NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 9832, 29 May 1895, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

After the long and severe spell of depression which has existed in Victoria, io is pleasing to learn that trade is again beginning to revive in that colony, and thab a better feeling of confidence prevails. According to the Melbourne Argus, a more cheerful feeling prevails in trading circles. As compared with this time last year, there is a slight improvement in the turnover, the terms upon which business is transacted are stricter, and expenses have been materially reduced. Upon the whole, the hope is now well grounded that in moat departments there will no longer be loss on the current trading. The bad and doubtful debts arising out of the transactions of former years are being gradually liquidated. The principal remaining drawback consists in some cases in the heavy interest charge arising out of the ownership of premises; although mortgagees have, as a rule, been liberal in this matter. Real property complications have in many directions stood in the way of an improvement in trade. But in one way or another trading conditions have been placed on afar healthier basis than existed during the period of inflation.

The recent rapid advance in the price of wheat, which has been noted in our commercial columns during the past few days, is in sympathy with the rise in the London market, where the price has reached a higher figure than ib has done for several years. This rise is based on the belief that the year's crop will be 15,000 quarters below that of 1894. The Liverpool Corn Trade News recently estimated the 1594 crop as 271,000 quarter?, against 282,000 quarters in, 1893, and an average of 279,000 quarters for the years 1891-92-93. Later returns would reduce the 189-4 estimate, as the crop of Argentina has been found to be less than was then anticipated. Of course a reduction of 15,000 quarters on the 1894 figures, even if that should prove as large as estimated by the authority named, and following a reduction of 8000 quarters, the average of the three preceding years, would show a decrease of 23,000 quarters, or very nearly 8 per cent, on the annual production of the early part of the decade. After the experience of past years, we can never place too much reliance on crop estimates covering tho whole world. It is notoriously difficult to get at the rosults in tho United States. We have seen estimates of Russian crops greatly falsified by actual results. Argentina's last crop was largely overestimated. If, however, the forecast of a decrease of 8 per cent, is realised, or even the half of it, there could hardly fail to be a higher range of prices, more particularly if the expected revival of trade should turn out to be an accomplished fact.

A singular and interesting occurrence is related by Slatin Boy, the recently escaped prisoner of the Khalifa. In December, 1892, the Khalifa handed him a small metal capsule, ordering him to open it and oxplain what ib meant. It) contained two small slips of paper, each about the size of a visiting card, with an. inscription in German, Trench, and English, stating that the capsule was attached to the neck of a crane, bred on the estate of Herr FalxFein, at Tskanea Nova, in the province of Taurida, South Russia, who had released the bird and requested its future captor to communicate to him particulars of date and place. Slatin, who speaks only from memory, as he was nob allowed to retain or even to copy the writing (the possession of any European writing being a punishable offence), thinks that the date of the bird's release was June or July, 1892. Ib was killed about November of that year ab Dar el Shaigia, and the capsule wan sent to Younos, the Emir of Dongola, who forwarded ib by special messenger, to

the Khalifa at Omdarman, a total journeying of about 800 mile* by camels. Slatin has written to Herr Falz-Fein, informing him of the incident, the remarkable point of which is that the paper reached the only man in the entire Soudan who could com ply with the wish of the breeder of the crane. ■

Mr. Whitehead, a member of tho Legislative Council of Hong Kong, in an article on bimetallism, predicts that unless our monetary law is amended, or unless British labour is prepared to accept a large reduction of wages, British industrial trades must inevitably leave British shores, because their product* will be superseded by the establishment of industries in silver standard countries. This is his account of the matter :— ln 1870 ten rupees were the equivalent of one sovereign under the joint standard of gold and silver, and paid 20 men for one clay. To-day twenty rupees are about the equivalent of one sovereign, so that for 20 rupees 40 men can be engaged for one day, instead of 20 men as in 1870. Against such a disability British labour cannot possibly compete. In Oriental countries silver will still pay for the same quantity of labour as formerly. Yet, as now measured in gold, silver is worth less than half of the gold it formerly equalled. For example, a certain quantity of labour could have been engaged in England twenty years ago for, say, eight shillings in gold, and a like quantity of labour in China for, say, two dollars, equal at the old ratio to eight shillings. Eight shillings in England now will pay for no more labour than formerly, wages being about the same, and they have still by our law exactly the Bame monetary value as formerly, though their metallic value has, by the appreciation of gold, been reduced to less than sixpence each. The two dollars exactly similar to the old ones can employ the same quantity of labour as before, bub no more, yet at the present gold price they are only equal to four shillings. Therefore, it is possible now to employ as much labour in Asia for four shillings of our money, or the equivalent thereof in silver, as could have been employed twenty years ago for eight shillings, or its then equivalent in silver. The value of Oriental labour having thus been reduced by upwards of 55 per cent, in gold money, compared with what it was formerly, it will be able to produce manufactures and commodities just so much cheaper than the labour in gold standard countries.

The question of marrilge and divorce is just now occupying attention in ecclesiastical quarters in England, the matter baring been discussed by Convocation a few days ago, and in France the marriage laws have just been reconsidered by the Chamber of Deputies. A Bill introduced by the Abbe Lemayre with the object of simplifying the marriage laws was discussed, and an amendment by M. Charles Ferry, authorising men of 25 and women of 21 to marry without the consent of their parents was rejected by 308 votes to 238, it being declared that public opinion was nob ripe for such a radical change. The Abbi Lemayre then moved the abolition of the law requiring persons about to marry, whose parents are dead, to obtain the consent of their grandparents. He said that in many cases young people who desired to marry were put to a great deal of trouble and expense in rinding their grandparents, and the latter, when found, often had to be paid or their consent. The Minister of Justice having spoken in favour of the simplification of the marriage laws so as to afford an increase in the number of marriages and a decrease in the number of illegitimate children, the Abbe 1 Lemayre's proposition was adopted by 297 votes to 227.

At the present time when the jealousies of rival European Powers in Africa are directing attention to what is going on in that part of the world, the news which we publish to-day of a rising in Bornu, and the deposition of the Sultan after a great battle in which he lost three thousand men, possesses an interest and significance which in different circumstances would not have attached to it. Bornu is situated within the boundaries of the territories of the Royal Niger Company, which they adminster under a royal charter granted in 1836. It is a powerful but declining state of Central Africa, somewhat larger in extent than England. It is bounded on the east by Lake Tchad, and on the north by Sahara. The population, which is estimated at about five millions, are mostly of negro race. The slave trade had here its home, and was prosecuted with great eagerness. From this nefarious traffic rast wealth was amassed by the various Sultans. The leader of the revolt was formerly a slave belonging to Zobehr Pasha, the notorious slave dealer whom General Gordon, to the amazement of the British Government, wished to be senb to the Soudan to smash the Mahdi. Zobehr in bis day, before he became a captive in Egypt, was a king in Africa, wielding immense influence and possessed of untold wealth, while his court was maintained with a barbaric splendour and pomp of which wondrous stories still continue to be told. His ex-slave, who has now become Sultan of Bornu, collected a largo following and after severe fighting, in which three thousand men were slain, '* succeeded in seizing Kuka, the capital, a town with a population of 60,000. Further developments in that region of Africa will be watched with eager curiosity. From the fact that the Japanese fleet is mobilising off the coast of Formosa, it is anticipated that fighting is in store. The Italian elections have given the Government an overwhelming majority. Lord Rosebery's Bill, providing for the appointment of colonial judges on the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, has been read a first time in the House of Lords. The measure is described by the Times as microscopic and tentative. Very large orders from England have been received in Sydney for hard woods.