LOCAL AND GENERAL

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XII, Issue 2417, 28 July 1891, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL

The Good Templars asserts that 30 members of the New South Wales Parliament are pledger! to support the temperance cause; 25 of these supporting a complete local optive with, no compensation, and the others favouring the introduction of a prohibition Bill. This afternoon a bad accident happened in Park street. Mrs Penlington, who was riding a spirited pony, in turning from Wills street, had the misfortune to have the girth slip, and the pony taking fright went off at a gallop. Mrs Penlington was unable to keep her seat, and, falling, her foot was caught in the stirrup. She was dragged along the road in this position until she reached Mr J. L. Brown's gate where Mr S. W. Alcorn pluckily caught the horse, and in doing so did not escape without in: jury. He was thrown down by the animal, but kept his hold until Mr T. Bircli was able to release Mrs Penlington, who was now in] sensible, from the stirrup. Mr Alcorn's right wrist was badly sprained and his knee was bruised somewhat severely. Mrs Penlington was taken into Mr Brown's house at once and l)r Tweed tent for. She must have received serious injuries, but their extent or severity we were not able to ascertain this afternoon. Taipua, the Native Member of the House of Representatives, whose wife died a few days ago, on leaving Wellington for the place of burial wrote the following touching letter to the Speaker:—Mr Speaker, owing to my sore affliction I pray you not to deal with or pa«s any Bills which affect the Native race, inasmuch as I have received a grievous blow in the loss of my wife, who is dead and who had been taken from me by my Creator. We are just leaving for Otaki this day, taking the body with iis, so that she may be buried were my father and 3-ngestors are. I ask your kind sympathy and consideration, and ask you not to proceed with the Native Bills at present. Nothing more from your loving friend, I Hoani Taimia."

