Oddfellows’ Hall on Monday and Tuesday evenings. There was a moderate attendance on both occasions. Town and County Jockey Club.—A meeting of the Town and County Jockey Club was convened for Monday evening at Baker’s Empire Hotel, but owing to the paucity of attendance, the meeting was adjourned till Saturday evening at Hickey’s Hotel, Kaikora, at 7.30.

Meteor.—On Sunday morning about four o’clock a large and brilliant meteor shot across the heavens in a south-westerly direction, leaving in its track a bright luminous line, which lasted for some seconds after the disappearance of the meteoric body. Accident.—Mr John Gollan, of Tamumu, met with an accident on Monday night by which his collar bone was fractured. He had been attending the entertainment at the Oddfellows’ Hall, aud was proceeding home, when his horse stumbled on the other side of the Waipawa River, and fell on the rider. Mr Gollan was conveyed to Mr Baker’s Hotel, where he was attended by Dr. Todd, and we are glad to learn that he is likely to get over his mishap in a short time.

The “ Bush.”—A person strolling down by Mr Rath bone’s sawmill and through the bush would be surprised at the number of comfortable cottage residences and plots of gardens that are met with. In the most out of the way and unexpected places you come upon buildings either completed or in the course of erection, all bespeaking comfort and prosperity. Ordinary visitors to Waipawa are not aware of the existence of such a number of residences.

Cart Accident.—Mr Charles Ayers, of Waipawa, sustained the loss of a horse, cart, and harness at Wanstead on Monday last. He had been carting water for Mr McGreevy, of the Wanstead Hotel, when the horse backed down an incline into a water hole fifteen feet deep. An attempt was made to save the horse by cutting the harness, but the animal was drowned. The cart was completely destroyed. The loss altogether is over £6O. Wairoa. Our Wairoa correspondent writes as follows, under date November 16th : —The elections are over at last, and have turned out as I predicted. The Council now consists of eight really good members. An election to fill an extraordinary vacancy in the Mahaka Riding will be held on December 3. The Jockey Ciub Races are expected to prove a great success this year, the public appearing to be much interested in the matter. It is leported that Messrs Royse, Stead and Co.. have offered to give £2,000 towards the harbor improvement fund if some one else comes forward and does the same. The Byers troupe have had a very successful season here, being largely patronised by the residents. Fire at Gisborne. A disastrous fire broke out at Gisborne on Monday afternoon, which originated in a stable owned by George Burnand, caused, it is said, by a spark from. Morgan’s engine failing on the roof shingles. The fire spread to Adair’s bonded and free stores, which were burned to the ground. Mr Adair was.insured to the extent of £2,000 on his goods, and £SOO on the building, lie calculates that Lis loss will be about £7OO. Messrs Shepherd and Co. had spirits and general merchandise in the bond of the value of £2,000, and as they were uninsured, they will lose to that extent. Tiiere are other heavy losers. The fire reached the wharf and destined the boat-shed. Tiiere was a strong wind blowing at the time.

Ball at Wallingford.—A ball and supper took place last Friday evening at Morgan’s Bridge Hotel, Wallingford. Tiiere was an excellent attendance of the residents of the place as well as a great number from the neighboring townships, and the lovers of “the light fantastic toe ” business doubtless enjoyed themselves exceedingly. Trie supper was excellent in the extreme, the tables virtually groaning with choice viands together with all the delicacies of the season. Upon the whole it was one of those festive reunions which give a zest to the dull monotony of life, assisting in cementing friendships which are not easily broken, as well as drowning the cares and troubles of every-day existence. The whole affair was a decided success, giving pleasure to the gathering and reflecting tiie highest credit upon the proprietor.

