NEW SOUTH WALES.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1735, 11 September 1879, Page 3

NEW SOUTH WALES.

[I\EOM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.] SYDNEY, August 29. It is always possible to turn one's blessings into bitterness, and the bounties of nature are converted in this colony into provocations to disturbance. Possessing the moßt copious coal measures at present known to exist on the south side of the equator—jgnorancei selfishness, and greed Btep in and make these benefits dangerous to the peace of the community. Your readers have heard of the " Yond " scheme, which has been adopted by the majority of the working miners at Newcastle. The purport of this scheme is to maintain the price of coal at an artificial height by limiting the output. By the miners' unions a regular Bcale was drawn up, fixing the quantity of coal which each mine should be entitled to sell. The limitations had the • direot influence intended of enabling working miners to earn full wages with light work, or at least short working time. But ore or two •colliery proprietors stoutly resisted the dictation of the Unions, and managed to secure the adhesion of their own hands. Chief among these was the Lambton Mine proprietary, who have all along taken high and firm ground, and have managed to persuade their hands to keep clear of the vend. The first consequence of this has been •that the Lambton colliery, working full time, has got 40,000 tons ahead of the limits formally imposed upon it by the managers of the vend. As neither proprietors nor men paid the least attention to the restrictions sought to be imposed upon them, a secondary consequence has been an ever growing ill-feeling and hostility towards them on the part of the associated miners of the other collieries. Agitation of that kind is never stationary. It is either absorbed by some counter-irrita-tion, or it comes to a head and breaks out. In the present instance the ill-feeling came to a bead and broke out. On the 17th instant a swarm of miners " rolled up" and marched anon the old Lambton mines, with the avowed purpose of taking possession of the works and preventing further production. Their numbers were upwards or 1500, and many of them carried firearms, either concealed upon their persons, or openly. Their advent bad been expected, and the men were

not at work, so tht»t any collsion was averted for the time being. One active "anti-vender" of the name of Brown rode into Newcastle to give information of the affair, and on his return route was mot by a detachment of the aggressors, who commenced hooting, and proceeded to Btone him. Foolishly enough he produced a revolver, a popgun of a thing, and fired several shots, upon which the angry passions of his assailants '.brokej loose ; he was rushed, dragged off his horse, and badly knocked about. One or two other prominent " anti-venders " were sought, and had to seek safety by bolting in'.o the bush. There is no doubt that the roll-up had been foreseen, and that the O'd Lambton proprietors had received beforehand assurances that the Government would energetically protect their hands and maintain liberty of laboring. At any rate, on the same day as this happened at Lambton, and before the evening papers had published their rather exaggerated accounts of what had taken place, the barracks of the Permanent Artillery and the central PoHce station were all astir, the Bteamer Coonanbara was specially chartered, and all preparations for dispatching a powertul force to the scene were in full swing. By half-paßt seven in the evening the steamer was alongside the Australian Steam Navigation Company's wharf, getting up steam as rapidly as possible, and a detachment of fifty men from the Permanent Defence Corps in heavy marching order, tramped down to the vessel, and in a few minutes were making themselves oomfortable in the fore cabin. Shortly afterwards the Inspector-General of Police marched down a body of fifty armed constabulary, and steam being up, the vessel left the wharf and went down the harbor en route for Newcastle, the soldiers apparently in high spirits at the prospect of fighting somebody, even fellow colonists, as their voices singing in lusty chorus could be hoard until the vessel's lights disappeared towards the heads. During the trip the men had sixty rounds of ball cart ridge served out, and were apparently expected to eat them, for although in the bustle of preparation few of the constabulary had eaten an evening meal, no provisions of any kind had been put on board. Before daybreak the force landed at Newcastle, where a special train awaited them, and where they were reinforced by five-and-twenty additional soldiers who are stationed at the batteries there, and getting out at Lambton marched direct to the mine and took possession. No attempt at resistance was made, and the sudden and rapid appearance of so formidable a force evidently took the miners all aback, for from that moment all riotous proceedings were abandoned, and recourse had once more to negotiations and persuasions, with the object of inducing the " non-venders " working for the Lambton Colliery to come to some arrangement with the rest of the district. These, 1 negotiations have been proceeding up to the present time, and the present state of affairs is that the bulk of the military and constabulary hav leen withdrawn to Sydney again, that at a general meeting of miners the Lambton men allowed themselves to be persuaded to work only eight days per fortnight. They have requested their manager to consent and have met with a determined refusal. Failing to come to work, they have now been locked out, and the company has, it is under, stood, arranged to import handß from England, and has actually set to work to prepare dwellings for them. How this strong action will eventuate it is difficult to say. The new arrivals are more than likely when they do come to be "got at" by the local men, and to refuse to work. The company apparently rely upon having forcible protection from the Government, and upon the funds of the Miners' Unions becoming exhausted by the drain of having to support so many locked-out men as are now on their hands, whose numbers have been swelled by the refusal of recent lots of men from South Australia and elsewhere, especially brought up by other companies who have been resisting dictation, and who on arrival refused to place themselves in antagonism to the feeling of the district. The situation is ticklish. If the vend men deliberately determined to meet force with force, and could procure arms sufficient, their numbers would make them so formidable that the Government might flinch at the prospect of bringing on what would amount almost to civil war.

