DE OMNIBUS REBUS.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 290, 17 May 1875, Page 4

DE OMNIBUS REBUS.

The first planetary discovery of the present year was made on the 13th January, by M Paul Henry, at Paris. It will reckon as,No. 141 of the small planets. Information has been received by Mr Otto Berliner, of the private‘inquiry office, Elizabeth street (says the Argus ) regarding the proceedings of two persons who have been swindling merchants in New South Wales; South Australia, Queensland, and New Zealand. The last place they operated in was Dunedin, and it is thought that they may pay a visit to Melbourne. Their system is stated to be to open an account at a Bank by paying in £SOO or £6OO, and working upon the credit thus gained to obtain goods to the value' of several thousand pounds, for which payment is chiefly given in bills. The goods are profitably disposed of, and when the bills become due, the two partners are not to be found.

The Russians are in a very bad temper with England just now. Their semi-official journals say that the English dislike to the plans of the Brussels Conference for limiting the horrors of war—that is, for punishing peoples for rising to resist an invader—is mere “hypocrisy,” and that its motive is the desire to keep up the present practices of maritime warfare. As France and all the minor States agree with us, and most of the latter have no fleets, the charge is a mere explosion of bitter feeling, as is also the charge that we have sent agents to sell rifles to the Turcomans on the Attrek. British rifles may be there, for what we know, for the Britishjrifle goes everywhere, to St Petersburg included, but Lord Northbrook is certainly hot expending either British money or British officers in any such work. It is difficult to imagine that the journals which circulate such charges believe them, or that they are printed for any purpose except to excite a prejudice against Great Britain. If so, the effort would seem superfluous. All men on the Continent believe that England is utterly selfish; and that belief being rooted, there is no need of proving the charge in detail. The Home Secretary has introduced his long-promised Bill for “ improving the dwellings of the working classes in large towns,” in a very dry but earnest and sensible speech. We have described his measure, which is really one for allowing the municipalities in the great towns and the Metropolitan Board in London to pull down houses in diseased districts and replace them by Peabody buildings elsewhere, but may add here that it was well received by the philanthropists in the House, that it is considered only too moderate, and that in the great towns the first objection raised is as to its probable cost. Mr Cross expressly repudiated State grants for rehousing the people. It was not the duty of the State to find them good houses any more than good food. All it can do is to remove obstacles, and this he has striven to do by enabling Municipal Councils in great cities,, with the consent of the Home Office, to acquire and to sell a Parliamentary title to the condemned districts. That power will limit expenditure, but we do not see that the dread of State interference need prevent the House from sanctioning cheap loans to the municipalities engaged in the work, if such loans will make them more ready to attempt it. The local, ratepayers will not be liberal till they are convinced that the clearances are not costly, and not very liberal then. In London, no doubt, the Metropolitan Board is very strong, but London does not present the worst cases in England. The chief commissioner of the Railway Commission, Sir Frederick Peel, has delivered a most important judgment. The Midland Railway is bound, by agreements with many Companies, and especially with the Great Western, not to lower its fares between places where competition exists without the consent of its rivals. It has nevertheless lowered first class fares from 2d to a mile, and the Great Western has tried the question. The Commission has decided that such agreements being in restriction of competition must be construed strictly, that general reductionscanuotbe held to be reductions between competing stations, and that the agreements do not bind except as to stations where there is actual competition, Thus, although (be JUidlf nd could not charge £d

mile from London to Birmingham, because the Great Western has stations at those places, it could charge it from Kentish Town to Birmingham, and could also charge it over its whole system. The application to restrain the Midland must, therefore be dismissed. The effect of this judgment is, that agreements between railway companies to prevent low fares are worthless, unless they cover the entire extent of the territory served by those who agree, and that any railway with the courage to adopt low fares can compel its rivals to imitate its example. That is good for the public, but we had rather the benefit had been obtained without a decision, which, though of course correct, might under some circumstances involve a legal sanction to breach of faith.