MISCELLANEOUS.

Inangahua Times, Volume VIII, Issue 1328, 26 November 1883, Page 2

MISCELLANEOUS.

Mr Hesford, the well-known actor, who was last in Dunedin as a member of Mr Willmott's Company, has retired from the stage and gone into the the publichouse business at Riverton. It has been discovered that many of those oaks which are called spontaneous have been planted by squirrels. This little animal has performed most essential service to the English navy. It has been thought that the most highly remunerated and successful author of the nineteenth century, taking into account the amount of work accomplished, was " George Elliot." It is proposed to open the tomb of Shakespeare in order to ascertain whether the MSS of his plays were buried with him, and also to measure the bones, in order to settle the point whether the bard was tall or short. The London Catholic Toial Abstinence League of tho Cross lias 14-5, 000 members in the metropolis, and 32 branches throughout the kingdom. The Marl borough Express says: — Messrs Foster and Gosling, after five months operations at their rabbit tinning manufactory at the top of Highstreet have finished preserving rabbits for the season. During the five months they have preserved and tinned 39,800 rabbits, and they could have put through the same number in half the time if the supply could have been depended upon. These gentlemen intend to start tinning again next year about the Ist of April, and expect to put through close upon 100,000 rabbits. During the past season they had only oiie week's full work. According to a London- >• society " paper a brother of the Queen's deceased "body servant," John Brown, is a farmer in the Middle Island, New Zealand. The journal referred to says : — " All the Brown brothers found their way into the royal service, except one who emigrated, to New Zealand, and settled on a little farm he made for himself on the West Coast of the middle Island. Some years ago, at Her Majesty's instance, the emigrant Brown returned home, and was installed as 'grief of the Balmoral House farm. This was a great promotion indeed. But a year of the position sufficed for Brown, whom colonial experience had emancipated from the gillie traditions of his race. Eoundly swearing that he was stifled in the atmosphere of sneaking and flunkeyisna that tainted the Deeside air, he shook the dust of the Home farm from off his honest feet, and hied him back to New Zealand, and freedom." The famous " Big Trees" in California, variously known by the names of Wellingtonia or Sequoia, are (states the World, of Wonders) far surpassed in height, and proba ly, also, in the total amount of timber in a single tree, by the real giants of the vegetable kingdom, the noble gum-trees of the genus eucalyptus, which grow in the Victorian state forest on the slopes of the mountains dividing Gipps Land from the rest of the colony of Victoria, and also in the mountain ranges north of Cape Otway. There are only four of the Californian trees known to be above 300 ft, the tallest being 325ft, and only about 60 have been measured that exceed 200 ft in height. In the large tracts near the sources of the Watts river, however, all the trees average from 252 ft to 300£t in height, mostly j straight as an arrow, and with very few branches. Many fallen trees measure 350 ft in leguth. It should be noted that these gigantic trees do not, like their Californian protoypes, grow in small and isolated groves, towering above smaller specimens of the same, or of closely-allied kinds, but both in the Dandenong and Otway ranges, nearly every tree in the forest over large areas is on this enormous scale. Mr Parnell has, it is stated, out of the national tribute, paid off the charges on his estate amounting to £13,000. The. amount was paid by a single cheque on the National Bank, endorsed with the certificate of the manager that funds to that extent were in his hands. There was but a single mortgagee to receive payment. Mr Par-nell's estate, which is said to yield, together with his sawmills, an income of between £2000 and £3000 a year, is now believed to be absolutely free of debt. Weils' "rouchi on corns." Ask for Wells' " Rough on Corns." Quick relief, comple c, permanent cure. Corns, warts, bunions. Moses, Moss Co., Sydney, General Agents.

The passing of the Laud Act (writes An Irishman in the Spectator) was an act of justice, but it was also something more. It was the first as well as, with such a Legislature as ours, the most difficult step in a policy which makes the reconciliation of England and Ireland for the first time possible. As long as the old system of land tenure endured in Ireland no subsidence of Irish hatred of England could be for a moment hoped for. But even the passing of the Land Act could do no more than make reconciliation possible. The Act is coming into operation and the unhappy circumstance that the Commissioners decisions take effect from the time they are pronounced and not from the institution of proceedings is seriously retarding its progress. Even where the Act is in operation, it will be much if five or ten years suffice todevelope the prosperity which must undoubtedly result from it. But as comfort diffuses itself amongst the masses who cultivate the soil, and the memory of the old system of land tenure dies away, the removal of other causes of national estrangement will become a task which even ordinary statesmen may well prove equal to. Writing of the inhabitants of New Guinea, the special correspondent of the Melbourne Argus says : — " The honesty of these people is perfectly astounding. Nothing, not even a pin, will they touch unless given to them. If a bead or tin} r bit of tobacco, or even a bird's feather, drop through the chinka of the floor, it is certain to be picked up and brought up again. Nor do they make any fuss about it. Thereis no ostentatious parade of thia virtue. They come iv quietly and lay the thing down in the first convenient place, and sit down quite contentedly to examine some article that may have excited their curiosity. Even the little children, mere toddlers, will not touch anything without asking. It isimpossible to live amongst them and not like them. The men are naked, except their heads, which are carefully wrapped in bark-cloth. They wear acane belt, to which a long, plaited tape, or a gard of some twiner, is fastened behind. This is passed between the thighs and fastened to the belt in front I laughed heartily at a. Papuan visitoc yesterday who was in' dress clothes i.e., a bustle of cassowary feathers dropping gracefully behind. They are wonderfully frve from pulmonary disease, yet they spend half the night yarning round a fire in the open air." The Egmont Courier of a recent datesays : — " Two hundred and forty Maoris, marched to the Waiau bridge last Tuesday week, and marched back again. On the following day the same programme was rehearsed by 190. Titokowaru was a prominent figure. All were well dressed, and several of the young men donned the blue ribbon. A case which may interest medical men has (says the N.Z. Times) occurred in Wellington. A young woman, aged about 17, has been known as & champion waltzer. She attended a. dancing room inTe Aro very frequently, and took prizes for long and steady waltzing, remaining up longer than all [ competitors in this dizzy round danceAfter months of this practice in the> evenings she became ill, or rather became subject to frequent epileptic tits, and has continued so during about three months. It is somewhat singular that this girl, after being a champion waltzer, has become unfit to earn her living iv any occupation, and that she continues under medical treatment. The papers ad vise the removal of all employes in Paris of German nationality. Hostile demonstrations were made during the week ending October 7, against establishments where German workmen were known to be. Charland. the proprietor of a large printing house, discharged all his Germans, and a number in the State tobacco factory are forced to leave. " Silver Pen" writes to the Auckland. Herald from San Francisco : — Pampas grass, so like the toi-toi ofyourcountry, is gaining special notice, and the cultivation of it is now a feature in one part of our State. The demand for the beautiful plumes is steadily on the increase, and New York, Boston, and Philadelphia monopolise almost all grown here. In Paris, London, and other cities of London, where these plumes are shipped yearly, they command a large price — that is, £1 a pair. Think of it T How little we> think of the wonderful waving crops that grow all over New Zealand, stuffing" the beds with it, and looking upon ifc more as a weed and a nuisance than anything else, though the plumea here are so much more beautiful that you | would hardly know the grass, of course, | being due to cultivation. Last season I there were exported 350,000 plumes, and still the cry was for more. The estimate of the present year's crop is I £80,000. One gentleman has twentyeight acres of grass, and others have ten, eight, and so on. The industry is attended to by women, who cut and cure the plumes for foreign markets. I should imagine that the grass in your country could be utilised in such a manner, but it takes an American to see money in things apparently valueless. In the following epitaphs there is a true American ring, a genuine Yankee humor. This one is on a Robert Gordon, who was blessed by nature with an immense mouth : — Here lies the body of Robert Gordon, Mouth almighty, and teeth accordin' ; Stranger, tread lightly over this wonder, If he opens his mouth, you're gone, by thunder ! The next one is from a grave yard in New Hampshire, United States : — To all my friends I bid adieu, A more sudden death you never knew, As I was leading the old^u-fl to drink, She kicked and killed me quicker'n a wink.(Signed) Tom