THE ARMY, WAVY, AND VOLUNTEERS.

GOSSIP FROM STAGE AND STUDIO.

Rifle Frauds.

American Bribery.

THE RESTRICTION OF THE SAN AUGUSTIN.

DELUDED FRENCHMEN.

[By Euteut'e.] Tiifcinuch-traVdled Smythe having dropped Some money sver Moncure Contvay, who proved a derided "frost," has concluded it best to givs lecturers a wide berth for some -time at lofipt, transferring his services mean while to the higher Drama. He is not. arranging to " tour" Miss Genevieve Ward throughout Australia. She is expected to arrive t.t Melbourne early in March, and ■will make her first appearance in the famoK? drama, " Forget-Me-Not," in which she vrill bo supported by the favourite Londtn actor, Mr W. H. Vernon.

Mfcs Annie Leaf is second lady in Dun ning^ Opera Company, which opens at Dunedin to-night.

The Rev. W. M. Ramsay is preparing for the press a work on the Gothic tongue, and its bearing on the philology of Latin and ' Greek.

A daughter of Sims Reeves will shortly bocome a professional actress. Solange Navaro is now a member of the :Majeronis' Company at Sydney.

Somewealthy New Yorkers with Vander biit at their head have offered Henry Irving a new theatre in that city to be managed by him in conjunction with" the Lyceum*, Lon don. Cash all subscribed.

Italian Opera in Paris was inauguratec on January 26, 1759, at the Tuileries bj Leonard, hairdresser to Marie Antoinette.

Professor Reid's new work on Japan is an nounced for publication in December. I contains an account of the travels and re searches of the author, who was sent out to Japan under the direction of the Prussian Government.

Lieutenant-Colonel Playfair, who has been busy writing a history of English re lations with Algiers, has discovered in the State Paper Office records of all the British captives of the corsairs for more than 200 years, and ■much other important informa tion.

Father Curci, the ex-Jesuit preacher, ■whose work on the temporal power of the Pope created so great a sensation, is now-in Florence revising the proof-sheets of another important work which, it-is said, ■will contain important revelations regard • ing the Vatican. Mr George Rignold, acting in partner ship with Mr .1. Allison of Adelaide, has secured the Australian right of the >\ew Adelphi drama, " In the Ranks."

Lord Archibald Campbell lias in the press a volume dealing with Scottish antiquities and Scottish tartans. The work will be issued during the forthcoming season by !Me&=rs Blackwood and Son. The biography of Madame Roland -will be prepared by Mathiide Blind for the "Eminent Women " series. Leopold yon Ranke, now in his SSth year, is reported to be manifesting marvellous vigour and power of work. He is about to bring out a new volume. Hollingshead, the well-known London 1 theatrcial manager, is to establish a per manent French Theatre in London. Sarah Bernhardt and Jadie are to open it for the •winter season. Dr. Villiers Stanford has completed-a. new comic opera in four acts, which wiil be the chief feature of the Carl Rosa season at Drury Lane next Easter. It will probably > be entitled" The Canterbury Pilgrims/" Balzac, the great French writer, is to have a statue in Paris, and to assist in ■ raising the sum of money required for that , purpose, special performances are to be given at the leading Parisian theatres. Wilkie Collins HUs given permission to translate his works into Bengalese. "Prose Masterpieces ' from Modern Es sayists "in 3 volumes by Putam and Sons, New York, will form one of the most valu able works of its kind that has been pub lished for some time. It contains standard essays selected from the writings of Irving, Hunt, Lamb, DeQuincy, Emerson, Arnold, Jtuskin, Cai-lyle, Froude, Freeman, Lander, Sydney Smith, Helps, Kingsley, and other great authors. It has been decided to celebrate the ter . centenary of the foundation of Edinburgh University on the IGth, 17th, and.lSth April next. It is intended to make the occasion one of s;reat eclat.

