INTERCOLONIAL.

Otago Witness, Issue 2660, 8 March 1905, Page 64

INTERCOLONIAL.

MELBOURNE, March 1. An Austrian gumdigger named Lopez, journeying from New Zealand to London, ■was " taken, down "at Hobart. He lost all his savings through the confidence trick. March 2. Mr Bent, the Premier, estimates the Victorian surplus this year at £350,000. March 3. Mr O'Brien, manager of the Maffra branch of the Commercial Bank, has surrendered himself to the city police, stating that he has defrauded the .bank of £1400 by means of fictitioxis accounts. MELBOURNE, March 6. The importation of apperin.e, describeoTas a substitute for hops, is prohibited by the Commonwealth. The Methodist Conference resolved to ask the Federal Postmaster-general to prohibit the carriage of letters addressed to Tattersail's.

SYDNEY, March 1. Stanbury has challenged Towns to row for the sculling championship of the world and £500 aside.

March 2. The loss.es by bush fires submitted to the Relief totalled £70,000. The Lord! Mayor's fund having proved inadequate, the committee resolved to ask the Government to vote £1500 to meet urgent cases.

March 3. The weather is boisterous on the coast. There is a spkmlul ialofall mer the

eastern half of the State. Three inches fell in Sydney.

Dr Danyez, of the Pasteur Institute. Paris, has written the Premier stating that it will be necessary to establish a permanent institution for the cultivation of pathogenic microbes for rabbits, in order to maintain their virulency, and to teach graziers and farmers how to apply them on a large scale. He offers to send a student to make some experiments for about £1000. In reply to the query whether he could come himself, he slates that he might be able to come in April for six months, but his fee would be £600 per month from the time of leaving Paris to his return. The Premier has communicated th,e letter to the other States, with a view to seeking their co-operation.

March 4.

The barque Miranda arrived from Rio with a fever-stricken crew. Fourteen of them suffered from beriberi, and) four died. One committed suicide by jumping overboard a couple- of days before the barque's arrival.

Giving evidence before tlie Navigation Commission, the immigration of consumptives was referred to by Dr Sinclair, superintendent of the Consumptives' Home, who said that theoretically it was better to exclude them altogether, but this was not practical nor actually necessary. He favoured the Ncav Zealand scheme, and thought it might well be followed by the Commonwealth.

March 5. I The steamer Pharsalin, of 3052 tons, '

owned by Messrs W. Thomson and Co., ' Liverpool, bound from Newcastle to Manilla, with 5500 tons of coal, is ashore near Manilla. She is full of water, and it is feared is a total wreck.

Mr G. H. Reid, the Federal Premiez*, interviewed, said) he* considered the people of Australia at the present moment were in a position of grave political danger. "There is," he said, "a vast organisation full of enthusiasm, single-minded individuals in their political actions, who don : t fight amongst themselves over even the. financial question, bent upon overthrowing as soon as possible all the foundations upon which ouv industrial system, arid, I believe, our national prosperity, are based. My grave duty is to endeavour to prevent Australia going otown in the depths of Socialistic, chaos. I look upon the matter as of vast and pressing consequence, not only for the people of to-day, but for the people of all time. lam determined to devote the best of my remaining faculties and energies to a fair, square, honest fight with this great ; organisation." j

March 6.

The partial eclipse of the sun was observed under favourable conditions at Sydney Observatory and) in other parts of the State.

Mr Reid, in his interview, portion of which was cabled yesterday, further said that he believed the policy of the Socialists sank below the lev.e-1 of patriotism and of national well-being, and that they w.ere aiming at the personal aggrandisement of a class, and that class not the whole of the working community, but a section which had been desperately fighting to entrench itself in privilege of the worst kind, because it challenged the right of other labourers and) other industrials to

earn their own livings under conditions of freedom and equality. Of course, the Socialists would say " Our goal is equality." Yes, but it was the- sort of equality of a Government gang, not the equality of human opportunity, and human right to develop its facilities to the greatest possible advantage and with just measures of personal independence.

A Prohibition party has been formed in Sydney with the object of strenuously opposing the manufacture, importation, and sale of intoxicating beverages. The hops is expressed) that the results will be similar to those in New Zealand.

A tragedy is reported from Cobar. A man known as Paddy Home shot his father-in-law, John Donnelly, dead in the street. Family troubles were the cause of the tragedy.

PERTH, March 2.

It is believed that the pearling schooner Alice was lost with all hands in a cyclone on February 8.

BRISBANE, March 1. Another case of plague and one death are reported.

March 2.

Two officials in the Mossman Sugar Mill have discovered a method for clarifying sugar, which, it is believed, will revolutionise th& production of sugar. Mills now producing raw sugar will be able to produce an article equal to refined. The process is a secret.

March 6.

Professor Watson, of Melbourne University, states that he found rinderpest very prevalent in the Philippines. Serum was being used with good effect. Another disease, similar to the sleeping sickness, was also raging and killing off cattle and horses, but there were no signs so far of its attacking human beings.

The Government is talcing stiict precautions against the introduction of rinderpest from New G-uinea.

Another plague case is reported from Fortitude Valley.

Tho official opening of the Maori Gala' School at Turakina will be performed by the Premier at a date to be fixed lat.-r, jjiobably^ about the 12th M&rciu