LATEST AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2366, 1 November 1870, Page 2

LATEST AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

The Germans in Victoria send home LIBOO by this mail, and the French L4OO. It is expected that the German subscriptions will reach close upon L3OOO before they close. In Melbourne the police are making a raid on dummy hotels, and so far have succeeded, in closing a great number of them. To recent proceedings in the City Police Court, we owe a very graphic sketch of a gin palace interior in Bourke street. The bar was,' as we might have anticipated, “ all right,” and rejoiced in the inspiriting presence of two ministering angels. _ But the inside of this white sepulchre was indeed full of all uncleanness. There were no beds and no furniture in the sleeping rooms. Two dirty mattresses, on stretchers that were in every respect worthy of them, were retained, in compliment, we suppose, to the requirements of the act, and as symbolic of the accommodation which the licence was iutended to secure. There was no cooking or other household utensils in the place. The water was coining through the ceiling, and the paper was dropping off the walls. Bricks were filling out of their places, and the kitchen fireplace was past all hope of mending. The whole place, in fact, seemed to be delivered over to spiders and to dirt. The inspector declared that in IS years’ experience in the police he had never seen so filthy a place. It was a place in which he would not put a dog, much less a human being. Such, however, was not the view taken of its capabilities by its spirited proprietor. That gentlemen quits understood the requirements of that portion of the public for whom he had to catw. His customers did not want furniture, and did not mind dirt. Inadequate as the accommodation might bo in other respects, the wants of the habitues of the bar were carefully considered. A room was provide! under the significant appellation of the “ dead house ” The bricks, we are told, were falling down under the mantelpiece, and there was no furniture. The, place, too, was in a filthy condition. In tipi} agreeable apartment, at the time of the visit of the police, there was kept safely and securely under lock and key a valued friend of the establishment, whom the downright constable described as being “dead drank.’ The companion picture of this charming interior was described in nearly similar language. The principal difference seems to have been, that while the former was, we suppose, chiefly patronised by steady topers, the latter presented the more festive feat,urea of a “dancing salt,ou.” We do not know whether it was to economise space, or to heighten enjoyment by contrast, or from some ''conception of pleasure, but ' whatever

Ina y }^ a ve "been the cause, the fact remains that under the dancing saloon was a cellar —that this cellar was used for a very humble, though very important, purpose—and that its condition is described as having been “very shocking.”