The agitation in connection with the education question still continues without abatement, and the metropolitan papers continue to give prominence to letters, lectures, sermons, and meetings bearing upon the topics. The " Herald " favors its readers with an average of a leader and a half daily upon the subject. Ably and temperately written as these articles are, to general readers they become somewhat tedious by reiteration. There is no room for anxiety. The preponderance of voting power is overwhelmingly against the denominational system, and as the tug of war will be at the polling booths, all this preliminary clatter is suggestive of tha corrobories which _ among savage people are the most important items in their disputes. The new Attorney-General, Mr Wisdom, has been duly re-elected after a feint of opposition by a friendly candidate who withdrew without creating any embarrassment. The address delivered by Mr Wisdom strengthens my surmise that the Government intend to avail themselves of the education ferment to maintain themselves in office. I think I mentioned in a previous letter that the challenge really proceeded from Sir Henry Parkes, although all the newspapers here have quite lost sight of the minatory speech made by that knight when opening a new school some months ago, when he stated plainly his intention of amending the law relating to education in a manner which would not be favorable to the denominational schools. Archbishop Vaughan's pastoral appears to me to have obviously been a rejoinder to this threat, although, of course, as a dignitary of a Church ruled by "infallibility," Dr. Vaughan has not condescended to notice so Bmall a matter, and has taken tremendously lofty ground on the unchangeable policy of the Roman Catholic Church, and it has been found entirely convenient to meet him on his own ground and accept the fiction that he is the aggressor. Mr Wisdom's speech affords an insight into the Ministerial change of position. The grand constitutional rumpus with the Upper House, and the tremendously important Land Bill which the Ministry retired into receßS flourishing as their motto for the ensuing session, and which they vowed they would stake their existence to fight out to the bitter end, are glided over with gingerly mention and astonishingly amiable expressions by Mr Wisdom. " Something like a collision" between tho two chambers had happened, he said, and he dared say that both had been somewhat in the wrong. He was willing to let bye-gones be bye-gones; and, with respect to ths wonderful Land Bill, he had no doubt that it, " or something like it," would be sent up to the Council next session, and he had hopes that the members of that body would, "to some extent," give up their own views. Thus, while tho Ministry brought the past session to a close, with their mouths flaring with " words of fire " on these very topics, we are given to understand that they will have so cooled down in the interim that when they next meet Parliament butter won't melt where the flames were. But, on the other hand all the vehemence has been shifted to the more convenient education question, and Mr Wisdom trumpetted out the Ministerial determination to tilt at Denominationaliem, and to make tho Bchoels " more national, secular, and public." In the present temper of the publio, nothing could be more judicious, if retention of office compriso the entire theory of good government. It is comforting, at any rate, to know that the Ministry have got a plan of keeping themselves in office, without provoking a deadlock for the purpose. The statements in connection with mission service at the Parramatta Benevolent Asylum, which I mentior.ed in my last, have formed the subject of some newspaper correspondence, in the course of which the allegations have been challenged. But the original complaint has not been essentially affected, and, so far as the correspondence goes, the accusations must be regarded as substantially made good. In fact, the asylum had been converted into a field for proselytising, and the operations had been conducted with a deplorable disregard of the comfort or feelings of the unfortunate inmates. The public exposure has probably sufficed to induce the offenders to moderate their high-handed operations. At any rate no fresh complaints have been made.

