THE QUEEN’S MONEY.

Gisborne Times, Volume V, Issue 47, 25 February 1901, Page 4

THE QUEEN’S MONEY.

HER PRIVATE EORTUNE. The disposal of the Queen’s private fortune is a matter of interest j ust now. Unfortunately few people are ever likely to know how much money Queen Victoria died possessed of, or to whom and in what proportions she left it. “ Whatever the Queen elects to do with her property and money it will be right,” says one in authority. “ But no one beyond the circle of her family and legal advisers will ever know the real contents of her will, for the wills of those who are Royal are never proved.” The Queen’s annual allowance as Sovereign was £385,000, made up as follows : —£60,000 for her Privy Purse; £172,500 for household expenses; £131,260 for salaries and retiring allowances; and £13,290 for Royal bounties, alms and special service ; leaving £BO4O unappropiated. The story of the origin of by far the greater portion of Queen Victoria’s wealth is much more romantic, and is related by O. A. Pearson’s Ltd. ‘ Private Life of the Queen ” :—“ On the 30th August, 1852, there died a penurious old gentleman of 72. John Camden Nield was the son of a goldsmith who had executed work for George 111., and kept a shop in St. James’s-street, London. The old jeweller was in his way a great philanthropist, and emulated Howard in his attempt to ameliorate the condition of those poor wretches -who languished in his Majesty’s prisons. He sent his son to Trinity College, Cambridge, and the bar, and at his death left him £250,000. This great sum was afterwards bequeathed to the Queen.

If to-day the Maori is loyal to our King and friendly to our people, and comes no longer with fire and steel upon our outlying settlements; if Peace broods over our province and Plenty grows apace beneath its.fostering wings; if to our furthest confines the weakest may walk unarmed and unafraid, and the little child play unchallenged by the grave of the unforgotten dead-; we who remember thank therefor the Imperial strength which makes our present festival. British soldiery come to greet us in Peace, who before came to make Peace possible. They come to a thriving city, the mart of mine and farm, who before came to a struggling settlement, that clung stubbornly to a hostile land. They come,' in our kinsmen’s name, to show us that the sword-play of our lads in distant Africa was worthy of their breeding, who ..before came to guard the homes in which those lads were born. For this, we welcome them with all our heart, and welcome their dusky comrades because they have fought side by side with our own kinsmen in Britain’s Imperial battles.— N.Z. Herald.

It is stated on expert authority that many portions of the Trans-Siberian Railway lines will shortly have to be relaid and partly rebuilt. The haste with which some sections of the road were constructed is only to a certain'degree accountable for tliis necessity. The wholesale and rampant system of speculation which obtained among many of the contractors for the supply of first-class building material, and the notorious scamping of the work on some sections are chiefly responsible.