Fires.—There have been conflagrations in almost all directions during the past few days. From Norse wood we learn that Mr Levy’s store has been burned to the ground, a bush tire having spread to the premises, despite the efforts of the settlers to save house property from destruction. The fire raged in' the bush with terrible violence, and as there was a stiff gale blowing, Mr Levy’s store and contents were consumed in a few minutes. It was only by the most vigoious efforts that other houses were rescued from the flames, which at one time promised to work fearful disaster. Mr Livy was insured in the Hawke’s Bay Company for £3OO, but he estimates the value of the property destroyed at double that sum. When the flames reached the store there was no time to save anj'thing, and Mr Levy consequently has iost his account books and papers. We learn that the building occupied l>y Mr Levy was the property of Mr Drower, of Waipukurau. Fire at Makaretu.—A disastrous fire occurred at Makaretu on Friday last, by which Mr Foulger’s 1 t*e was burned to the ground. The fii i ‘ginaleri in the hush, and when the ii < reached the dwelling-house, Mrs Foi was absent endeavoring to rescue tl ■■ ,!e, i n which she was fortunately ful. Mr Foulger was not in the tn-ig morhood, having been engaged on Colonel Herrick's run. Not a single article was saved from the house. Jlrs Foulger, in her efforts to obtain some valuable documents from the burning house, was fearfully scorched the hair actually being burned off bethead and the clothes off her back. Mr and Mrs Foulger are old residents of this district and are highly respected. Much sympathy is expressed at the serious loss they have sustained, and subscription lists have been opened at Waipukurau and Waipawa. In the course of the same fire Mr 0. Morton, the schoolmaster at AshleyOlinton, met with an accident while driving his cattle out of the reach of the flames. A burning branch of a tree fell upon him, inflicting seriou's injuries. We regret to hear that Mr Morton is still in a precarious state,

H.A.C.B.S.—A meeting of the committee of the above society was held last evening, when it was decided to postpone the anniversary ball for a month, it having been found that there was not sufficient time to perfect the arrangements by Monday next, the date on which it was originally intended to hold the ball. Quick Passage.—We notice that the City of Sydney’s passage from Sydney to Auckland, with the San Francisco mail, is the fastest on record. It only occupied four days and fifty-five minutes from pilot to pilot. Australian Blackfellows.—“ A few weeks ago,” states a New South Wales paper, “ a human skeleton was unearthed by the workmen engaged in forming the new road to Howlong, via the river. On the 24th inst we had an opportunity of seeing the spot from whence the skeleton was taken, and to our intense surprise found the tomb was about sft. below the surface in the solid rock. To discover a human being’s remains in a mausoleum of adamantine stone appears to be so marvellous a story that it would be worthy of a veritable Baron Munchausen. Nevertheless it is a fact ; sft. of stone lias been penetrated in some manner or other by the aborigines in years gone by, and the cavity filled up by rocks. What were the implements used to penetrate the rock, and why the blacks preferred to sink a grave in the stone in preference to soft ground, are questions that require answer-

A writer in the Dunodin Age says : At the sale of educational reserves the other day, the lease of a block of a dozen acres was knocked down to an innocent countryman at half-a-crown per year per acre. The bidder handed over the thirty shillings, and patiently waited till the end of the sale. As the crowd was dispersing, he moved up to the Secretary of the Education Board, and blandly asked, “ Whan wull ’e ca* for ma Croon grant ?” “ You have no Crown grant. You only got a lease,” was the reply. “ Only a leese !” exclaimed the other. “ An’d’ye think’es goin’ to gi’e half a croon an acre for a leese ?” “ You never expected twelve acres for thirty shillings, did you ?” “Deed did a,” was the unabashed rejoinder. “ Here, then, take back your money,” said the secretary, handing* him his deposit, and drawing a line through the record of the purchase. Some people have no consciences.

Eugenie’s Jewels.—lt appears that at one time in the reign of Napoleon 111. lie was severely pressed for money, and so it was determined that the emeralds, each one worth a fortune, in one of Eugenie’s necklaces, should he sold, and false ones should be put in their places. r lhe Imperial Treasury was charged with this delicate task, and succeeded in doing it. After Eugenie’s fall from power, an English jeweller purchased the necklace which the dethroned Empress liad left behind her, and had it not been for his curiosity to discover how much the emeralds were worth—a curiosity which led him to unset one and test it—he would never have known that the stones were false. When he found that they were not genuine, he demanded an explanation, and the whole matter came out.

Unearthed.—The Dunstan Times says: —“Among the wreckage brought down by the late floods, and which, could it but speak, might possibly tell a tale of horror, is the upper part of the skull of a human being with a bole in the side of it, bearing a suspicious resemblance to a bullet-hole. It was found on a newly-formed bank of gravel, about a mile below Mutton Town Gully, by Mr Thomas -Sims, and lias been presented by that gentleman to the Clyde Atlienamm Museum.”

