VICTORIA.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1579, 12 March 1879, Page 4

VICTORIA.

[fbom ottb own coebespondent.] Mklboubnk, February 28. On Saturday last Sir George Bowen, cxGovernor of the colony, sailed from Williams- | town in the mail steamer. There was nothing to signalise his departure in any marked way, A considerable number of the associated trades promenaded the city in his honor, with banners and music, a few hundreds of his political allies saw him on board ship, and a few dozen accompanied him three or four miles down the bay in a (free) steamer. The demonstration in honor of Lady Bowen was a more genuine and spontaneous affair. She was presented with a beautiful tiara of diamonds as a souvenir of the Lictorian episode iu her life, and a host of lady friends shed real tears at parting from her. She will be long held in affectionate remembrance by all classes in our community. Yesterday our new Governor, the Marquis of Normanby, arrive! and assumed office, Never was there a gubernatorial change more happily timed —though of course it would have been better for us if it had happened some years earlier. When, at eight p.m, yesterday, a salvo of groat guns announced that the new Governor had been sworn in, a great sigh of relief escaped the lips of all reasonable and law-abiding citizens, “ Now,” they said to themselves, and to each other, “wo shall see what just, enlightened, and constitutional rule really means.” And truly there was good ground for both the felicitation and the expectation. The helm of our State ship, which had escaped the feeble and nerveless grasp of an inane time-server, had been seized by a man of purpose and strength of will: and who can set a limit to the advantages that will ensue ? It is almost needless to say that the noble Marquis was well received. Members of the Ministry and their party met him outside the the Heads in the steamer Victoria. The Harbor Trust, and a numerous party of invited guests, representing the Conservative sootier, met him in the steamer Warhawk. The V.Y, Club met him in a numerous fleet of elegant pleasure boats. The general public were all ajog to give him welcome. _ Since I last wrote events have transpired hero that give peculiar significance and value to the advent of a new Governor, and he a man of proved capacity. Bud as things wore with us, politically, when Mr Berry was to the fore, they have been infinitely worse since. The absent Chief Secretary always paid sums outward respect to the dictates of propriety and decency, if not much. His deputy pays no regard to either. Sir Bryan O’Loghlin, Attorney-General and Acting Chief Secretary, is no politician. Ho never had any other qualification for either membership or office save his title, which is a thing indescribably dear to your true democrat ; and when his sudden inheritance of this same title caused him to bo called to power, it did him a desperately ill turn, for ho has done nothing but blunder ever since. Since Mr Berry’s departure ho has every day turned worse and as is the nature of evil doers when unrestrained, worse, until he has at length reached a point beyond which ho cannot possibly further descend. Smarting under the severe but entirely truthful and fully justified censures of the “ Argus,” he has adopted the extraordinary course of denouncing that journal officially in the Government “ Gazette” of 20th inst. Iu consequence of its (the “Argus”) “fabrication and publication of false news concerning the proceedings of the Cabinet, the public is cautioned against giving any. credence to its intelligence for the future ; and further, the ‘ Argus’ has been refused official information by the AttorneyGeneral, because it has for several months unpatriotically attempted to depreciate the financial credit of the colony." This is the precious pronnnciamvnto in brief. Need I say that it has raised a howl of derision from one end of the colony to the other ? Half the Ministerial journals cry shame upon it. Sir Bryan’s colleagues are understood to have telegraphed to Mr Berry to come back at once, and let the “ mission ” slide, else there will be nothing left for him to come back to The proclamation is childish and absurd in the highest degree. With the command of groat resources, and a numerous staff of skilled and enterprising reporters, the “Argus” can, of course, got whatever news it requires, notwithstanding all that the Ministry can do. But that is not all, nor the worst. The proclamation is impudently mendacious. The “ Argus ” has never knowingly published false news, and when it has done so in mistake —as every newspaper will do some times —it has always hastened to correct its errors when they were pointed out, while, in marked contrast to its conduct in this respect, the Ministerial papers have inserted misleading statements and suppressed facts deliberately and persistently. As to the “ Argus” writing down the credit of the colony, what nonsense ! Why its proprietors have more at stake, financially, than the whole Ministry and half their supporters. What it has done is to point out that nearly every act of the Berry Ministry has tended to the disintegration of society and the insecurity of property, and unhappily for us, the Opposition press has nob only had to point out that such was the inevitable tendency of the Ministry’s action, but also that a great depreciation in the value of property had already occurred, that trade was dull and employment scarce, and that capital was rapidly removing itself to other countries where the rights and claims of property were still held in some respect. But what do Messrs Berry and Co. care about tbe rights of property ? Why, he (Mr B.) has publicly declared that his colleagues are all paupers, and he thanked G od for it, which to some people may seem a somewhat extravagant exercise of the noble virtue of gratitude. I am not sure that he put the matter quite so tersely as I have done; but what he meant was quite plain, viz., that he could depend upon hia colleagues to stand by him to the last, since, if out of office, they would also be out of harness and out of bread.

