INTERCOLONIAL

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXI, Issue 46, 12 November 1903, Page 31

INTERCOLONIAL

The Sydney l Freeman's. Journal ' states that his Eminence Cardinal Moran will reach Sydney early in ' December. The death of Sister Mary Aloysius Bourke, sister of the Right Rev. Mgr. Bourke, of Perth, Western Australia, is announced from the Convent of Mercy, Kansas. The Right Rev. Dr. Gallagher, Bishop of Goulburn, who was in Rome about the end of September, is expected in Australia early next month. In five years the number of fruit ships calling at Hobart has doubled in number and tonnage. Last year 19 called. This year 22 will come, and ship between 300,000 and 400,000 cases. Mr. Justice Real has been appointed Senior Puisne Judge of the Queensland Bench in succession to Mr. Justice Cooper, who has succeeded Sir Samuel Griffith as Chief Justice. Sister Mary Sc'holastica, daughter of Mr. Gerald Byrne, merchant, Dublin, expired at the Convent of Mercy, Fitzroy, on Friday, October 23. The deceased nun, who was in her 38th year, made her religious profession in 1894. Sister Scholastica has two brothers members of the Passionist Order, Rev. Father Pancras (Londjon) an£ Rev. Father Berchmanjs (Harold's Dross, Dublin) . 4 The ' Southern Cross ' says that the Rev. Father Joseph O'Malley, S.J., of Norwood, has devised a new system of teaching sight-singing. Father O'Malley, who is equally a master of music and mathematics, has been engaged in teaching children singing for over 30 years, and is the inventor of more than one device for simplifying the present complicated methods. The system illustrated on this occasion he has used in teaching the pupils of the Sisters of St. Joseph at the Beulah road school for the past six months, and it appears to have been very successful. It is an ingenious combination of the tonic sol fa system and the ordinary fixed method, and the inventor aims at teaching harmony at the same time. It is unwise (says the Melbourne correspondent of the ' Freeman's Journal ') to take importast news from unauthentic sources. An instance in point was the canard anent the erection of the towers and spires of St. Patrick's Cathedral. There is absolutely no truth. in the statement which has gone the rouhds of some half-dozen papers. The basis of the statement, no doubt, rested on the fact that his Grace the Archbishop has been left some allotments of land by the will of the late Monsignor O'Hea, which are not half so valuable as some people think. There are no funds available for completing the exterior of the Cathedral. There aro more pressing works for which money is required, not the least of which is the Central Catholic Hall, now in the course of erection. His Lordship Dr. O'Connor, Coadjutor-Bishop of Armidale, u;ives the following picture of the western plains :— ' We living on the highlands have no idea of the extent and bewilderment of these western plains. Just fancy the distance I have now travelled to attend to three or four outlying centres. I have driven 280 miles in a few days, through a vast expanse of black soil country that would and should grow anything if it had sufficient moisture. We have seen man making hay of the grass in various places, mowing machines being kept very hard at work. The herbage is fully a yard long, and neither cattle nor sheep to eat it down. We passed by one great shed ah here a few years ago they shore 170,000 sheep in a season, and this year they could only muster 2200. It is pretty much the same everywhere about these far-back parts. Settlers and squatters are on the verge of bankruptcy It is sad indeed to hear of t>heir tales of loss and ruin. They are truly a brave people to fight against such odds, for many of them have been compelled to make a fresh start in life. After travelling from Bulyeroi to a place near Wee Waa— 4o miles— from 10 o'clock to 3, we boarded a train There was no carriage, break-van, or empty truck of any kind, and to the sides of a water-wagtron we were compelled to cling for 10 miles. It was a " grand " finish to our long; trip, and we were very glad when it came to an end.'