SHIPPING INTELLIGENCE.

PORT OF LYTTELTON. ARRIVED. April 13 —steamer Taranaki, 299, Kennedy, from Northern Ports. bAII.ED. April 13 —steamer Taranaki, 209, Kennedy, Southern Ports. April 13 —steamer Luna, for Northern Ports. The barque Adamant sailed from Napier, for London, yesterday, with a cargo valued at .£67,000. The Alhambra arrived at the Bluff yesterday. She left Melbourne on April 6th, and brings 42 saloon and 32 steerage passengers, and 400 tons of cargo.for all ports. She sailed for Port Chalmers to-day.

COMMERCIAL TELEGRAMS.

Sydney, Friday. Brandy, case and quarters, unchanged ; rice, £22 10s.; New Zealand wheat, 3s. 3d.; New Zealand oats, 4s. 3d. to 4s. 6d.; Barrett’s twist, is. 6d. to is. 7d.; sugar and candles un altered. Adelaide, Friday. Flour unchanged ; wheat, 3s. 9d. Auckland, "Friday. Dairy cows, £7 to £l3; fat cattle, in full numbers, 245. to 28s. per ioolbs.; fat sheep, 2^d. Share Market—Buyers : Bank of New Zea land, £24; National Bank, 745.; South British, 73s- Sellers : Colonial Bank, 525. qd.; New Zealand Insurance, 945. TIMARIi, Friday. Wheat, 4s. id. to 4s. 2d. ; oats, 3s. to 3s. 3d.; both with decidedly weaker tendencies. Deliveries during the week liage been very heavy.

ASHBURTON PRODUCE—PRICES RETAIL.

In the produce market we have to report : Butter is plentiful, in good quality, at is.; inferior qualities arc bought as low as Sd. Eggs are scare at is. 4d. per dozen. Bacon is offered freely at 7£d. to S£d.; and prime smoked is selling at iod. Prime hams in cloth are worth is. per lb. Cheese is in in good demand at Bd. per lb. retail, prime quality. Flour in bags, retail, 15s. per 100 lbs. New oatmeal, having advanced, is now sold at 265. per 100 lbs.

POST OFFICE NOTICES.

Mails at the Ashburton Post Office 'close as follows : For Christchurch and North at 10.20 a.m., 4 p.m., and 7.30 p.m., daily. For Chertsey at 10.20 a.m. daily. For Rakaia at 10.20 a.m., and 4 p.m. daily. For Ashburton South, Winslow, Hinds, Coldstream, Rangitata, Orari, Winchester, and Geraldine at 10.30 a.m. daily. The next outward San Francisco mail will close at Christchurch on Friday, the 26th.

The Evening Echo. SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1878. LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The civil cases heard at the Resident Mrgistrate’s Court yesterday were: Craig v. Ull, claim £4 10s. fi/ 2 cl Judgment for plaintiff. Mr. E. G. Crisp plaintiffs agent. The vexed case of Martin v. Wellborn, which has been twice heard already, was reheard yesterday accord ing to arrangement last week. The claim was for £3O, for alleged wrongful detention of a reaping machine. The Court sustained its previous decision. Other cases were adjourned till Tuesday at eleven.

Mr. Weldon, of Ashburton Forks, lost a valuable horse this week, which dropped down dead in a paddock near the farmhouse. By a bush fire, which is raging in Alford Forest, a large number of sheep have been destroyed, and a great amount of timber, both cut and stand ing. Last night a disastrous fire occurred in Cashel Street, Christchurch, by which a large amount of property was de stroyed. The fire originated in the premises of Mr. G. M'Clatchie, and extended to neighboring property, in cluding a portion of Mr. J. Anderson’s Canterbury Foundry, the patterns de stroyed in which are estimated at ££s>°°° to ££o,ooo. The Timaru Herald of Tuesdav states

ing. Last night a disastrous fire occurred in Cashel Street, Christchurch, by which a large amount of property was de stroyed. The fire originated in the premises of Mr. G. M'Clatchie, and extended to neighboring property, in cluding a portion of Mr. J. Anderson’s Canterbury Foundry, the patterns de stroyed in which are estimated at ££5,000 to £20,000. The Timaru Herald of Tuesday states that the railway employes now get paid extra for any overtime they may put in,

Last night a disastrous fire occurred in Cashel Street, Christchurch, by which a large amount of property was de stroyed. The fire originated in the premises of Mr. G. M'Clatchie, and extended to neighboring property, in cluding a portion of Mr. J. Anderson’s Canterbury Foundry, the patterns de stroyed in which are estimated at ££5,000 to £20,000. The Timaru Herald of Tuesday states that the railway employes now get paid extra for any overtime they may put in, ten hours being set down as an ordinary day’s work. Our contemporary has been misinformed. Not only have no such payments been made, but we have reason for saying that strict orders have been issued that they shall not be made, and that overtime shall not be entered upon the pay-sheet. Such is the value of Mr. Larnach’s positive pro mise given at Oamaru.— P/css.

