AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8995, 4 December 1907, Page 5

AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

FANNING ISLAND. THE REPUTED SALE. Received December 3, 9.25 a.m. SYDNEY, December 3. Mr Milward, representative of the Pacific Cable Board, states that the sale of Fanning Island has no Imperial significance whatever. It simply relates to the sale of the Fanning Island copra estate, which does not mean the whole island. The fact that the estate absorbs all but about forty acres oi the island does not affect the question. British control remains the same, and the Pacific Cable Board's possession is untouched. The purchase of the estate by a French Catholic missionary, who ranks second to Bishop Vidal, of Fiji, I has, says Mr Milward, no religious V significance either, as it is known that the missionary was only the nominal purchaser for some one else who already possesses a large trading interest in the island. FALL DOWN A MINETWO MEN KILLED. Received December 3, 9.sß'a>.mv MELBOURNE, Decembers, Two miners named Cadd and Edmonds were drowned through falling from a cage at the Britannia' mine, Ballarat. LOCAL OPTION IN NEW SOUTH WALES. REDUCTION NOT NULLIFIED, Received December 3, 9:58-a.m.. SYDNEY, December 3. In connection with the points raised, the president of the Local Option Court has decided that as a Gazette notice was published notifying that reduction had been carried in certain electorates, reduction has not been nullified. HOT WEATHER IN NEW SOUTH WALES. Received December 4, 12.48 a.m.. SYDNEY, December 3. There was hot weather throughout the State to-day. At Bourke the thermometer registered 112 degrees: