COMMERCIAL.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 2589, 25 May 1870, Page 2

COMMERCIAL.

Yesterday beiug the Queen's Birthday, was observed as a close holiday, and no business was transacted at the Custom

House.

AGRICULTURAL REPORT, • (The Argus, May 13.)

The markets remain almost without change. Flour is dull at last week's rates, and although wheat nominally retains its value, the demand for it is slack. The supply of maize continues small, but the high price is fast reducing the consumption of this grain. Oats are, therefore, firmly, held, with an upward tendency, and unless shipments of maize are renewed on a larger scale, prices must go higher. The hay market is more fully supplied again thU week, many of the small farmers near the town being anxious to sell out, as each shower of rain penetrates more deeply into their stacks. . This colony has been very fortunate in escaping floods as yet, but they can scarcely be said to have ceased in New South Wales, for it was raining again heavily this week iv some parts of that colony, and the rains have extended this time far into the interior, as well as to Adelaide. The frosty nights here lately have left their mark on the foliage of tender plants, and give promise of a similar winter to that lately experienced in England, frost and snow alternating with occasional sunshine and heavy rains. The sheep inspectors are all under orders of removal, and the changes are to be effected within a few days. Mr Kerr is to come to Melbourne from Coleraine, Mr Riley to go to Geelong, and Mr Peevor thence to Seymour. They have all to change their districts, and the policy of these changes, without some sufficient reason in each case, is much questioned. If these officers are upright, honourable men, they will not be influenced by personal friendships in the discharge of their duty, and if they are not they are unfit for the position, especially under what we may look for as the new Act, which, to be of any effect, ought to give them extensive powers. We may presume that it is in anticipation of this the changes are made; stiH, such an officer could do much more in a district with which he was well acquainted than in one in which he was a stranger both to persons and localities.

The report adopted by the members of the Ballarat Agricultural Society at their annual meeting last. week gave a very satisfactory account of the proceedings for the year—ex hibitions, ploughing matches, and trials of reapers and mowers. The show-yards have also been improved by the planting of trees, both outside, and inside, along the main alleys, and in vacant corners here and there ; and this is an example that should be followed, for in future years these trees will form a grateful shade on hot show days, besides adding much to the effect of the. scene on such occasions. The trees, mostly blue-j-ums, were furnished to the society by the municipal council of Ballarat, this body also bearing half the expense of planting the trees outside the yards. Additional sheds, were erected for the National Grain Show, and after paying all chims upon it the society will still have a respectable balance in hand against next year.

Accounts from England show that the winter there has been on the whole a severe one; and very unfavourable to the agricultural interest. The weather in the early part of March vas cold, with much rain and snow, but there was a genial change towards the end of the month; and spring set in: .all at once. The wheat plant looked very bad all through the winter, and was in many places so thin as to leave little or no hope of its recovery, so that the fields would have to be sown again with spring crops. Owing,to the wet state of the land, the farmers were very backward with these, by far the largest proportion having still to be sown at the end of March in the warmer parts of the country, hone being then sown in the colder parts. Feed for stock was becoming scarce, when the weather opened, and it was hoped that the spring of grass would be speedy, for the remains of the rather scanty root-crop of last year were nearly exhausted. Wheat had a rising tendency "while the weather continued severe, but no sooner did this change than prices began to give w_ay again, and as they were falling in America and in the ports on the Black Sea, there was little prospect of a recovery. By the published statements we are led to believe that wool only maintained its value, as fixed by the opening sale of the year, but private advices speak of an advance, and;there is no doubt that, at the least, this branch of trade was in a sound condition. The old '".stocks in hand were all used up, and there was no fear of any increase in the quantity of raw material this year. Supplies from all the great wool-growing countries of the world were not likely to be stationary,; if not on a reduced scale. A steamer, fitted up specially for the purpose, in London, had returned from South America with 144 bullocks, 300 sheep.and a few cows and horses, in good condition, and it was supposed that the voyage would be a successful one in regard to profit, the bollocks being on their arrival valued, at Ll6 a head; but a later telegraphic message states ihat they were sold by auction at a loss. Amongst the items of general information, we fiud it announced that Mr Henry HallDixon is no more, and with him end the graphic articles sin the Mark-lane Express on the Herds of Great Britain signed "H. H. D." As a writer on sporting subjects, lie was better known as " The Druid," and there is no one to take his place.