The Electric Light.—Dunedin promises not to be so far ahead of Wellington (says the New Zealander) in utilising the electric light as an illuminating agent after all, as one of our enterprising townsmen has asserted his intention, when his advices arrive by the next English mail, of making an offer to the Corporation to light the city by this medium. The latest mode of applying this recent invention of which we have heard is the proposal to cause all merchant shipping to carry it at the mast head. Were tin's system enforced, there would doubtless be fewer disasters at sea.

The Melbourne Argus, in a review of the magazines of the month, says of the Fortnightly :—“ Mr Anthony Trollope g'.ves us his impressions of Iceland in a light and lively fashion ; and it will gratify our New Zealand friends to know that having seen the geysers in the North Island, he was by no means iinpressed by the less imposing hot springs of Iceland. On the other hand, lie seems to have been delighted with the people. He says : ‘Everybody seems to be comfortable. Everybody was well clothed. Everybody could read and write. I saw no poverty. I saw no case of a drunken man, though I heard of drunkenness. I found a taste for prettiness—notably as shown in the ornaments and dress of the women; a very general appropriation of literary pursuits ; a tendency to religious worship ; orderly, easy, comfortable manner, and a mode of life very much removed indeed from barbarism.’”

A Voracious SriDEß.—The editor of the Timaru Herald has been entomolorising. Referring to the trap-door spider, he says : —“ One of these singular insects was brought to us yesterday, and is now on view at our office. It is of a dirty black color, about two-thirds of an inch long, with heavy round body and long legs, and is rather a repulsive-looking object. That it is in a healthy state may be judged from the voracious appetite it possesses. In the course of two hours last night, it demolished two big moths, several small flies, and a small lump of meat, and would probably have gone on feeding if we had had the time to go moth and fly catching for its particular benefit.”

Sir George Grey’s Movements. The N. Z. Herald says : —“ The Premier, after a brief stay at Kuwait, will visit New South Wales and Victoria, to endeavour to make arrangements in regard to commercial reciprocity. Sir George will, no doubt, be well received in these colonies. His connection with the early history of South Australia and New Zealand is well known, and has become matter of interest to the colonists. Furthermore, he has been abused in season and out of season by a section of the Victorian Press, for party purposes, and to such an extent has this been carried out that it must have created wide sympathy witli him. The first recess work of the Native Minister will be to visit Te Whiti, at Parihaka, for the purpose of endeavoring to obtain the rendition of Hiroki.”

Church Property.—The Christchurch correspondent of the Saturday Advertiser mentions as a thing not generally known that during one of the debates in the recent session of the Synod it was stated that the Church Trust Property in Canterbury had now reached the enormous value of one hundred thousand pounds sterling, and that the trusts were so loosely tied up that the money could, if so desired, be diverted from one to the other.

Wool Market.—The Tasmanian Mail says : —Great competition is threatened at present in the wool-broking and buying trades of Melbourne and Sydney. It is admitted that, hitherto, Melbourne has been the better market of the two, but the great supply of wool in it represented clips in the Riverina district of New South W ales, and there comes into operation the difficulty of the Border Customs duty to mar the progress in the trade. The wool can be sent to Sydney without such a charge being paid, and the cheapness of packing wools by dray to the seaside more than compensates for the lighter carriage by the train. Rowdyism in Otago.—Says the Dunedin Times of the 12th instant :—“ The South Dunedin Borough Council held its usual meeting last evening, and more disgraceful behaviour than that exhibited by some of the ratepayers who attended it, could hardly be imagined. During the whole of the time the tramway question was being discussed by the Council, these persons were acting in the most riotous manner. In vain did the Mayor call them to order, appeal to their good s«nse, and threaten them with legal proceedings. They only laughed at him, challenged him to take what proceedings lie liked, and even uttered oaths. Every time a Councillor rose to speak in favor of tramways, yells, hoots, anti hisses assailed him on every side, although two or three persons exclaimed, with a patronising air ‘ Let us hear what he lias to say?’ The proceedings reached a climax when two rowdies, who differed slightly in their opinions, determined to fight it out in the open air. A rush was made from the Council chamber, and when our reporter left the two were fighting in the middle of the street, coats off, with an admiring crowd around them.”