An aged Hebrew went one evening to the opera, accompanied by a Gentile friend. The -piece was Meyerbeer's " Huguenots." Suddenly he burst into a loud lauglT. " Why do you lautrh ?" inquired his friend. "Laugh! The betli game I ever saw. A lot o'. Protethanth an' Catholicth a killin of each other to aiocthie written by a Jew ' Ha ! ha !"

Dvorak's "'Swbat Mater,"' which created such a sensation.at St. .James's Hall, Lon don, in April lasj, will be one of the leading iteme of the approaching Worcester Fes tival.

" O'er the Sec," a canzonet, and "Annice," a song (both from Xovello, Ewer, and Co'.'sJ, are two pretty vocal items, \. hich have been recently issued.

Yolkciann, the recaitly deceased musical compowr, knew sg Kttle how to get on in the world that when -bis works were being .performed all over Europe he found himself conßtraifd to live upon vegetables and bread, te. teach at starvation prices, and in winter, Klien short of lessons, to stay in bed and kfcsp'HmEelf wane.

I. jfcronifcone player in France lately : brought a..large gum balloon, filled with ; . air,,in to theo?rchestra, and -concealed it upon his perspn. "Favoriia" w.as being per ! formed. As.-roon as theefcoru3,'iadfiniehed the phrase of, the finale <A«t.3d) —"Qu'i reste-^eul areo eon dt-shonneur'—just ai the tisse when the celebrated paure occurs -?-tae tiusiciaa cat down aa his baboon, and -thtougtthe-suddsnsilenceosathestagea weird unearthly noise v. as heard— ffztaaaaa/ The , choristers, instead of singing, bepan to ;laugh, ar-d;the musicians and-public fcad to liollowsuir.

The ,Ke". E. Bvsband, of J^eamington, !% England) does ait anticipate a speedy Millennium. In &c address on " Musital

i)e\i3lopmeat" heat id: —"I believe that inttlvj future history of the world, it may be ;in hundreds, <or thousands, or iCnilUais of years to come, greater fthan.even Handql or Beethoven orMendel hsohn arise to giv,{ it music euch as ear had; not yet.Ueard." He also said :" I have naver yet Jiieard a iSermon that has risen so JvCgli in eloquence ,or in heart-jnelt ing appssCas Handel's '' Messiah " or Bach's xausiii of '"XhePasi&on."

The two bcoks that everybody is reading just now are " John Ball andiis Island,'' an English translation of the enormously succeesful French brodiiu-e by Max O'Rell (the nom.de 2}lu»ie of a gentleman tvho is the French maeter at St. P&ul's School), and " Don't," a funny little pamphlet pHiblished in (Amerfca. " John Bull and His IsLand " was issue.l on December 10, and on the 13th the whole of the first edition of 10,000 copi'ss bad been sold out. It contains a number of the queerest mistakes about England, but is in the main so shrewd, witty, ,»nd caustic that the reader cannot help laughing" and feeling enter tained.

[By Martini-Henri.]

(jstvT preparations are being made out -at Sllerslie for the forthcoming rifle meeting. Men have been employed the past week in erecting the butts and doing what work is necessary, It is expected that folly 200 competitors wiH take part in the firing.

The North ©unedin Rifles will be repre sented by five first-class stiots at the N.Z. Association's meeting to be held at Ellers lie. The team will include the two Hut chisons, Sargeson, Richardson, and Lieut. Burns (at one time captain of the Hobson Company:). I will hazard the opinion that in the Teams Match of five men a sido, the North ©unedin Company or the Clutha Rifles will be very near winning when the scores -are totted up. I believe Sergeant Provo, of the Dunedin City Guards (who is also well known here, being a member of the Auckland Volunteers for many years), intends to take part in the New Zealand Wimbledon tournament.

John Macka3", at one time Sergeant- Major in the Cameron Highlanders, died at Dunedin on February 4.

The total force of the French at present in Tonquin is 9,430 men. It is the intention of the Government to bring it up to 10,000 men.

It is stated that the boys now entered to be trained for the Navy are superior in size and physique to the men enlisted under the short-service system for Line battalions.

