OUR MELBOURNE LETTER.

Evening Star, Issue 4022, 17 January 1876, Page 2

OUR MELBOURNE LETTER.

. January 10. Hobday-making has absorbed the Melboornitea almost ever since my last. This year holiday making; has been to a large extent synonymous with wet feet, soaked clothing, and spoiled hats. The steamer exclusions down the Bay were, as usual, much advertised in advance and much revil-d in retrospect. The great Int rcolonial Ciicket match—victoria v. N. S/ Wales—was an absurdity. Our men could not stand against N. S. Wales’s bowling, and were beaten in one innings. The most interesting thing in connection with it was a newspaper correspondence that ensued, wherein one writer set out to show that the superior bowling of the Sydney men was not merely due to physical causes, but had an intellectual factor in it, and invented the ghastly phrase, “brain-bowl-ing ” to denominate this new discovery. On the other side, ic is contended that a bowler, like a poet nascitur non fit, and authorities were quoted in support of the dictum. Among others, that of old Lilloy was brought forward in an t a cdote—well told—of a certain supper, that reminded one almost of the “Noctes.” Expe rienoe in Melbourne certainly seems to favor the latter view. Allan, acknowledged by Grace to be one of the best, if not the very best bowleis in the world, never practises. Except at a match, nobody ever sees him bowl, and in the othericlubs the best bowlers are mostly men who bowled well the first time they touched the ball, and have not learned much, if anything, from art. The betting nuisance reared its head at this Intercolonial match. An attempt was made to induce the Sydney men to lose the game*by the hint that they could thus ensure LSOO “ to a friend.” “I play thejgame tor New •tr'outh Wales’’was the instant reply, and the next ball decided the matter. On one account it is almost £a matter of rejoicing that it happened so. Had the event been otherwise, the fact of the offer having been been made would have tarnished, not only the lustre of the triumph, but the‘purity of the field at large. The death of a hospital patient operated on for stiff hip-joint led to unexpected results. Your readers are already aware that Mr Fisher, a wrote to one of the papers a letter that implicated veiy seriously the skill or oarfulm ss of Dr Ltweliin, one of the medical officers at the institution. The evidence at the inquest, however, completely negatived every material assertion that told against Dr Lewelliu ; and as it was universally agreed that no surgeon ought to be held responsible for non-success in an operation where reasonable care and skill were used by him, Mr Beamy was held guiltless thus far. His neglect to call a consultation of the honorary officers was of course severely commented on. So the living are congratulated all round, and nobody is to blame. But poor Barry is dead. However, that very fact precludes hj s raising his voice—which might, by its complainings rather, disturb the general harmony', i'he adverse comments on his case brought out ] however some letters from other patients of Mr Barney's in similar oases, and they did not bear testimony' to hU great skill. Still more serious was the tacit inference from another case—then about a mouth old—where an operation for calculus had terminated fatally under the same operator’s cue. 'lhe borly was exhumed and an inquest held, when it was proved, and oenial was not attempted, that the 0.-iginal incision, of very moderate siz?,' had been enlarged by the tearing out of an immense stone from the viscus, to which it was adherent. Several witnesses described the operation as “levering it out,” and the extracted calculus (which was on view for a day' or two at a scientific publisher’s) bore testimony to ihe exertions required to extract it. However, it is satisfactory (?) to learn that here, again, no person was iu fault, although, on th o;;c baud, it was alleged that the operator ought to have crushed the stone, and,~dti the other, that the Hospital did not possess a iithottite powatful enough to do go. The latte*

allegation, however, seems to be sufficiently met by one of the staff, who deposed to having crushed a piece of road metal with the identical instrument rejected by Mr Heaney as' inefficient, Is ot results : another dead man to be buried, and a fine unbroken specimen for the surgeon s museum of trophies of his practice. It seems like a rather severe satire to read, after this, the letterpress ot one of the new Christmas books by a well-known theatrical writer, wherein a certain “Dr Goodley” is bespattered with praise and puffery to an extent that could not have been surpassed if it had been paid for. I leave your readers to contrive some horrible process of wordtorture - worthy of the worst pantomime scribbler that over wrote—by which to connect the actual prnctitioner’s name with the tale doctor’s, if there be any doubt about the allusion the diamonds and oth -r traits of person, &c.« will dispel Jly the way the illustrations to that ephemeral publication are as Rood as the remainder is the reverse. On dU that they were the skeleton of the book—to fill up the “ soft parts” being the penman’s office.