Another outrage just perpetrated by the Government is the disfranchisement of South Bourke. That electorate had always been a stronghold of the Berry party, and when lately there came to be a vacancy in its representation, it was all important to the Government that it should be carried in its interests. The result was surprising to most people, but alarming to Ministers, The opposition candidate polled more votes than any other candidate has done for years, and would no doubt have been elected but for a gross misuse of power on the part of the Attorney-General. At the polling place the ballot-papers ran out early in the day, while there were a good number of electors in attendance to record their votes, and many more expected. Under the circumstances the deputy-returning-offioer adjourned the election till a future day ; but when it was found that the Government nominee was only fifty-one votes ahead, it was clearly seen that if the votinginthedelayeddivisiontook place (the opposition candidate’s chief stronghold) that small majority would certainly bo effaced. Consequently the adjourned polling was forbidden. Another remedy for the misfeasance was at hand. The returuing-officer’s duty was to report to the Speaker that the election was incomplete, and a new one would have been ordered. He was instructed to make no such report. Thus another Ministerial supporter has been foisted upon the Assembly by the Government, and an important district disfranchised by a set of men whose only claim upon the people’s confidence is that they are entirely devoted to the people’s cause, which it is their dearest wish to champion and defend against the base machinations of a tyrannical aristocracy. Oh liberty! what things are done in thy dear name. The foundation stone of our grand new Exhibition was laid on the appointed day with all the usual ceremonial observances. Its walls are now visible above ground. The president of the Commission gave a sumptuous banquet in celebration of the occasion, when there was provided in abundance the best food, the best wine, and the best music (instrumental and vocal) that money could buy The concert was introduced to kill the speech making, and judiciously, for it was Sir Geo.

Bowen’s last public appearance, and while the greater part of the guests would not have shown him any disrespect on such an occasion, still they were not in a humor to hoar patiently any adulation of him, whether by himself or others. Hence the songs and duets. The giver of the feast, the Hon. Mr Clarkr, is a prominent and useful colonist. He is spending with a free hand the vast fortiv e wbicb his father built up with sedulous care, but spending it wisely. Ho indulges in a liberal hospitality, freely encourages art and sport, rebuilds his tenants’ houses and offices, pays a lecturer to teach them how to better their modes of husbandry, end in a hundred trys to do good with his vast means. IXis case is the more notable, that we have several other wealthy men among us who could do nearly as much and yet do nothing. Probably Mr Clarke’s exertions on behalf of the Exhibition will bo rewarded with a title, if he cares for such a thing. The country is etill in the possession of the Kelly gang. It would seem us if the arm of the law was paralysed. It is a miserable business altogether. Already one lot of ruffians, encouraged by the immunity which the Kellya have so long enjoyed, have taken to the road, but after committing only one or two outrages, it was captured by the N.B.W. police. The wonder is that they (the Kellys) have not found more imitators. There are thousands of untaught or ill-taught youths in our country districts to whom hard work is intolerably irksome, and who are under but little moral restraint. When they see that by making a bold dash at some lonely bank they might secure as much money in an hour as they could earn by fencing and cattle mustering in five years, great is the temptation to which they are subjected, and particularly when it is made plain to them that punishment does not follow on the heels of crime, or if it does, that it is at a very long distance behind. The great difficulty is that in the present state of the law the police have not the power to deal effectively with supposed aiders and abetters of the robbers. The so-called “sympathisers” have had to bo discharged. Now it is urged that Parliament should be called to repeal the Habeas Corpus Act so far as the affected districts are concerned, but in the absence of the Chief Secretary there is but little chance that anything will be done.