In a competition for a silver cup at Dunedin on February 2, Volunteer J. D. Blyth, of the City Guards, made seven bull's-eyes in succession at 500 yards.

A rifle match was fired at Dunedin lately between ten members of tho City Guards and ten commercial travellers. The ranges were 200, 400, and 500 yards. The " travel lers " lost by 74 points—the scores bein" 756 and 682.

The Admiralty have decided to make the Australian a Rear-Admiral's com mand, instead of Commodore's as at present. The Squadron will be considerably in creased in numbers in consequence of this decision.

A young orhcer in the Fourth French Engineers, unstrung at the idea of having to face a court-martial for some trivial fault, tied a belt, filled with dynamite, round his waist, applied a match, and wai literally blown to pieces.

The total number of desertions from the British army in ISS2 was 4,145, of whom 1,297 rejoined. In the household cavalry the desertions were S in the 1000 -. in the foot guards, 1 j ; in the cavalry of the line, -o ; in the infantry of the line, 24.

A Commission has been appointed by the Russian Minister of War to examine the various methods in vogue for teaching illiterate adults, with a view to adoptin? the most approved, in various quarters, for expediting their education. It is stated the army in Russia consists mainly of men who can neither read nor write.

Nothwithstanding that- thirty years have passed'since the Crimean campaign, bombs and ammunition are still being found in great numbers in Sebastopol and the sur roundings, which are supposed have been used by the Anglo-French army at the bombardment of the town. A great quan tity have been collected, and are bought by tho GoTernment. The money paid for them will be devoted for tho erection of a monument to the marines killed at the defence of Sebastopol.

Last year the Russian Couxcil of State sanctioned an expenditure of £3,313, 4MO sterling on fortress extensions, and £1,350,000 on siege artillery, to be dis tributed over a period of 13 years. A first instalment of this, consisting of £355,727 has been assigned for the ensuing year, to provide for the manufacture of several hun dred steel guns at the Aboukoff Works and in the Ural Mountains, all of which are in tended for garrisons along the Gorman frontier.

Lord Wol-eley, in a speech lately, ey pressed the hope that the day wa.s not far distant when the names of volunteer officers would appear in the Army List, "not in a separate portion of it, but together with those in the Regular service." The " Army and Xavy Gazette " says the muddle that would ensue by so doing would be stupen dous, and thinks it is time " that such tom foolery ceased, and the recognised authori ties turned their attention to more serious matter?, and tried to create that first re quirement—an Army."

The latost addition to the British iMavy is the Imperieuse. She is a twin-screw, armour-plated criviser of 7,000 tons. Her jlength between perpendiculars is 315 ft . breadth, 02ft; depth of hold, 24ft; and mean draught, 25ft llin. The thickness of her armour—compound—on belt is lOin ; and on barbettes, Sin. She will be armed with four 9'2-in (IS tons) breech-loading guns, carried on the Vavasseur system, six G-in breechloading broadside guns, 10 Nor denfelt guns, and four Gardner guns, be sides boat and field-guns. She will also carry 12 14-in. torpedoes, which will bo fired from three above-water positions, on each side of the ship. She will be brig r!gSed> and will be equipped with two second-class torpedo-boats, besides steam and sailing craft. Her engines are to de velope S,OOO horses ; and her speed is to be 16 knots an hour. The total of the ship is estimated at £325,000.

The "Army and Navy Gazette " is con stantly calling the attention of the Home Government to the fact .that they Ere behind the French Navy iniregard to first class war vessels. It says :— >" Four French ironclads of the first-class, viz., the Terrible and Caiman, of 20 inches armour and 72-ton guns, the Tonnant, of 18 inches armour, and the Foudroyant, of IGJ inches armeur, both with 48-ton gunt, are to be finished during ISB4, with one iconcladofthe second class, the Vauban, of 10 inches armour and 14-ton guns, in all, five new arsaour-plated .ships. It does not appear tthe English s>,"avy will be reinforced by more than Jour, ,viz., the ColKngwood smd Rodney, of the first class, the Insperieuee and War epite of th« second. At present the Itench have-virtuatty complete six ironclads of first cltss against four Englkh. The Admiralty appear, howerer, perfectly satisfied At the gradual decline £>i our naval power."