A neat little discussion is just now going on about hereditary crime. “K. G. T.” is a signature that serves rather to reveal than to conceal the personal identity of one of the pleasantest, most kind-hearted gentlemen in Melbourne society, but under those initials I e advocates Draconian severity, and i altogether as unlike his actual self as chalk is to cheese. Everlasting imprisonment is the very least he would inflict on habitual criminals, and that, not for retormatory nor even for punitive purposes, but merely in order to prevent their having any children. By this plan, he assures us that in two or three generations we shall have eliminated the criminal taint from our race; and I suppose imagines that millenial bliss would inevitably overtake us. On the other hand, the ‘Argus’ writes leaders declaiming against such plans as cruel, and arguing, for education in order to reclaim the delinquents. As a matter of argument, of course “ H. G. T.” has infinitely the best;of it. As a matter of sentiment and coincidence with public opinion, his opponent ia.equally, of course, the stro.ige-. As matter of fact and practice, I am quite sure that wr Duncan, our InspectorGeneral of Penal Establishments, or any visiting justice with eyes in his head and a trifling knowledge of human nature, would very soon demolish the pair of them. Whilst we are luxuriating in weather more suitable to August than to January (we had fires in an evening last week!), the central portions of the Continent are very differently treated.' In that region there has been a drought for eighteen months; the ground is as bare as a macadamised road{; travellers have to carry horse feed with them, and how the people get water to drink I really cannot imagine. Yet we hear of rivers that have to be swum across. To ryes so long accustomed to those sc?nes the neighborhood of Melbourne must seem a very paradise. Our green is of the bright! Sb, and the clover as sweet as anything at Home. . Our G. Bowen—ls on his way back. The last San Francisco mail landed him at Sydney, and I shall probably soon have to chronicle his arrival here. A month before that the same route brought us a most interesting virit >r—not at all like Sir G. Bowen, however. This was no less a person than Democracy herself! come all the way from America—and if I remember aright, from the eastern side of it too. Democracy is personified by a rag doll of the ugliest possible appearance, in height about eighteen inches, and wearing as sole apparel a hempen cravat whereby she has evidently been “lynched” before setting out on her travels. .Vhe bears a label setting forth her pedigree as descendant ot some “Governor Kellogg” or “Keiy,”or other Yankee patronymic of some petty -tato nobody, and she appears to have teen sent into banishment on account of her evil nature. By one railway and another she was sent ever westward till she reached San Francisco, whence she was shipped witha parting sentenceof hearty and well-deserved contempt to Sydney. But Sydney would none of her, and sect her to Melbourne—perhaps wish a view to continuation of her westward journey—via Suez to England—and thence perhaps—who knows? —to her birthplace. But it was not so to be. Fate amuses herself with a joke sometimes, and decreed that the numerous mail label-, dangling' like Bearejisod supernumerary wooden limbs from the doll’s neck and arms and legs, should not at present b* increased in number. What strange instruments does she use to joke withal! In the Post Office there happens to bo a grave, sed ite, middle-aged gentleman, icsponsible, indefatigable, indispensable, the terror of the youngsters, the del ght of the official heart. For his instruo.tions in regard to her “ Democracy ” was 'Produced, and a sohflnn minute ivas by him then and there penned and attached to her unhappy bosom ; audit said that as there seemed to be no good reason for paying the postage upon her she had better remain where she is ‘ until inquired for by the persons interested ” in her! Alas for Democracy I Doomed to in “ durance vile,” in a gloomy chamber of the Melbourne Post Office, because she ia not worth paying postaeeonto getrid of her instead of flying forth round the wide world, & 0 (For the remainder of this sentence vide any Fourth of July “Oration.”) It i B a pity that a good joke should bo spoilt for such a dull offiaal reason, but it seems symbolical. It is fitting that Victoria, whose love for democracy has saddled her with protection and the other rags and remnants cast off by all the rest of the earth, should have to keep her dardoll because sliu CRtiuot tJio expeuso of getting rid of her.

An old colonist, who has made a name in the literary world, has lately returned to settle amongst us. Mr James Bon wick, whose works on “The Daily Life of the Tasmanians ” and similar ethnological sul jeots have taken a good place in the literature of that branch of science has resumed his old profession- the scholastic! Ler contra, Melbourne is to lose one of her most cultured ministers, the Rev. W. R, Fleicber, M.A.. who has accepted a call Jt o Stowe Memorial Church, Adelaide. Mr Fletcher is a man of considerable talent, but neither that nor his great attainments appear to have appelated here. At Stowe Church he will have a higher position than here, though Richmond (his present charge) is one of tne most numerous independent congregations in Victoiia.

Uao by one our old colonists, disappear. A few wests ago Mr O. Williamson died at his station—de Cameron. Old Victorians will remember Mr W illiamson in business in Collins street, at the establishment which he sold«to Messrs Alston and Brown. Mis age was seventy-five. On Friday hat Mr Hogarth (of Connell, Hogarth, and Co.) succumbed to an apoplectic attack, which first seized him a month ago. Few men were more Widely known or better liked than Mr Hogarth, and the loss of bis genial smile, hearty manner, and ui flagging spirits will be felt even by those who merely met him in busineis—the more so because of his untimely removal at only forty, five years of age. J Political affairs there are none. But the material for a very exciting one is all wady and only waits the assembling of the House to-morrow to break out into a conflagration. Water kmdies ibis fire. The new main being completed, the Public Works Department oeeiued it a fitting rime to issue new regulations, Ihe petty tyranny of these rules is beyond either belief or endurance. This is forbidden and that is forbidden, and half-a-cioz.-u other thingi are peremptorily commanded till the Yan Yean is as dangerous to touch as a suit iu equity and its regulations are as com* plex. Fines and punishments, and never, ending cut-off of water are the sanctions behind all those impudent impositions. The ‘- rgus’ has got up a ‘ howl” against them, but not on the ground on which they are really most obnoxious, which is the intolerable interference with the personal liberty that wo all lovo and the subjection of our private houses and doma.lio affairs to a police surveillance as offensive as that of any continental country. I should not be surprised if the Government suffer politically more from Yan Yean than from the “ stone wall,” A much pleasanter thing do contemplate is the working of the ; tate School Exhibit one scheme. These exhibitions are worth 185 afear, are eight in number, and are open to all i'Upils in St«te schools '1 ho winners must study »t one of fire first-oW .-ch • >)« named oy .bo Department, must uia ricu ate, and, at the ad of their fourth, pass the first B. A. examination, • The exhibition! are tenable fot six

{rears. > Thirty-eight w»nt up; ten from Geeong, nine from Melbourne and its suburbs, six ' from Ballarat, five from Sandhurst, and eight fiom country districts. Three from one school at Geelong, three from one school at Sandhurst, one Melbourne boy, and one Ballarat boy succeeded.