THE MELBOURNE "LEADER" ON SIR GEORGE BOWEN.

Wellington Independent, Volume XXVIII, Issue 3974, 10 December 1873, Page 3

THE MELBOURNE "LEADER" ON SIR GEORGE BOWEN.

If our critic, Anthony Trollope, comes | across the speeches given at the Mayor's entertainment on Monday, he will triumphantly quote them in proof of the truthfulness of his assertion, that we are a people much given to blowing. The blowing of the lnst fortnight has been something stupendous, and far exceeds any previous effoits in that direction. We pity the Governor. The amount of blowing that poor gentleman has been obliged to do during the last six weeks must have severely tried his energies. It is quite evident that the blowing tendencies of the people he governs have afH'cted him with i.n irrepressible u Hiatus. Befcre coming here he was never known to give vont to uncontrollable enthusiasm, or to utter wild expressions of delight at everything around him. He might elsewhere on half-a-dozen occasions have declared that certain moments were the happiest of his life, and that go where he wouid no attractions could possibly efface his recollection of the place he was leaving. He may have from time to time placed his hand on bis heart and assured thousands of people that their names and he names of their wives and children were indelibly engraven on hie heart. But until he came here his Excellency was never given to downright hard blowing. Since that auspici us advent, however, he has kept up the steam at a rate which cannot last long. When he w. Nt to Buliarat he was expected to blow the praises of the place where the gold once was but is not. There was no place like Ballarat, because of its ancient and departed glories. Geelong ex peoted a loud blast and got it, whilst Sandhurst would be satisfied with nothing short of a declaration that there was no locality on the face of the earth so wonderful. Sand hurst was gratified to its heart's content. Its name was said to be typical of energy and good discipline, because of the fuofc that at the original Sandhurst is <i military college, and Sir George made the happy discovery that his guest, the gubernatorial Hercules, of New South Wules, was cradled there. It was a coinoidenca that would have occurred to no one bub our Governor. Happy Sir Hercules Bobinson, to have been the subject of so pleasant m illustration! Happy Sandhurst to have been so complimented! But this sort of thing cannot go on for ever. Sir George has already declared that our shorthorns and Clydesdales are the finest he saw ; that he never beheld more beautiful roses and geraniums ; that our racecourse is the very best in the world ; that the grandstand is no cow-shed ; that the ladies there were the handsomest and most elegantlydressed of any he had met with in the numerous dependencies which it had pleased Her Majesty to permit him to govern. And as for the horses — well, as good might have been seen at Ascot, but that was doubtful.

It is a mistake to expend one's strength at once, even in blowing. There will soon bc> nothing left by our obliging Governor to do. When he has gone the round of the Bchools to present the prizes, exhausted his reper toire of quotations and Latin phrases, and pronounced some monster gooseberry to be the most corpulent he had ever measured (and donbtless his Excellency has carefully recorded the dimensions of all former goose berrwa which hare come under bis notice) he will, we fancy) be blown out. And wo people of Victoria will be responsible for the catastrophe. For nothing Bhort of fulsome outrageous trumpeting will satisfy the people who lionise Sir George Bowen. Even the so called Mayor's banquet was made the occasion for seeking self-laudation and unconscionable blowing. Mr Francis did his trumpeting, and Sir Alfred Stephen joined «in the blast. But the hard blowing was left, to the Governor. He compared the Mayi r's dinner to the dinner on similar occasions at the Mansion House, and Lord Mayor M'llwraith's was, in his opinion, the more excellent, He hud dined with Lord fcfajore of

the City of London, but they never could get beyond cold chicken, with hot potatoes and soup; but here, at a much earlier hour of the day, at three in the afternoon, thero were actually boiled turkeys and roast geese piping hot. Whit could be bettT proof of the great progress of this young country ? Only thiriy-five years old, and it can produce a hot dinner for 500 people in the middle of the day. The achievement is so perfectly astounding that it is quite impossible to predict what Melbourne will produce when thirty- five years older, when the age of three score and ten is reached. It is now the ninth city in the empire. Edinburgh is 600 years old, and contains no more population. Just imagine what Melbourne will be when it is as old as Edinburgh ; the whole continent will not be able to contain it. The guests cheered, the louder the Governor blew. They were unquestionably of opinion that on the earth's surface there was none to compare with them, and Sir Q-eorge, equally delighted with himself and all around him, felt that ho was the biggest Governor of the biggest citj in Britain's colonial empire. In hia exuberance he announced himself to be a Victorinn. His last declaration on the subject of nationality was, if we remember lightly, that he was a New Zealander, and before that he was prepared to live and die a Qucenslander. Some wag suggested on Monday that his Excellency should slightly change hia name, and permit himself to be called Sir George Bio win' !