According to official returns, says a Wellington paper, the Hon. H. A. Atkinson, Premier in the late Ministry, received the sum of ££22 ss. 6d. as travelling expenses. Other members of the same Cabinet averaged ££so. It will be interesting to note the little bills in the same direction of the present Ministry. An Australian paper says :—Shortly after the rain commenced to fall on March 5, residents in the eastern por tions of Echuca became unpleasantly aware that the air was full of swarms of insects greatly resembling flying ants. They came from the eastward with a slight breeze, and sometimes the air was dark with them, and here and there pools of water were to be seen covered with a thick coating of these minute inhabitants of the atmosphere. They stuck to pedestrians’ clothes, defying all efforts to shake them off, crawled into people’s eyes, ears, mouths, and noses, and were a perfect plague while they lasted, which was for a short time hap pily, and not one was to be seen in the locality half an hour after their first appearance.

CHISPA’S LETTER.

“ I am not yet so bald that you can see my brains.”—Longfellow.

Last week butter was oil, and Mrs C. bought it by the pint, not pound, as your bungling P.D.’s put it; this week, I can assure you there has been no necessity for a refrigerator, and some mornings this week I have walked about like the Laplander,

“With blue cold nose and wrinkled brow.” The change has come, and while I write an Ashburton nor’-wester is going it high overhead. At that haunt of men with too much to do, too little to do, and nothing to do at all—the Railway Station—l wit nessed a struggle. The power of the Press, represented by the captain of the railway bookstall, aided by the power of the Law, as represented in the stal wart person of one of New Zealand’s blue-clad national defenders, fought a hard battle against a higher power than either in Ashburton—the Nor’-wester aforesaid, and it called to its aid against the terrestrial forces that power from which all humanity is said to have sprung, and to which it must again revert, viz., Dust. He of the Bookstall felt his whole soul rise within him when he looked upon his repository of learn ing. Those yellow-backs contained the brain-sweat of many a studious toiler, and the very essence of the Massive Intellects who pull the wires of the universe and are the levers of public opinion was poured out in those sheets of daily, weekly, and monthly literature. The great element of decay, the ulti mate of things terrestrial, had come

down upon those treasures with the density of an Egyptian plague, and aided by the terrible Nor’wester, threat ened ruin to the fair collection. But the Mercury of Letters and the Myrmi don of Law stood to arms, and success followed the hugeness of their efforts and the strength of their words—the cloudy foe was expelled and the trea sures saved.

I have studied that Railway Station. It has its lessons. Its attendants, “ cabin’d, cribb’d, confin’d,” have been taught, by the force of circumstances, to perform their work under difficulties few railway men have to encounter. Fancy a station having no more passen ger accommodation than a roadside in termediate, and yet doing as much business as the traffic on some whole lines I know. I have the prints of bucolic hobnails in five different im pressious on my understandings, and so much has custom become second nature with me that I can allow a man to tread on my toes, and make no more fuss over it than Mrs C. makes when I tread on her dress and bring her up like a—but comparisons, &c. Only, to wear a sweet face while the iron enters my soul through the painful medium of my corns is too much.

“ What is a bona fule traveller” was a question it was my felicity to hear argued out in Court, and from what 1 could gather of the learned debate, a man who travels three miles is entitled to a drink at a pub. on a Sunday in the prohibited hours. The more I think over this “ law of liquor,” the more am I puzzled. A Boniface may have his house open at a tapu time on a Sunday, and the officers find it so ; he may sell drink to men who have walked three miles, or who say they have, and the officers be witnesses to the sale ; and men may be drunk and noisy in that house—and no law broken. I will in time master that law.

There are many wants in Ashburton. If you should be the fortunate means of coupling with two “ blondes of a re ligious turn of mind, aged eighteen to twenty-one years,” the tradesman and the holder of a responsible situation, whose habits are “ modern” and whose ages are 23 and 25, you will doubtless be a happy man. But what are the “ modern” habits ? Mr C. E. Watkins bids fair to become a public benefactor. He has given the County Council a scheme by which they can bring pure water into this great city, and make glad the hearts of the people. I pumped a bucketful from my pump yesterday. I let it stand two hours, and then poured off what of it would pour, filtering through a piece of muslin. Inventory of the muslin after the filtering process :

7iK earthworms One spider One hair

Half a bushel iron rust Three bushels sand Sixteen dead flies

Inventory of sediment in the bottom of the bucket:

3 lbs clay Ten periwinkles —of the hip; sort that swim on gooseberry bushes One lady’s hoot—very soft Brim of a bell-topper One dead frog And a hill of matter Mariner’s

Two barracouta One paper collar Haifa brick Dilapidated copy of the Echo —(truth always lies at the bottom of a well) Spur—branded with the broad arrow in which the Ancient

“ Slimy things did crawl with legs.”

