INTER-COLONIAL JOTTINGS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 185, 13 October 1876, Page 12

INTER-COLONIAL JOTTINGS.

Some months ago a Roman Catholic clergyman, named Healy, who was officiating as curate at Wangaratta, snowed evident signs of * mental aberration, and at length disappeared, in a mysterious man- * ncr, from the locality in which he had resided. Search was made for *• him, but in vain, and his friends were left a prey to the utmost anxiety. Meantime, two members of the police force were engaged to •* follow up a bushranger who had lately committed some excesß, and in s the course of their inquiries they came upon the traces of a man ' whom they supposed, from description, to be the one they were con- ! cerned about. They tracked this man to a public-house in the neigh- 1 borhood of Wagga Wagga, and, besetting the room in which he was 1 sleeping, without making any announcement to the effect that they !]! ] were policemen, they called on him to surrender, when he, in turn . '' belie Ting them to be bushrangers attacking the house, discharged a | ' pistol at them, which, however, had no effect, and to which they j responded in like manner, but unfortunately more effectually, for ' they succeeded in mortally wounding him. It now turns out to be j ! beyond all doubt that the supposed robber was the Rev. Father ( Healy, who appears to have been aimlessly wandering about the , country, as it often happens to those who are afflicted as he was, and : who was thus cruelly shot down by men purporting to be the guardians of the peace. Government has ordered a thorough investigation into the matter. A movement has been set on foot in New South Wales to eneour- 1 age Italian immigration into that colony. It would seem that the people of Italy are now on all sides acknowledged to be in anything but flourishing circumstances — a rather astounding fact to those who remember the prophecies that abounded some years ago of the marvellous reforms that would be witnessed when that terrible " ultramontane" party should have been quelled throughout the beaiitiful peninsula, and the beneficent reign of the " re gculantuomo " established there. The changes, however, ushered in by the cry of " Italy for the Italians " appear to have resulted by no means satisfactorily for the people, at whose disposal their native land was supposed to have been placed, and it turns out that there is every probability of large" numbers of them being anxious to exchange their azure skies and myrtle groves and all the fine things we have been accustomed to hear " highfalutingly" described, including the paternal sway of King Victor Emmanuel, for the arid regions but plentiful rations of New South Wales. The subscriptions at Sydney for a testimonial to Trickett, the champion oarsman, amount at present to close upon £600, and will probably reach a much higher figure before the lists are closed. The enthusiasm, manifested on the occasion of this Australian hero's victory by the natives of the Queen of the South, reminds us of the tempest of Gallic triumph that hailed the success of the French horse, Gladiateur, when he won the Derby. There was not a cabdriver that day in Paris who refrained from, exultingly slapping the flanks of his hack, as if the creature were also — par hasard — a Bucephalus, and English pre-eminence upon the turf was supposed to have collapsed for ever. Has experience verified the prediction ? An enterprising company has undertaken to import from Europe iuto the Australian colonies an Italian opera troupe. Genuine Signors J and Signoras with the ring of La Sccla, and the Boulevard des Italiens \ in their performances. We expect that tbey will meet with lively appreciation in these antipodean climes, for, however certain critics may prose over the " legitimate drama," or bewail the fiorature and vocal antics generally that distinguish opera, there is no doubt but that the lyric stage has long since attracted to itself the lion's share of public approbation.