The •" Volunteer Gazette " has the follow ing particulars abasia fraud perpetrated by a Volunteer at the firing for t»ie Caledonian : Shield a few month* back, nitd as the big rifle meeting taken place hero tfais month, I would ask tuose in charge to " csad, mark, and learn," 60 as to prevent the possibility of fraud being committed :— "Some time back we published a report of the winning of the Caledonian Shield at the Edinburgh and Mid lothian Meeting by Alexander Moat jomery, then a private of the 9th Lanark shire K. V. Ifontgemery was, it appeared, a grocer at Carluke; and vaa regarded as a

very promising and remarkable "colt." When the usual procession, &c, in hia honour took place, he modestly observed that he had been very much surprised at carrying off the Shield, being a young and inexperienced shot who had simply come to Edinburgh with a view to preparing him cll for Wimbledon. We roast say, in his avour, that he had the grace to absent him self from the formal presentation of prizes. At Wimbledon he did nothing, but as every body knows how often promising shots go ;o grief there, the circumstance gave rise to ittle observation. But in. August, at the Angus and Mearns Meeting, Montgomery tried his tricks once too often. He forged an entry on a ticket crediting him with a very higli score for the Moritrose Corpora tion Challenge Cup. The register-keeper repudiated the. signature purporting to be his on the ticket, and the Council of the Association disquali fied Montgomery. This led the Council of the Edinburgh and Midlothian Association to investigation, tho consequence of which was that criminal charges were brought against Montgomery, who, last week, was arraigned before the Scottish High Qourt of Justico at Edinburgh on three distinct charges of fraud—first for having at the Edinburgh and Midlothian Meeting in .Tame last, delivered up a scoring ticket for the President's prizes with fabricated scores, without shooting at all at the 200 and 500 yard?, and with having forged the initials of the register-keeper ; secondly, with hairing "by a similar method of falsifying and forgery, returned a false ticket for the Caledonian Shield, and thereby obtained a gold cross and a sum of money;" and, thirdly, with having at tho Angus and Mearns' Meeting falsified his scoring ticket, and "immediately afterwards used and uttered it with the view of obtaining a prize by forging, not only the initials of certain officers, but the full name of each officer on his ticket." He was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment. The amount of money Montgomery won with the Shield was £25."

At Creedmoor, on October 30th, the Ex ecutive Committee of the American N.R. A. met at the rooms of the Association, Vice- President Wingate in the chair, when Assist ant-Secretary W. M. Vose presented a charge of attempted bribery, during the match for the Marksman's Badge, againsi 2nd Lieut. D. A. Skinnell. Co. H, 9th Regt. New York National Ciuard. Lieut. Skinnel was present, and after hearing the charges, declared every one of them to be unquali fiedly false. The scorers, B. E. Heinrichs and S. F. Glover, -tTth Regt., were sworn, and gave evidence sustaining the charges. The testimony was in subst-ance as follows :

Heinrichs, who was scorer at target No. £ on the 300 yards range, said that Lieut. Skinnell came to him and asked if ho could L ret him a musket, and that he (the scorer directed him to Mr Brower, the Range SujKjrintendent, for it. Skinnell asked him where he dined, and gave him 50 cents to buy his dinner with. The Lieut, said: "I can't shoot very well, and I want to get a score.'' The witness adjusted the sights oi the mu.-ket, and Skinnell fired three phot?, making three misse?, and the witness gave him a score of twenty-six. Glover, t-he scorer at the 200 yards range, testified that on the same day Skinnell came to hi* target and gave him fifty cents. The witness asked what the money was for, "and Skinnell told him it was for his dinner, and went on to say that he couldn't shoofc very well, bul wished to qualify that day, and asked ths witness to give him a score. The witness gave him nineteen, although he did nol shoot at all, and at once reported the matter. William M. Vose, who wa3 Executive Officer at Creedmoor on the day of the alleged bribery, testified that Skinnell pur chased the entry tickets to the ranges from him and paid him a two-dollar bill.

