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Woodville Examiner, Volume XVII, Issue 2946, 17 April 1899, Page 2

Wanganui rejoices in the possession of men with advanced ideas on her Borough Council. The town was sadly in want of some building for amusement purposes which would in-

duce sterling companies to visit the place, and as no private enterprise was forthcoming to supply such a want, the Council took the matter in hand. Having obtained the consent of the ratepayers to raising a loan of £4OOO for the purpose of building an opera house, the Council called tenders and have just accepted that of Mr N. Meuli at £4597.

At Mr T. B. Taylor's meeting at Stratford last week, the following resolution was unanimously passed : "That this meeting is of opinion that the time has arrived for the return of men to Parliament piedged to such constitutional reform as will secure the full exercise of the people's political power, whilst guaranteeing a vigorous system of close land settlement and social reform, and is of the opinion that the following reforms should be a common ground of action for such men in the best interest of the colony as opposed to those of contending political parties :—l. Elective Executive. 2. Referendum wi:h power of initiative. 8. Reform of Legislative Council. 4. The closest possible settlement of the land by the people. 5. Civil Service reform. 6. The reference of the whole liquor question to the people.''

The London correspondent of the Ofcago Daily Times, writing under date February 17th, says:—"A somewhat uneasy feeling has been caused by the Queen's persistence in her determination to go to Nice, as originally arranged. Recently there have been some very disagreeable anti-British demonstrations at Nice. The bitterness of feeling amused through the Fashoda incident has been accentuated by the nuprecedentedly bad season experienced this year along the French Riviera, this being due to a degree of uncertainty on the part of intending visitors as to the character of their reception, So, just as the Parisian? hated the English for the Fashoda trouble which they had brought on themselves by their own ' unfriendly act,' so the worthy Niceans have sought to restore British confidence and to make their locality again attractive to English visitors by violent anglophobic outbursts, Evidently practical ' bulls ' are acted outside of Ireland.—A popular French actress has been giving imitations of well known public characters. One of these is Queen Victoria, and thence arose the hullabaloo. When the Russian Empress was presented, tremendous cheering followed, but when arepresentation of our Queen followed and the British National Anthem was played by the orchestra, a storm of loud hisses and hooting instantly arose, mingled with cries of ' A bas les Angiais ! " Some of those present went even further, and shouted various opprobrious words, including furious French execrations, and not a single voice was heard in applause of the actress, or in cheers for the Queen, or in dissent from the rude and ungallaut outburst of the hostility to a Sovereign who, as a lady, might have been suppose to have at least some claim upon French gallantry. Nor must it be imagined that this /was a mere disorderly freak of a low class audience. On the *.-*j, mo nut) crowuect tne

house was almost exclusively of a well-dressed and seemingly superior class, who might have been expected to know—aud behave—better. The audience appeared to be entirely French, and the occasion was deemed an appropriate one for a display of cheap and ill-bred 'patriotism.'"