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New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 468, 31 March 1882, Page 23

The Empress >f Austria ha 9 arrived in England for the hunting season. As is well known, her Majesty would much prefer coming to Ireland, but the representations made about the state of this country prevailed, and the Empress was induced, one may say, compelled, so to chanse her original intention. We need not express f onr own and the general regret at the decision of the great lady who' won golden opinions during her too brief sojourn in this conntry ; and alao at the circumstances under which her Majesty's absence has been entailed. We hopa that brighter and better days are in store for the country, when hunting sport of every kind, as well as commerce and agriculture, and the peace which th°y brine in their train, will be re-established on a sound and healthy bisis. For the present we must content ourselves with wishing the Countess of Hohenemba and her friends and attendants a pleasant time in Cheshire. — Dublin Freeman. Lord Erne has published in the Ijondon Thmet a valuable letter from the late Sir Richard Griffith, the author of the famous valuation, to himself, together with an official letter, written by Sir Richard's directions, to his agent. No doubt can now remain as to the relation which Sir Richard Griffith considered that his valuation should bear to a fair rent in Ulster. "In using the tenement valuation," ha wrote, "as an aid for letting, the second or land column should be the basis of valuation, to which may be aided, according to the views of the landlord in regard to ' live aad let live,' say 10 or 15 per cent., and in accommodation land 20 or 30 par cent. And in the other letter it is laid down that when the tenement valuation of the county Fermanagh is finally checked and completed, it will be from 2s. 6d. to 3s. per pound under the fair letting value to a solvent tenant on a lease of fourteen years." On all which the Pall Mall Gazette remarks, very pertinently, that "it would be very interesting to knq\v what Sir R. Griffith would have thought of the views in regard to ' live and let live ' o£ those landlords whose rents have, since his day, j been raised to double his valuation." ( What is known as the '• Monroe doctrine " had its origin and i name in a recommendation of President Monroe, in one of his messages to Congress, at a time when Spain was making arrange* ments to re-conquer and subdue her various colonies in America, which had revolted and established their independence in 1819. 1820 and 1821. It was apprehended by the American Government that the despotic Powers of Europe, after the overthrow of Napoleon and the re-establishment of the despotic sway in Europe, would lend their aid to conquer and subdue the Spanish colonies, which had then become independent States ; and that while a pdrtion of them would, in this event, be restored to Spain, the others might be divided among the various Powers of Europe. In view of this probable result President Monroe declared, in his message to Congress, with a view of its being taken as notice to all Europe, that no portion of the American Continent was hereafter to be deemed open to fiuroj pean colonisation, and that the United Statea would consider any ! such attempt as imposing upon them the obligation to take such stepa as were necessary to prevent it. This declaration assumed the name of the Monroe doctrine, and it has frequently been appealed to by American statesmen, as a rule to be inflexibly adhered to whenever any European Power has threatened or attempted to extersd ita dominions upon the American Continent — North, South or Central America. This doctrine does not contemplate any interference on the part of the United States with the existing rights or Colonial possessions of any European Power, but was a protest against the extension of their power and policy in the future. — Pilot.