ANGLO-cOLONIAL NOTES.

PRIVY COUNCIL AND CHIEF JUSTICE. SIR ROBERT STOUT'S PROTEST. (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, 21st July. On the 26th inst., t'ho thirty-sixth annual general meeting of shareholders in tho Colonists' Land and Loan Corporation will be 'held at tha company's offices, Dashwood House, 9, New Broadstreet. The report of tho directors together "with the accounts dnade up to the 31st March last has xsached me. It states that during the year fifteen acre 6 of land, which includes the last section held in Feilding, were sold for £5674. There are etill thirty-two acres remaining on hand in the email town of Halcombe, which in the balance-sheet stand at £35 cost price. The rsvenuo account for tho yeaT shows a profit of £10,042, which includes £5561 proceeds of land (sales. This added to the £9745 brought forward ironi the previous year makes a total of £19,787 to the credit of profit and loss account. The directors on the 30th January last paid an interim dividend at, tho Tate of 2£ pel cent., and now recommend a, further distribution at, the same rate, and a bonus or addition of 2£ per cent., making together 7£ per cent, for tho year, free of income tax. This will absorb £6138 and leave £13,649. A London paper cays : "A penny-in-the-slot stamp-supplying machine is being practically tested in New Zealand. How many yeaTS will it take to roach London— where it is badly wanted?" " A rather 6tarthng attack on tho oversea jurisdiction of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council is attributed," says a leading English puper, " to Sir Robert Stout, €hief Justice of New Zealand. He- is cabled to 'have said 'he was surprised that tho colonies endured that cases should be pending for two or three years before an appellate- tribunal which sat thousands of miles away, and whose judges looked on the Privy Council only as an institution for a stray exercising of their judicial functions.' There is something in tho argument from time — if two "or three yeara be the normal time of pendency ; tho law's delays are too great all round —even at Home w© have to put up with it. But there is nothing in the argument from distance, for that gete lees and less every day, and does not affect the justice of any case — the main matter. It is not true that the members of tho Judicial Committee look on their cape- ! cial functions as ' a stray exercising,' etc. — if by that is meant any want of devotion .to their duties ; they cannot help dt if they have other work to do. No miscarriage of juetice has ever been alleged. A' "nuch greater colonial authority than Sir Robert Stout," continues the same writer, '' viz., Alphoiis Todd, Librarian of th© House of Commons of Canada, wrote in 1869 : ' Since tihe establishment of responsible government in moot of the British colonies, the supreme interpretation and application of th© law upon appeal to tho Mother Country is well-nigh th© sol© remaining exercise of power retained by the Crown over the dependencies of the. Empire; and it is tmo which tho colonies havo hitherto shown no disposition to throw off.' Sir William Aneon, M.P. (who pays a high tribute to Todd's great work) says: 'The King in Council wa3 still' — after the Long Parliament — 'the Tesorfc of tho suitor who could not obtain justice in one of the dependencies, and th© Act which took away t'ho original jurisdiction of the King iv Council at Homo did not touch petitions from th© adjacent islands or the plantations.' Still, if New Zealand wishes to provide its own final Court of Appeal, tho Privy Council will certainly not object, and its Committee will bo relieved of a part of its worl* (There cannot, by the way, be many cases in. the course- of a- year dscmed sufficiently important to send Home.) Th© right has generally been regarded by the colonies as a privilege, and on. th© formation of tho Commonwealth, of Australia it was expressly safeguarded. A colonial euitor without this right would alone in the Empire have no recourse to the King, for every subject may appeal to him either in Parliament (House of Lords) or in Council " At last Wednesday's meeting of the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce it was stated that a joint memorial had been sent to the Jiew Zealand Government by the Chambers of Commerce of Birmingham, Walsall, and Wolverhampton, urging them to withdraw tho proposed legulalions requiring cxporteis in certain circumstances to j>ubmit to the New Zealand Customs authorities the original manufacturers' invoices for tho goods exported. It is announced that the directors of Messrs. 'Nelson Brothers have declared an interim dividend of 3 per cent, (at tha rate of 6 per cent, per annum) on tire preference and ordinary shares respectively. In their report for the six months ended 31st March last, the directors of tho Eastern Telegraph Company say that the revenue for the period! amounted to £676,256, from which aio deducted £179,330 for the ordinary expenses and £53,263 for expenditure relating to maintenance of cables, depreciation of spare cable, and income tax payable abroad, leaving a balanco of £44,6,662, to which is added £35,631 brought forward from the preceding half-year, making a total available balanco of £479,294. After providing for income tax payable in England, interest on loan from Eastern and South African Telegraph Company, interest on mortgage debenture stock, and for two quarterly dividends on the preference stock, which in all absorb £93,146, there remains, a balance of £386,147, out of which tho directors have placed £10,000 to the reserve fund for maintenance ships, £195,000 to the general re&ervo fund, and have paid an interim dividend of li per cent, on the ordinary stock amounting to £50,000. The directors now recommend the declaration of a final dividend on the ordinary stock for the year ended 31at March, 1905, of li per cent, and a bonus of 2 per cent., amounting together to £130,000, both payable on the 27thi instant free of income tax, and making with the throe previous payments on account a total distribution of 7 per cent, for the year. It is proposed to carry forward the balance of ±51147 to the next account. Mr. R. Logan presided at the special meeting of the National Bank of New Zealand which was held yesterday at Winchester House. It was held to confiider, and if approved to confirm the resolutions which weic passed at the recent meeting of the Bank to divide tho 100,000 unissued shares of £10 each into two shares of £7 10s and £2 10s. After tho resolution had been adopted the directors -were authorised to consolidate 20,000 of the £2 10s shares into 30,000 shares of £7 10s each, and to cancel the residue of tho £2 10s shares, so that iv lieu of the 100,000 unissued shares of £10 each the unissued capital should ue represented by 130,000 shares of £7 10s each. Tho Chairman stated that the issue of the new shares would depend upon the advices received by the directors from the colony. It was obvious that they would not havo taken power to put the unissued shares in line with the issued shares unless they had contemplated the issuo of at least a portion of them. Howover, they would arrange that the issue should be only in such numbers as could be easily taken up by present holdeiß , without an;,' inconvemeace at all