MELBOURNE.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XXI, Issue 1063, 17 April 1890, Page 3

MELBOURNE.

(Fr.on Ock Own Correspondent.) March 31. It seems only like yesterday that I wrote January Ist. On that day few people were at work with the exception of unfortunate pressmen. Now lam recording the lapse of one quarter of the new year. In the course of comparatively few hours we shall be ou the eve of Good Friday, when most of the brain-workers of Melbourne will be leaving the city for another spell until Wednesday morning—all but the pressmen. They must remain. Well, it cannot be helped. We muse work on and make the best of it—unless we are laid by the heels by the influenza. Then I suppose we must take a holiday. It is no respecter of persons. I called at one of the leading colonial life insurance offices a day or two ago, and asked to see the manager—"Laid up with the influenza," was the answer. The next day I called at one of the American offices. "Mr. — is suffering from influenza," was the greeting. And it is astonishing ac how many other places you are told the same story. Formerly, if you called to see a man, say for the_ settlement of an account, it was either mail day or he was getting ready for the mail, or the mail had just gone and he wanted a rest. Now, for a while at least, the excuse will be " influenza."

Now, if this epidemic would kindly fasten upon a good number of our loafers and larrikins, and lay them by the heels for a few months, and leave peaceable people to go unmolested about their business, there would be more sense in it. The number of vagabonds, both men and women, who loaf about our parks and gardens, botli day and night, would not be tolerated elsewhere ; but in Melbourne they are allowed a free hand. Andif they are occasionally taken before a , magistrate they are dealt with in a manner that almost seems to imply they are favorites with the Bench rather than pests to society. I have met one or two persons lately—-well-known, figures in Melbourne—who, after having .been afflicted with deafness for many years, now hear ordinary conversation quite well, and I think the facts are" worth" mentioning. lam not a person to be taken in with the first " nostrum " that is offered me, but l am a firm believer in the efficacy of applied electricity, having seen its beneficial effects in a case of partial paralysis in a member of my own family. There is no need to enter upon a long description of the causes cf deafness—a disease that may be contracted in more ways than people are apt to imagine. It is enough to say that in most cases it arises from the disarrangement of the delicate mechanism of the ear—like the clogged wheels of a watcn which will not work—or from paralysis of the fine muscles which work this mechanism. In one case the mechanism must be again set in motion ; in the other the muscles must be restored to their normal state of healthiness. The patented aural battery has accomplished this in the cases I have mentioned. The secret consists of the fact that a pleasant electric current is sent throngh the parts affected, sets in motion the vibrating media, upon which the sense of hearing depends, and, after repeated applications, restores the organs to a perfect state of health. The batteries were obtained from Professor Harvey, 145 Collins-street, and appear to me to be the neatest things I have seen for 1 the alleviation of deafness, noises in the head, and other inconveniences arising out of injury to the ear. The " Herald" has commenced a raid against fortune-tellers. It is alleged that, under the cloak of revealing the future to women and girls who are foolish enough to visit them, many of these people are guilty of crnel andinfamouspractices ; that fortunetelling is merely a mask behind whichfemales are first deceived, then ruined ; and that to conceal the shame of their victims there are those who, for a." consideration," are ever ready to admiuister remedies which, unhappily, are only too well understood' amongst us. The." Herald " declares that it cau attest on good authority " that not only do fortune-tellers deceive women and girls iuto vaiu expectations of love and fortune,' and get well paid for the fraud," but by working on the jealous fear of wives they foment dissensions where none ought to exist, and lead their confiding victims to utter ruin. We are further told that some of these honses are used as places of assignation, and that females are being decoyed from virtue to immorality, and led on from vice to ruin ; and it is significantly remarked, " immorality and infanticide are closely related." All this is no doubt true. There is probably a great deal more that cannot be told, because the details are not fit to be written. But all this only proves that we are no better than other people. I read only the other day of a gentleman in New York who, in the absence of her husband, had induced a lady to go out with him to supper at one of the fast restaurants. While the pair were eujoying themselves the gentleman had the pleasure of hearing the voice of his own wife in the next box, who wa3 enjoying herself with a male acquaintance. Every now and then a fatality happeus that brushes aside the screen which hides the working of our public departments from the vulgar gaze. Thus: —The Bijou Theatre fire revealed the fact that the general Board of Health had scandalously neglected the public safety ; escape doors were neglected, - and fire extinguishing appliances were deficient in most places of amusement. Still more recently the want of drainage and general neglect of sanitary arrangements at many of the State schools have Leen accidentally exposed. And now this fatal accident at Pain's fireworks shows the shortcomings of the Mining Department. At the inquest held on the body of the unfortunate man, John Lawrence, who was fatally injured whilst mixing some " blue fire composition," Mr. Dunu, the Inspector of Explosives, was quite eloquent upon the provisions of the Explosives Act of 18S5 ; but the mischief of the thing is that Mr. Inspector Dunn neglected to see that these very excellent provisions were complied with. After the explosion had taken place that gentleman visited the scene of the accident, just as Mr. Le Capelaine visited all the other theatres after the Bijou had been burned to the ground. And, by a singular coincidence, just as Mr. Le Capelaine found that the law had not, in some cases, been complied with, so Mr. Dunn found many things among the dtbris at Pain's works which ought not to have been there if Mr. Inspector Dunn had performed his duty. These operations have been carried on for three years without a license. I have myself a personal recollection, from what appeared in the newspapers more than a year ago, that orders were given to stop these works until a license had been received, and a permit from the Council had been obtained. " How," asked the Coroner, " was this allowed to go on for such a time without a license?" Said Inspector Dunu, "I was under the impression it had been attended to. It only rested with me to make the recommendation, and for some one else to carry it out." Mr. Dunn stopped the works after the accident took |>la:e. Said Dr. Youl, " Then aman must bekilled L>iiforeanything can be done ; is that the way of it ? " —" Well, it seems so." If these public officers of ours would display half the zeal i<i the service that they show in their effort to obtain their appointments, they would be more deserving the positions they hold than they are now they have got them.