AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6129, 16 March 1898, Page 2

AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

O[Froh Our Correspondent.} (By Telegraph from the Bluff.) MELBOURNE, March 10. A STARTLING STATEMENT. A sensation was created at Benalla by the remarks, in Holy Trinity Church on Sunday, by the Rev J. Allen, who referred to the immorality alleged to exißt in the town. "Ib it true," he asked, •' that there are men in Benalla, married as well as unmarried, who, could they but be Been in their true guise by all their neighbours, would be known by every resident to be mean, lewd fereatures? Is it true that some of these are received into society, as we call itj whereas, if only half of what we hear about them be true, they are utterly unworthy of the company of all respectable people of every station in life P" The opinion of a large Bection of the Bobdrminded residents is that Mr Allen haß been misinformed. AN AMERICAN CONTRACT The Pennsylvania and Maryland Steel Company, of the United States, has secured the contract for supplying the Victorian railways with 12,789 tons of steel rails and 1250 tonßof fish-plates, at .£75,471. The contract was settled through the AgentGeneral in London, by cable. Five tenders were received, two from American companies, two from English companies and one from a German company. The German tender did not comply with the specifications, delivery of the rails being promised at Antwerp instead of at Melbourne. One of the American tenders was also informal. The prices of the English were .£79,274 and £81,256 re* spectively. A TERRIBLE DROUGHT. The mallee country in Victoria is in a deplorable condition through the drought, and the Argus urges immediate aotion by the Government in the direction of supplying water and seed wheat. With ingenious implements such as mallee roller and stump-jumping plough, the most forbidding country in the colony was oleared and cultivated, and land which had been . given over to the dingo and the rabbit became a national asset of the greatest value. Hundreds of thousands of acres were put under crop/ with the most encouraging results. Settlers were attracted from other colonies to Victoria, and for several seasons the mallee became the centre of agricultural activity, a veritable land 'of plenty. To-day this same country is a land of want, hunger and thirst, where settlers are .bankrupt and destitute ; from which an exodus has set in as from a country stricken with the plague. Three years of drought following on a year of bad prices have brought this about. To-day a progress through the i blocks is like a journey through a desert. The ground is baked and in places bare, and the soil once so fertile is blown about in thiok clouds. One may travel fifty miles through occupied and cultivated oountry and not see a head of stock. Were it not for the .teams which are met with now and then hauling tanks from some distant waterhole, the country would be absolutely destitute of animal life ; either the cattle and sheep have died of thirst, or have been driven away south to some dam or watercourse, to be kept alive till the rain comes. There is not even a rabbit to be scan ; only flies flourish, and for them, unhappily, there is plenty of food in the carcases of horses which succumb daily t~> Band or drought. The Government is urged' to prevent the entire desertion of the mallee country., , . , ■*, : . MISSING VESSEL. The four-masted ship Glenfinlas, which , left Newcastle for Manilla on Oct. 6 last, is mißsing. The vessel was a powerful ship, of 2033 tons, built in 1882 at Sunderland, and owned by the Red Cross Shipping Company, Limited, and commanded by Captain A. Pa tor son, an exceptionally able,,master, • v ■ ASBESTOS. A telegram from the Warden at ifcalgoorlie states that a find of asbestos; apparently in payable quantities, has been made by Richard Dobson, near Feysville. SUDDEN. DEATH... ; A telegram from Roeburn states that the mail contractoc.foll dead from the coach, and that the passengers had to drive the vehicle for the remainder of the journey. SABBATH OBSERVANCE. . At the sitting of the Wesleyan Conference, in Sydney, the Rev W. Hill moved a resolution, deploring the running on Sundays of special trains to the Zoological Gardens, exourgion trains to country districts and the employment of steamers to convey pleasure parties to Hawkesbury on the Lord's Day. The motion also condemned the opening of the Zoological Gardens on Sunday as a serious mistake. There was, the mover said, no necessity for either trains or trams on the Sabbath. These practices were going on every Sabbath, while the churches seemed dumb. He thought the churches had dim bed down a little, but they ought to have influence enough to prevent the evil. The motion was carried. MEAT EXPORT. The. Yamashiro Maru takes, on board at Brisbane a hundred tons of preserved beef as a, tentative shipment for an Eastern market. Both the consignors and the agents are extremely reticent as to the destination of the shipment, but it is understood that the beef is intended neither for Japan nor Southern China, but for Vladivostock or for one of the German or Russian stations in the north of China. The experiment is not connected with the proposed export of frozen meat to Vladivostock.