ANGLO COLONIAL NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIII, Issue 81, 7 April 1902, Page 2

ANGLO COLONIAL NOTES.

l (Erom-Our Own Correspondent)

LONDON, February 28

Sir Clements Markham has met with a ready response to his. appeal for £20,000 to equip the ship Morning, which is to sail in the Southern summer of 1902-3 to the relief of the Discovery. The Prince of Wales subscribed £50, the Royal Society £500, the Goldsmiths' Company £200, the Dukes" of Northumberland and Bedford and Sir E. Cassel are among the donors of £100, and Sir. Clements Markham gives £35 10/. The largest subscriber is Mr L. W. Longstaff, with _5000. The total amount promised is about „9000. ~ To whom does Kerguelen really belong? It is supposed to be French Territory, but the Australian Commonwealth has advanced a claim to its supervision. The actual Power in possession, according to latest news, is Germany, which is utilising it as a depot of supplies for the German South Polar expedition. We read that the "German flag was run up at the spot where the supplies are stored." If the French acquiesce in that it is tantamount to an abandonment of any rights they may have in the place by virtue of formal annexation. In the Eastern a.viary at the Zoological Gardens there has just been added an entirely white specimen of the weka rail (Ocydronius australis) of New Zealand. This bird, which has been presented to the society bythe Prince of Wales, is of considerable interest, for although the weka rail is not uncommou iv the menagerie a white variety is a distinct novelty. Sir Walter Buller is the chairman of directors of the Federated Mines of Rhodesia, Limited, which is now offering the public £250,000 sharesof !£1 each for subscription, and which has been formed primarily to acquire 765 mining claims in Rhodesia, in the Lomagunda, Gwanda, Gwellc. Bulawayo, Shangani and other districts, as well as the "Leechdale" farm, of 6000 acres, and to participate in the general development of Rhodesia, Lieut-Colonel Sir Gerard Smith, K.C. M.G., late Governor of Western Australia, is another director. Old bowlers of the colony will perhaps pooh-pooh the newest development of their game, but "table bowls," which bears the same resemblance to the real game as ping-pong does to lawn tennis, is undoubtedly making headway in the Old Country. The new game was exhibited on Saturday last at the Crystal Palace, where it met with, such favour that the ping-pong tables were almost forsaken, and three were turned out to make room for the bowls table. In consequence of the success of the invention a Surrey Table Bowls Tournament is being arranged, and nearly every bowling club is taking up the game. The King's Bench Divisional Court on Wednesday quashed the convicifcion of Messrs Pearks. Gunston and Tee by the Richmond Justices under the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, 1875, for the sale of milk bleaded butter. The Lord Chief Justice came to the conclusions that to the ordinary purchaser the large notice in the shop contained a statement that the butter was mixed with milk, and had in it 23 per cent, of moisture, that there was no evidence that the butter was sold to the prejudice of the purchaser, and no evidence that the water was fraudulently added. Mr Justice Darling and Mr Justice ' Channell concurred, the former expressing the opinion that the appellants had sailed very near the wind, and were saved entirely by the large notice in their shop. The "milk-blended butter" therefore emerges from the series of prosecutions to which it has been subjected without a stain on its character, but extensively advertised. The Agents-General have received from Lieut- P. F. Cockerell, Assistant Provost Marshall of the Western Division, Mafeking, a letter upon "a subject of considerable moment to those interested in the future welfare" of the new colonies. He sets forth that "During the course of military operations a large number of the better class of Boers have lost the greater part of their holdings and property from commandeering by one side or the other. Of these men there are a certain namber of men of proven loyalty to our cause, whose sympathies so openly declared will make it of the utmost difficulty that they should ever return to their farms in the Transvaal. And so, a large number of them are approaching various English people to obtain information about the possibilities of emigration to other colonies, with a view to making a fresh start; they are a most desirable class of colonists, and accustomed to meet nature face to face.'' After asking for particulars re emigration land grants to the colony represented by each recipient of his letter, Lt. Cockerell remarks: "The capital Avhich these people will have at their disposal will depend largely upon the amount which they are allowed in compensation for their losses by the Imperial Government, but will, I fancy, be largely in excess of the averag-e amount at the disposal of settlers in the colonies." The decorations for the Coronation are being put in hand. There are signs that the higgledy-piggledy individuality that marked the Jubilee ornamentations will on this auspicious occasion give way to a series of harmonious schemes of decoration. The inhabitants of St. James'-sti-eet are spending nearly £1500 in the combined adornment of their thoroughfare. The scheme, which ■has been copyrighted in the name of the decorator, has poles of special design rising fifty feet from the ground, erected at intervals of twenty feet on either side along the whole length of the street. Great difficulty has been experienced in getting straight masts of the required height, as the usual size is only twenty or thirty feet, and the decorators have had to go to Norway for what they want (another injustice to the colonies. Where are the Empire's "palm and pine?"). The (base of each pole, for eight feet up, Jjyill fee in ±he. form of an octagonal r -

pedestal, and the whole, as far as the yard arm, which will stretch out from a point a few feet from the top* Will be fluted in crimson and gold. Above the arm the mast will be enamelled ill white, and fixed to the pinnacles of each pole wi.ll be a large banner, bearing the arms of a colony. The arm will run out from a metal socket to a spear point, and from it will depend a basket of choice flowers, from which, again, will hang floral festoons, carried in undulating fashion across the thoroughfare to the opposite mast, and joined to its protruding arm. The result will be a canopy stretching from end to end of the thoroughfare. Real flowers will not be used for the garlands, as the decorations must remain up two da vs. The floral representations will be in linen, coloured in delicate tints, waterproof and fireproof, and hardly distinguishable from flowers garden-grown. At each corner of the street a female figure 22 feet high, representing one of four divisions of the United Kngdom, will be placed. Britannia will symbolise England, the rampant lion will go along with the female figure for Scotland, the harp for Ireland, and the dragon for Wales. At the Piccadilly end a banner of Royal purple velvet, twelve feet deep, will stretch across the street, and the motto will be picked out in bold gilt letters. Hanging longitudinally in festoons between the masts v.-.'-i. be over 10C0 variegated electric prismatic globules of silver, gold, and Royal blue colours. These will be lit on both evenings. The Westminster Council have also invited designs for that part of the route within their boundary, at a cost of about £200 a mile.