The ship Crusader sailed from Titnaru ■yesterday for Callao with a cargo which included HOO tons of flour and. 2000 sacks of barley, shipped by Mesas W. E. Reynolds and Co., of Dunedin. An invitation to attend the Ministerial dinner which was extended to the labour members of the New South Wales Parliament by the head of the Government was not accepted for fear that it might seem'to compromise their independence. A young lad was sentenced to one month's imprisonment, at the Auckland Police Court, last week, for having assaulted a boy at Ponsonby. Sir |William Fox, who was on the Bench, took occasion to remark upon the extent to which larrikinism is prevalent in Auckland. A new company, " The Ash burton Finance and Agency Company, Liniitel," has been successfully formed in Ashburton, and the first issue of shares taken up. The capital of the Company is £20,000 in 4000 shares at £5 each, and the objects are indicated by its title. The Directors are Mes rs George Jameson, Hugo Friedlander, John Orr, T. Bullouk, and Dr Trevor, and most of the ) leading business people of the town are shareholders. That the demand for good land which has been so strongly manifested during the last six months is still unsatisfied was shown on Saturday by the sale by Mr Bullock of Mr S. Donaldson's farm.of 43 acres, at Longbeach, about fourteen miles from Ashburton. The first bid was £19 per acre, and quick advances took the price to £23 an acre, at which Mr Bullock knocked it'down to Mr I John White, a neighboring farmer, who well knew the vahie of the land. On Friday, old George White, who for the last eighteen or twenty years has been well-known at Tinwald and Ashburton, died at the hospital, and on Sunday his ,remains were buried at the Ashburton Cemetery. White was for about ten years in the employment of the late Mr John Carter, and latterly employed by Mr Mark Scott He had no relations in the district, nor so far as is known in the colony, but old friends saw to his being decently buried, and a considerable number attended the funeral. ■ At the Oddfellows' Hall last, evenip, between 200 and 300 people attended to witness the entertainment provided in connection with Mr Higgs' Art Union. Mr j Crook, of Ohristchurch, displayed by oxy-; hydrogen light a long list of admirably executed and admirably shown pictures, much to the enjoyment of the audience. The advertised piece de resistance of the entertainment, however, was ,a transformation scene, painted by Mr Hipgs, and representing the Pink Terraces of Rotoiiiahana, with Tarawera in eruption. Evidently, however, there was some slight hitch in the stage machinery, but this will probably be remedied this evening. Tlie Palmersfon Mutual Improvement Society have decided that the pictures given away with popular brands of cigarettes and tobacco are immoral. We do not know whether they are immoral or not, but if the ■manufacturers would do away with the pictures and give us better tobacco and more of it in the cigarettes, smokers would welcome the charge. They want a, good cigarette, and the smudgy portrait of some old stage harridan or fleshy member of the deir.i mon.de is no compensation for a bad smoke. Away with the pictures by all means, but give 11= good tobacco. A change in that direction would satisfy both moralists and smokers. About eighteen months ago a young man named Black, who had arrived in one of the direct steamers from the Old Country, called in at Oamuru in quest of work as a compositor He probably thanks his presiding genius that he did not get it, for lie is now one of the labor members for the City of Sydney in the New South Wales Parliament and is earning more at that than he ever would have done as a compositor in Oamaru, or anywhere else. Like Cincinnalus, he lias probably left his humble employment to save his country.—"North Otago Times." The' Sultan of Turkey had the toothache > and the dentist said the todth must be extracted. Fearing the operation would be painful, the' Sultan ordered it to be tried upon one of his slaves in hia^ presence. The niian screamed so while his tooth was being drawu that the Sultan shrank from the ordeal. Nor could he bear the continued toothache, so in all eight slaves, one after the other, had to have a tooth drawn to try to prove to his • Majesty that the operation was not a very painful one. All bore the extraction so bully that the Sultan resolved to put up with the toothache. With respect to the engagement between the heir presumptive to the throne of Roumania, Prince Ferdinand of Hohenzollern and Mademoi?elle Varesco, a Roumanian lady and Maid of Honor to the Queen Elizabeth, which the Roumanian Ministry has disapproved, it may prove interesting to know that the Queen of Roumania his no children, and the succession to.the throne was settled upon the King's elder brother, Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, He renounced his rights in favor of his son Prince Wilhelm, who on November 22, 1888, did the same in favor of his brother Prince Ferdinand, born August 24, 1865, who by a decree of the King, dated March 18, 1889, received the title " Prince of Roumania." The Chertsey School Committee met on Saturday night, Present—Messrs McDowell (chairman), Childs, Hudner, Murphy, and Dow^ie. A letter was received from the Board stating that the sum of £5 had been paid into their account towards the fuel shed; and that the required repairs to the sclioolhouse were granted. The Secretary was lequested to write to the Boanl in regard to the gymnastic apparatus, which was at present in a useless condition. A list of bad attendance was handed in, and the Secretary was instructed to write to the parents about the matter. It was agreed to lay several loads of shingle about the ground where there was much traffic; and in reganl to the school cleaning it was decided to let the existing contract remain as it was! The Sunday School was granted free use of thy room for their concert on Friday evening. Accounts having baen passed for payment, the meeting adjourned. Tiie sudden death of Lord Hartington's younger and sole remaining brother, Lord Edward Cavendish, from pneumonia, following an attack of influenza, has (says an English paper) been n great shook to society and the Liberal party, by whom the deceased was much liked and respected. Lord Edward had for many years acted as the Duke of Devonshire's manager, and all questions concerning the vast properties of the family were invariably referred to him. In Derbyshire, at Eastbourne, and in Ireland, Lord Edward was really beloved, and will be sincerely mourned. Lord Hartington's marriage now stands indefinitely postponed, and, in the opinion of many, may never take place. Tlie aged duke—who is eighty, four—is known to object to the union strongly, and one can hardly wonder at it. The .heir-presumptive to the dukedom is now Mr Victor Cavendish, Lord Edward's eldest son, a lad of twenty-two, who lies sick with influenza at Oxford. There are two other sonts —Richard, aged twenty-one, and John aged seventeen Mr M'Hale, of Minnesota, is, according to the "Globe,"one of the most miserable men upon the earth. He, it appears, is ihe antitights champion of the State of Minnesota, and his Bill for abolishing ballets passed'tlie State Senate triumphantly. Since then Mr M'Hale's life has been a burden to him. When his buggy stood before his door, MiM'Hale's stepped cut. jauntily only to find that his horses legs had been neatly fitted with old trousers. If he dropped into a restaurant, friends had a bill qf fare iceady for him qn which 'f frqgs-' legs " appeared cjis " frogs' limbs," qr cljicken would, be. served up to him with the drumsticks tastily wrapped with paper. The post brought him humorous, even abusive, comments, which manifested, rather undesirably, the interest of a whole continent in M'Hale— verses, pictures, seijous papers, comic papers, sporting papers, all had their fling at M'Hale j one envelope was addressed to him after the Indian fashion, to "Qldrinaiir ashamed-of-his-legs M'Hale." It was at first flattering. It has now become unendurable, and Mr M'Hale is represented as feeing a desire to retire from public life.