After deliberation the following resoln tion, offered by Col. R. C. Ward, was un animously adopted :

Resolved, " That Lieut. D. A. Skinnell, Go. H, Oth Kept-., if guilty of offering a bribe to the scorers ■■ft Creedmoor durin" t.he matches for the Marksman's Badge, that he be hereafter disqualified from furthei competitions on the range of the Nntiona' Kiiie Association, and that a copy of the?e proceedings be forwarded to the command in" officer of the Oth Regt."

The Committee also acted upon the report of a committee appointed to investigate similar charges against Sergt. B. Blue, of Co. X, 10th U. S. Infantry. On motion ol Mr Seabury, the Sercreant was declared ffuilty, lib prizes won during the late Fall Meeting of the X.It.A. were forfeited, and ho was debarred from further competition at the Creedmoor range.

An Awful Story of a Fire at Sea.

[FI'.OM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT],

Christmas is nearly always associated with some more than ordinarily awful story ol marinedisaster. Last yearduring the festive season people were holdingtheir breath with horror over the unspeakably tragic Atlan tic Liner, and to-day conversation turns frequently on the terrible tale of the loss of the San Augustin by fire.

Tlie vessel was formerly the Balmoral Castle, belonging to Messrs Donald Currie and Co.'s Cape line. She was built in 1577, and her description represents her as a fine steamer of nearly three thousand tons groes, driven by engines of three hundred horse-power, and having a length of two hundred and fifty-eight feet. She was bound, at the time of her loss, to Liverpool, with a cargo of eiigaf and tobacco from Manilla. There were two Englishmen on board, one of them Mr Armstrong, the chief engineer, and the other, Mr Vines, chief clerk in the Liverpool office of the owner. All the rest were foreigners, many of them presumably Spanish, since it appears that the steamer had been purchased by a Spanish gentleman residing in Madrid, "and run by him in the mail service between Singapore, Suez, Barcelona, and other port.?. She left Corunna on Saturday, December 15, early in the morning, and made good progress until the following— Sunday—afternoon, when, at about half past bwc, one of tlie engineers reported to Mr Anrosteong that there was smoke gift ing through into tho engine room. On hastening btlow the chief engineer saw the smoke, and co ncluded that the coal in the bunkers had taken tire. All the pumps were got readi', by which time the chief officer had discovered a great lire raging in tjie clean linen .store room. The pumps were set to work, but thedee^e smoke drove the people from the narrow passages, and then the fire gained fast upon all efforts to check it and in a short time had reached the port cabins. The sea at this hour is described as running high ; but the engines continued driving the flaming ship along until she was on fire from forward to aft; And then, two hours and a half after the

