Late Australian News.

Hastings Standard, Issue 147, 16 October 1896, Page 4

Late Australian News.

Last week's hero looked very much like becoming a shattered, or, at any rate, badly damaged, idol this week. Ex-constable flatter, who figured as hero of a shooting affray with burglars in Sydney sonic years ago, turns out to have mailed with Captain Slocum as third mate in the vessel Northern Light. Captain Slocum is now here on a voyage round the world on a small cm ft. A good deal of commotion was made at the time by Slatter's thrilling account of the cruelty practised 011 him by Slocum. According to the former's version he was placed in a small compartment four feet by four by live, ironed with eighty-three pounds of chains, given a starvation allowance of biscuits and water, and kept in dunuice for Jifty-three days. Ho tells how he caught a rat and killed and ate it raw, so ravenous had he become. Slocum was fined SOOdol. at New York for cruelty, 011 the other hand, Slocum admits being fined, but says that the Judge expressed the opinion that he was not actuated by malice, but by a desire to maintain discipline. Extracts from American papers largely bear out Slocum. An alleged affidavit by Slatter, published by one, shows that Slatter did not blame the captain's treatment, but rather that the chief mate wilfully neglected to give him food ordered by the captain, and that the suit which led to the captain being fined was instituted by designing persons for the purposes of blackmail, Slatter being made a tool. Unusual interest centured in the Victorian Parliament this week, the attraction being the debate 011 the second reading of the Constitution Act Amendment Bill, The galleries were crowded with ladies, who were deeply concerned in the fate of that portion of the Bill proposing to confer womanhood suffrage. Sir J. M'lntyre, leader of the Opposition, opened the attack. The country had not asked for and did not want the Bill. He strongly opposed one-man-one vote, womanhood suffrage, and the abolition of the ratepayers' roll, the principal proposals of the measure. He urged that the dual vote should be adopted as a concession to thrift. His main contention against giving women the vote was that the

softer sex, as a whole, were not asking for the franchise, but were perfectly satisfied with the present order of things. Those demanding the franchise were only a few agitators, freaks of nature that had not been made men. He had personally acquainted himself, while in New Zealand, with the effect of giving the franchise to women. He knew that the effect was bad. It interfered with the tranquility of domestic life and brought the kitchen into conflict with the drawingroom. The evil did not stop there. The women of New Zealand, having got a vote, were now asking for seats in Parliament, and demanding to be made policewomen. Several other members followed in a similar strain. The Government was charged with changing its views on certain points, and with being dominated by the Labor Party. These charges were repudiated by the Government, but the party refrained from speaking, and the Premier refusing to consent to an adjournment the Opposition kept up a stonewall throughout Friday night, a wearisome sitting ending in a triumphant majority in favor of the Bill. The pierced, patched and practically reformed Licensed Victuallers Bill has finally emerged from Committee in the South Australian Parliament. Clauses have beea added, penalising;

parents sending children under fifteen years for liquor, debarring brewers holding storekeepers' licenses, debarring both hotels and clubs appealing to the Supreme Court against Licensing Board' decisions, and giving a twothirds majority of the electors the right of veto of storekeepers' and colonial wine licenses. The House wei.it back on its previous decision, and agreed to make an experiment with the Gothenburg system at Renmark.