TELEGRAMS.

Waipawa Mail, Volume X, Issue 1022, 14 December 1886, Page 3

TELEGRAMS.

Per United Press Association. The New Zealand Shipping CoWellington, This day. At a meeting of local shareholders in this company last evening, a reply was received from the chairman to the latter, urging the claims of the North Island to shore in the management of the company,s affairs. Mr Murray-Aynsley said that the limitation of shareholders approved of at last meeting, and the articles of association did not permit of local boards in the colony. He begged them to wait till Mr Harper,s mission to England had been completed. The letter was condemned as inaccurate and unsatisfactory and it was resolved to inform the chairman that the results of Mr Harper’s mission would be awaited, but they did not mean to postpone action indefinitely. A list of Wellington shareholders qualified to act as directors was prepared, and arrangements made to secure the necessary votes from Blenheim. A letter from Blenheim shareholders co-operation. The New Zeuland cross will will be presented to Col, McDonnell to morrow at the Parliamentary buildings. Pines from VolunteersThe first case under “ The Defence Act, 188(1,” in this city is now in course of progress against a private in a local company. By section 47 and the following sections of this Act, an officer commanding a Volunteer Company is empowered to inflict fines for certain offences, and on non-payment of the same, to report the case to the Commanding Officer of the district. On the line still remaining unpaid, notwithstanding an order to that effect, papers, including the order, to ho sent to the Clerk to the Bench, who records the order, which has there and then without further judicial procedure, the same effect as if a conviction had been recorded, and a distress warrant is issued for the recovery of the fine and costs. Dunicdin, This day. The City Council will defend the action Drought by Sargood’s for 4-5,500, for damages to their stock through the sewers beiug stopped during the August floods. They have also agreed to placing the Burns’ Statue opposite the railway station instead of in the octagon. The weather is still very wintry. Caffrey’s Mother in Trouble. Found AgainAuckland, This day. Caffrey’s mother was fined this morning for drunkenness. Mrs Traill who was believed to have been drowned in the barbor and was buried lias turned up. The mystery of tho drowned woman is still unrevealed. The Australian Shipping Disaster. New Zealand Times. Another and another terrible disaster at sea ! It is saddening to reflect how many have occurred of late, and what a hecatomb pf valuable lives lias been sacrificed to what cannot reasonably bo designated, in legal language, as “ The act of God. lho remarkable feature about almost all ot tlieso frightful maritime catastrophes is that they seem to happen in fine or moderate weather. Wo do not in our Australian disasters reproduce the circumstances of tho Royal Charter and London affairs. Those ill-fated steamships were

overwhelmed by the fury of the storms, but the New Zealand and Australian mishaps are confined so markedly to moderate weather that it would seem to be safer to go to sea only in howling tempests. When vessels in fair weather run ashore on a well-lighted coast, or steam full bu'tt against one another, it is palpable that somebody must be in fault. Either they do not give the land a wide enough berth, but are “cutting off corners,” or else they run faster than is safe in thick weather, or else tho commanders content ihemselvcE with rough-and-ready, rulo-of-thumb computations of distance. All these fatal disasters could not occur without there being some carelessness or incompetence as a primary or contributory cause, and it is bis high time that very stringent measures were taken to bring to a severe reckoning all who are wholly or partially culpable for any disaster at sea. For tho sake of tho numbers of lives which are daily at stake the most rigid justice should be meted out in all its cases ; indeed, we need several sharp examples to operate aH a warning to these free-and-easy navigators who are responsible for recent mishaps.