irst alarm, a brig having been sighted and signalled, the eDgines v.<sro stopped, and ;he captain, M. Juan, summoned his ofßcei-s to tho bridge for consultation. There was not, indeed, very much to con sult about. The ship was on tire from end to end, and the only chance for her people lay in the boats and in such succour as the brig could give. In all there were eighty three souls on board. When the vessel was brought to a stand three boats were low ered, and "some of the crow," says Mr Armstrong in the narrative wo recently published, "got into them." One boat started for the brig, but she had been dam- aged before she left the San Augustin, and after struggling to get to windward against the heavy seas for on hour and a half, aban doned tho hope of reaching the brig; and re turned to the steamer. Then was begun the first of a series of terrible fatalities. The boat's crew, as may be supposed, were utterly exhausted, and one of the poor fellows, when in the act of clambering on board, was crushed between tho ship and the boat, arid though he lingered until four o'clock next day he was in the utmost'ag6ny, when at last death put an end to hig suffer ings. The other boats had disappeared, and nothing' more was seen of them. To what extent tho brig was of service, is not mado clear in the published statements. The Humes contin«ed to rage, .and there were but two boats remiiin'ing,' tho third having been destroyed by lire. The sd proach of the night must hare immeasur ably added to the horrors of the scene of the burning steamer lighting up tho heavy seas. At eleven o'clock two steamers were sighted, and attracted by the fire they ap proached the San Augustin. The two boats wero then lowered, into which all the married men wero allowed to enter; but, whatever hope the steamers may havo kindled in those who got away from the burning vessel, nothing more came of their presenco of mind to the unhappy men who wereleft behind. The terrible hour passed; the iron decks meanwhile growing so hot as to render the contact of the foot with them almost unendurable ; and then dawned the morning of Monday, the 17th. The unfortunate captain was in tho act of goingfto tho bridge when the mainmast fell; the *par crushed him between the davits and the boat, severing his foot from the leg. The second mate was following tho captain when_ tkis happened. The sight of the bleeding and apparently dying man seems to have driven him crazy, for Mr Armstrong snys that he instantly rujhed into his cabin and shot himself through tho head with a revolver. By passing buckets of water along, some of the people contrived to reach the captain, whom they carried to the emoko-room. where his wounds were dressed by the doctor's assistant. It was at this mo ment thatayetmore heartrending scene took place. Four seamen, in endeavouring to crawl forward where they might think"the heat would be less intense, fell into tho fiery hold. Their cries were lamontable, and such was'tho terror they excited, that a fireman plunged a knife into his heart, whilst two others flung themselves over board. A vessel named the Governor now hove in sight, and bearing down to the ship, sent two boats, but they kept at too great a distance from the San Augustin to be of use. Then another steamer was described, and eventually succeeded in saving five or six men, Captain Juan, seeing the boat. grasped a lifebuoy, and, maimed and crushed as he was, threw himself overboard to swim to her. Finding the buoyant apparatus too cumbersome ho cast it off, but shortly afterwards he was eeen to fling up his arms and disappear. Terrible as these sufferings had been «> far, they wero by no moana completed. Seven sailors, following th» captain'a ex ample, and were lost to a man. Tho third mate, undeterred by the fearful fat* of these people, jumped into the sea, and was drowned. Both steamers then picked up their boat* and went away, leaving the un happy survivors to pass yel another night on the burning sHp. "Our boots," says the narrator, " wero nearly burnt off our feet, and some of us were nearly blind with the heat. We also suffered greatly from want of food and water." The foremast and funnels had fallen, and the deck had dropped in. Nevertheless, the steamer kept afloat throughout the night, and the next morning, at nineo'clook, theGrantully, bound for West Hartlepool, sighted the burning craft, sent her boat) in charge of the chief mate Mr Boyle, and after five hours of heroic struggling her crew suc ceeded in safely transhipping the whole of the survivors. There can be no doubt that both the steamers which Mr Armstrong describes as leaving them were prevented from helping tho unhappy sufferers by the state of the weather. Captain Cottew, of the John Williamson, says that ho lay by the San Augustin until three o'clock in the afternoon, "but," he adds, "the hurricane increased, anr1, being obliged to keep his ship's head to sea, he lost sight of the burning ship at midnight." For such explanations one is always thank ful. There is no reading more humiliating than the account which states how an English captain encountered human beings in fearful distress, and deliberately left them to their fate. It is^not for any man calmly and in safety perusing ench a narra tive as this to say what the master and crew of the vessel should have done, and to sit in judgment upon the conduct of the dead and therefore the defenceless. We hope—we believe, indeed—that had the San Augustin been manned by Englishmen the peril of the situation would have been diminished by devices in which the cool bravo mind is always ready ; that the loss of life if loss there were, would have been small ; and that inexpressibly horrible and appalling as the situation was, it woull havo been opposed by all that courage could supply, and then endured with the fortitude which may without boasting be claimed for the British seaman. It goes, perhaps, against the grain of the English reader to hear of men shooting themßelves, stabbing themselves, drowning themselves in the paroxysms of their terror ; but to be just it is necessary to realise tho position, to appreciate all that is meant by tho glow ing hold, the shrieks of tho burned, tho torture of the scorching deck, the blood-red light that reveals tho mountainous forms of the Biscayan seas, the crash of falling funnels and masts, and the rending and yielding of the dropping, dislocated deck. Above all, must the significance of tho utterly hopeless heart amid such a scene, and its influenoe upon the brain, be considered in dwelling upon this deplorable calamity, and while judging the actors, alive and dead, in it. Shipwrecked men have gone mod with despair, on azure seas, under bright skies, and have destroyed themselves raving. Not excusable, there fore, should the man be held whose courage expires before and whose brain is turned by such a scene of horror, suffering, and death, as appals even the reader of a brief and pausing account of the terrible tale.

