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Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 26 April 1901, Page 3

The Council of Ballarat School of Mines lately received a group photo of 19 students now stationed in Westralia whoso united salaries exceed £17,000 per annum. According to an Australian exchange, the committee in charge of the decorations in connection with the Duke of York's visit to Melbourne is seriously considering whether it will paint the city pavement flags red, white, and blue ! It is the generrl opinion in the United States that the ship Subsidy Bill will not I pass. It entails a permanent national expenditure estimated at £9,500,000 a year,, and the abstract merits of the measure fall into insignificance in thi popular view besides persuasion that this sum would simply effect the enrichment of a few private firms at the public expense. The Tasmanian Minister of Railways, in accepting the resignation of Mr F. Back as general manager of the railways of that colony, wrote :—" The Hon. the Premier and my other colleagues unanimously join mo in expressing our high appreciation of the able and conscientious manner in which you have fulfilled the duties of a very responsible position, and of the valuable services which you have rendered to the colony during the past fifteen years, not only as manager of the State's principal business department, but frequently also a* our adviser on important matters affecting the prosperity of Tasmania. I have the honor, in conclusion, to convey to you an assurance of personal esteem from every member of the Government, and our hope that .your future may be as successful as your high merits deserve. The Daily News Berlin correspondent complains of the plague of a new toy, which has swamped the streets of the city. It is the " little mama," a small whistlo to put in the waistcoat pocket, and which imitates the whine of a small infant with ; a shriek of " mama, mama "in the middie of the whine. The toy is very popular, and in the most out-of-way streets, as well as the most frequented, the torturing cry is heard.

A curious order has just been issued by the British Admiralty. It appears that many sailors have been in the habit oi wearing steel stretchers in their caps, and that instances have been reported of these stretchers becoming strongly magnetised, and when worn close to the ship's compasses, deflecting the needle to a dangerous extent. The wearing of such stretchers is therefore forbidden in future.

It is alleged, says a Sydney journalthat the Japanese Government is about to make a stir in the position of its subjects in Australia. So far the Jap. authorities have limited the number of little brown men departing for Australia, but thera are indications that this limitation will not be long continued. Japan alleges that she has shown herself a foremost power, and is not prepared to submit to the degrading restrictions general'j imposed on Asiatics. Among the American memorials to our late Queen is to be a University scholarship to be entitled the Victorian Foundation." Its promoters are the members of the National Institute for the Higher Education of Women at Philadelphia, and its object, it is said, is to keep before the young women of the future the womanliness, domestic virtues, and progressive spirit exemplified in the life of Queen Victoria.