A man must eat a peck of dirt in his lifetime, but he needn’t do it all at once nor ought he to be compelled to give the lie to the proverb, and d/ink a peck. If that water hope of ours does not reach fruition soon, the gullet of each Ashburtonian will have swallowed its peck, and ceased to gulp. But these “ Fathers” of our County Council have another foe to meet. It has been my lot to talk with men afflicted “ inwardly” by the water of Ashburton, and they are not few. They find their way to Court as “ drunks,” and they lay the blame on the water. Their medical attendants prescribe “brandy & port” as an antidote to the evil effects of the bad water, and the medicine is a stum bling-block, and many good men and true have taken to it wholly and have forgot the taste of water. A piece of ground has been reserved for a pound, the Gazette says. I felt happy when I read this ; but" I suppose the long stmnner evenings will remove my terror of stray quadrupeds before the pound does.

Chispa.

TOSSING THE HAY.

OUT in the meadow, tossing the hay, An old, old man, one August day, Sighed as he worked, and wearily said : “ The flowers of summer will soon be dead, And the leaves of the trees will wither and die, And the bees’ hum cease, and the song-bird fly I o the sun-blessed South; and the harsh winds blow, And the earth grow cold with the ice and snow, And long months pass ere again we see The roses, sweet roses. Ah, me ! ah, me ! For I am as weary as weary can be !” Out in the meadow, tossing the hay, Working as though the work were play, A brown-faced boy right cheerily said ; “ The apples and peais are turning red, And the grapes grow sweet, and the nuts grow brown, And the maple will soon wear a fiery crown ; And when it is faded old Winter’ll be king, And the rivers will freeze, and the sleigh-bells ring. Then, ere long, for the days so short will be, The roses, sweet roses, again we’ll see, And I am as happy as happy can be ! ” — Harper's Weekly.

OSTRICH FARMING AS A BUSINESS.

A report on the Cape and its pro ducts, published in connection with the recent Philadelphia Exhibition, tells us that one of the first colonists who tried ostrich farming commenced in iB6O, or thereabouts, and his success in breed ing and rearing these birds was such as to induce many persons, far and wide, to enter upon what lias since proved to be a very interesting and highly remu nerative pursuit. The number of birds that can be kept on a given area of pasture depends entirely on its quality. A full grown ostrich will consume twenty pounds of chopped lucerne, a sheep twelve pounds, and a horse of fourteen hands seventy pounds. The birds do not like grass or green forage ; they prefer cabbage-leaves, fruit, grain, etc.; but for permanent food there is nothing like lucerne or clover. Os triches do not in general lay until they are four years old or upwards. In a wild state there are sometimes as many as five hens to one cock. There should always be two, but then there should be an incubator for the surplus eggs, which cannot be covered. The birds, for the most part, begin to lay about the be ginning of August, and continue for about six weeks, when they commence sitting. In about a month or six weeks after they have done hatching (at least, if the young birds have been removed), they begin to lay again, and continue for a month or five weeks. At the first laying they lay from fifteen to twenty eggs, and at the second from twelve to sixteen. Incubation lasts from six to seven weeks from the time the bird be gins to sit. The young ones can be taken away when they are so strong that they can leave the nest, which is in a day or two. Considering that the value of an ostrich a week old is SSO, and that its value increases rapidly as it matures, ostrich breeding must pay remarkably well. The artificial hatch ing has proved quite a success. Out of every dozen eggs, it is seldom that more than one fails to generate. There are reckoned to be now 22,257 ostriches among the other live stock of Cape Colony, and ostrich feathers and ostrich eggs were among the Cape products recently exhibited at Philadelphia.

COOLNESS IN ACTION.

A good story is told of the Russian Prince Paskievitch. During the siege of Warsaw he ordered a certain Polish battery to be silenced by his own artil lery, and became perfectly wild with rage on observing that the artillery fire produced no appreciable effect. Gallop ing to the battery, he asked, “ What idiot is in charge here ?” “ I, sir,” answered an officer. “ Then down you go to the ranks this very day,” said Paskievitch ; “ you don’t begin to know your trade; your shells do not explode.” “ I know they don’t,” answered the cap tain ; “ for the best of all reasons, that they can’t explode.” “ That’s a lie,” said the Prince. “ Is it ? See for yourself, then,” replied the officer, coolly picking up a shell from the pile and lighting the fuse, holding it up between himself and the marshal. The marshal tranquilly crossed his arms andwatched till the fuse sputtered and went out.

THE EVENING ECHO, SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1878.



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