Habitual Constipation, the cause of so much discomfort and so many troublesome ail ments, can be relieved by nothing safer and more effectual than Castor Oil in repeated small uosos, Us nauseous flavour being the only draw back. Allen and Hanhury's new process of manufaeturecompletely obviates this, and there ts now no more palatable aperient than the A. and H. " Tasteless" Castor Oil shaken up in warnt milk. At Is 3d and Se. Sold by Graves AickiS, The Pharmacy; and J. A. Pond, Homco. Chemist, Queen-stroet, Ask for tho " A. an J H." brand.—(Advt.l

Terrible Experiences of Emigrants.—Loft on an Island to Starve.

Paris Lkttek in- Philadelphia Press

The readers of the " Press " have already been made acquainted with the Marquis do Rays and his infamous swindling schemes for colonizing the utterly barbarous purts of the island of New Ireland in the Southern Pacific. During the past week the grand sensation has been the trial of that worthy. The newspapers containing accounts of the trial have been selling enormously in tho kicsks on the boulevards and the story al ready developed is so monstrous in many of its details that many persona do not know whether to decide that the Marquis was a crazy enthusiast or a swindler of tho raoet cruel and unscrupulous description. New Ireland belongs to thu Australasian croup of islands, claimed by thu Frouch, in the South Pacific ocean and lies almost directly west of Papua or New Guinea. Although in the interior there are fertile lands, the coast-line ia bold, sterile and in hospitable, while tho natives aro almost entirely barbarous and hostile to whitomen. Port Breton lies in thesouth-westeru portion of the island, and is about 400 miles from the French penal settlement of New Cale donia. In July, 1577, the Marquis dc Kays, who is said to belong to an ancient Breton family, and to have such a passion for tra velling that before the age of 20 he had travelled over America and even attempted to found a West African colony in Senegal, advertised throughout France a schemo for colonising Port Breton. He claimed that he had obtained possession of the territory by a treaty with Maraganio, King of New Ireland, who at first agreed to cedo his rights ior 1550 franc*, but afterwards ac cepted, in lieu thereoff, two bales of to bacco,;some beade, and a scarlet uniform. Intending colonists were offered fertile land for about §1 per hectare (nearly two and a half acres) and the Marquis pninted for them bright pictures of speedy tortune.