In addition to the election of Mr Wisdom, there have been two contests for seats in the Assembly. Mr Coombes has been elected for Bathurst on the education ticket, as was anticipated, and Mr Barton, a young barrister and graduate, has defeated Dr. Benwiok, an old medical man, for the honor of representing the University. Mr Danger had the grace to withdraw early, on the ground that he found nothing in Mr Barton's published address which so differed from bis own poli-

ticil convictions aB to require him to oppose a gentleman much more intimately connected with the University.

The preparations for the Exhibition are still extremely backward. Only the colonial courtß are arranging their exhibits as yet; in all other departments the packages were, up to yesterday, unopened. The commissioners at their last meeting admitted that thoy entertain no expectation that the machinery or art departments will be ready by the day of opening, and only " believe" that the main floor will be in proper order. The representatives of Brit : sh and foreign exhibitors of machinery at present in Sydney are holding a meeting to-day to arrange for a combined protest against the delays which have taken place in marking out the floor space for the machinery. Altogether, there is ample evidence that the day fixed for the opening was altogether premature. Despite all the bustle, and the fact that Sydney is unusually full of visitors, attracted by the near opening of the big show, business is far from good, and the number of unemployed is large. The Exhibition Commissioners have 700 names of applicants registered, and have notified that they will receive no more. Government apparently recognises that steps must be taken to anticipate and counteract the depression which is likely to commerce when the affair is over, and hayo called for tenders for quite an array of public works, including several of great magnitude. Tenders will be opened for the construction of sixty miles of railway, from Junee to Narrandera, on the 2nd proximo, and further tenders for seventy-five miles extension of the Great Northern line, from Uralla to Tenterfio'd, a town close to the Queensland border, will probably be called for before the end of the year. It is to be hoped that by the distribution of public moneys thus to be (fleeted, the course of business and prosperity may not suffer any very severe interruption. With respect to retail business in Sydney, the universal complaint is that every line is overdone, and that competition has become so crushing that profits have been squeezed down to almost imperceptible proportions. One of the largest establishments in the drapery and furnishing line, Farmer and Co., are selling professedly at cost price on the cash system, and come near enough to their professions to occasion a great deal of angry feeling among their rivals. There are now in the harbour war Bhips belonging respectively to France, Austria, and Germany—viz , the Bhin, the Heligoland, and the Bismarck, and the amount of saluting which has been going on has been something portentous. No volley however could have so shocked our oars in the prevailingly rampant condition of our Protestantism as the boom of the guns with which the Bhin saluted Archbishop Vaughan on 'that prelate paying a formal visit to the ship of the French Bepublic. The Courts are in full business, but there there have been no causes celeb res to trouble you with. An incident in an arson case is worth noting A fellow charged with arson, produced certain documents in proof that he had conveyed the tenement to another party before the fire, and had no inducement to commit the crime. His statements, although supported by the sworn testimony of the alleged transferee, were regarded with suspicion, and when the jury retired they took with them the sale note put in in evidence. Happening to examine it against the light, they discovered that the paper bore a water-mark date subsequent to the date of the transaction purported to be recorded on it. They promptly convicted the prisoner, and recommended that the quasi-transferee should be prosecuted for perjury. It has, however, since been pointed out in a letter to the " Herald " by a barrister that it was not safe to take the water-marked date as conclusive evidence of the time when the paper waß made, as manufacturers post-date their paper to suit the probable time when it will reach its market.

The sculling race for the Championship between Trickett and Laycock is just oyer, and I have barely time to mention it in this letter. Trickett won as he liked, after the first mile. This makes the seventh time that he and Laycock have tried conclusions, and the sixth that Trickett haß had the beßt of it. Laycock beat Trickett at the last Balmain Regatta, but the former had not trained with any thoroughness. Rush came down to see the race, and have another trial of his skill, and a match has been made up between him and Laycock for the sth pros.