The steamship _Ionic_, which lately left this country for New Zealand, took out with her a large number of passengers of a description not usually met with on shipboard. They consisted of one hundred and fifty-eight stoats and weasels, whose mission in New Zealand will be to prey upon the rabbits which are fast overrunning that country. This is the third consignment which has left our shores. The little animals are accommodated in zinc-lined boxes, and during the forty days’ journey are calculated to require for their food more than two thousand live pigeons, which accompany them. The poor pigeons also require food, and therefore sixteen quarters of Indian corn were taken out for their consumption. Altogether, the expense to the colonial government must be something considerable, but will not be grudged if the required result is achieved. STOCK EXCHANGE MORALITY. Perhaps there are few institutions possessing attributes more diametrically opposed to one another than the Stock Exchange. Undoubtedly useful in its way, it nevertheless abounds in gross abuse. It is a necessity to the _bonâ fide_ investor, as indicating the locality where he can on the instant purchase or find a market for almost any stock in the world; yet it becomes a very hotbed of vice in the hands of the professional speculator. We apply this term to the man who fraudulently buys without the intention of paying, and worse still, sells what he does not possess. The method of so doing was fully explained in an article on ‘Corners’ in No. 19 of this _Journal_. Take a quite recent illustration of the two evils. Only a short time ago, a letter purporting to come from Mr Gladstone’s private secretary, addressed to the Secretary of the Exchange, was received by him, and posted up in the House. It stated that certain unexpected interests would be paid to the Peruvian bondholders. The price went up over thirty per cent. in a few moments, so that any one having bought ten thousand pounds-worth the day before, could have then sold them for nearly fourteen thousand pounds. It is more than probable that the writer of the forged letter had previously purchased without any intention of paying or ‘taking them off,’ and on the imposition taking effect, at once sold out not only those he possessed, but also more that he did not possess. Within half an hour, the forgery was discovered, when the price immediately fell the thirty per cent. it had just risen. Thus this impudent adventurer would not only secure an enormous profit by the rise, but by buying back on the fall the extra quantity he had sold on the rise, reap an additional profit.