HOBBIBLK TREATMENT OF TIIK COLONISTS,

Subscription lists were opened in Europe, and were soon filled up by a number of small capitalist., chiefly hard-working agricultur ists. In Paris 5,900,000 francs was sub scribed ; in Havre, O'JO.OOO francs ; in Ant werp, 78,000 francs; while in Brussels, Marseilles, and other cities, large sums wero collected and sent to the Marquis do Rays. Styling himself King Charles 1., of the now colony and added to bis gains by creating an order of nobility and selling "titles, the Marquis aroused great enthusiasm among his dupes, who became eager to start off at once for the land of promise. The vessel Chandernagor was chartered by him and left a Dutch port with eighty-nine passengers. Then commenced the revelation of° tho fatuity of tho romance. Tho company's officials and the ship's crew were con tinually fighting and quarreling; the captain was a brutal drunkard, and tho mate, a man named Seyhens, thoroughly incompetent to perform his duties. " Tho berths were wretched, each consisting of a mattress and - sheet: the ship was filthy, the diet was detestable, the biscuits being full of worms, the bacon putrid and the codfish covered with fungi." Passengers fell sick, but there was neither doctor nor medicine chest on board. Even this was not all. The captain called upon the emigrants to do the work of tho crow, and if they refusod he had them triced up by the thumbs until they fainted, when thoy wore revived by being deluged with buckets of salt water. DEATH AND .SUFFERING ON TIIK ISLAND. This wretched journey finiehod in January, ISBO. Sixteen men were put on shore at Laughliil Island with a small quantity of previsions and left there. They could find neither fish nor game ; the water was un drinkable, and the ground was so rocky that cultivation was impossible. Four of them volunteered to go in search of assist ance, and after thirty-five days' drifting about they reached Test Island, where thoy wero relieved by some English missionaries. Many of those left behind died from starva tion and despair, and the survivors were snbsequently rescued by an English gun boat and carried to Australia. The balance of the immigrants, or colonists, who had been carried to Port Breton, suffered similarly. The Marquis sent out from Europe another shipment of colonists, and only two of these were found to be alive when the ship India took out a third batch shortly afterwards. Still another crowd of men, women, and children to the number of ISO wero sent out from Barcelona. Many of them wero comparatively well-to do and had paid large sums for settlements in Port Breton. At Singapore the captain heard rumours of tho true state of affairs in Capo Breton, and tried to pcrsuado tho emigrants to go no further, but such was their confident enthusiasm in tho coloniza tion scheme that they persisted in their do sire to be taken on to their destination. DKVOUKED BY CANNIBALS. Here is the public prosecutor's statement of what followed:—"On their arrival the colonists found at Port Breton, instead of a town, with churches, docks, and factories, two unfinished wooden buildings and a poor, half-famished Italian. This man re lated his sufferings on the adjacent isle of Bougainsville. He had five companions. These were killed and eaten by tho nativo cannibals. He, too, would have shared tho same fate but for his tears. The barbarian chief thought it so funny to see him weep ing that he spared his hie on condition that he should weep or laugh whenever ho was told to amuso tho savages in that way. He was compelled to live on raw human flesh. He was rescued after three months' awful misery." This narrative was a torriblo blow to the hopes of tho sanguine colonists, who found Port Breton to be shut in by mountains, with an eight-months' rainy season, and absolutely without pasturage or arable land. They, too, saw starvation staring them in the face. PREPARING HIS OWN COFFIN. The captain of tho ship left for Manila, whore he hoped to receive funds from the Marquis, and a batch of coolies, who would be useful in helping the colonists to found a settlement elsewhere than in Port Bretoa. Ho was absent four months, and found nothing from Do Rays. Meanwhile the people left at Port Breton were sufforing ter ribly from scarcity of food and malarial fever. Several persons died, and, finally, out of 170 survivors, only four men wore left in health. One of these, a carpenter, was so certain of his approaching death that he made his own coffin and cut his name upon it. Shellfish cast among the rocks were literally devoured, and even the rainwater that drenched them was a bless ing, for it, at least, was drinkable. The Cap tain returned from Manila, took off all the survivors.and carried them to Sydney, where the ship had to be sold to pay expenses. Many children, whoso parents had died at Port Breton, wero compelled to wander through Australia and beg for charity, and, as the agent of the Marquis in Australia absconded without offering to provide a passage back to Franco for any of the unfortunate Port Breton colonists, the majority had to seek the assistance of the French Consuls, who brought the scandal prominently under the notice of tho Homo authorities, with the result that the Mar : guis de Bays finds himself to-d«^ a prisoner i in the criminal docks,

STAR SATURDAY, SUPPLEMENT, -rFESRUA##r-;#«*\" A6B%j ATR

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