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New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4373, 26 March 1875, Page 2

The arrangements which had been made for the next session of the Supreme Court, have been necessarily altered, owing, we regret to say, to serious illness in the family of Mr. Justice Williams. It was, we believe, originally proposed that Judge Williams, to whom the Dunedin district is assigned, should take the April session at Auckland ; that Judge Gillies should take. the Cook Strait circuit during that month ; and that Mr. Preudergast, who will succeed Chief-Justice Sir G. A. Arney, at the end of this month, should take' the April session at Dunedin. Judge Johnston would have proceeded to his own district, Christchurch, at the end of this month. It was found impossible that Judge Williams .could go so far as Auckland, owing to Mrs. Willianis’s' serious illness, and it was then arranged that he should take the Wellington and Wanganui session ; but Judge Johnston has now undertaken to remain at Wellington for the Cook-Strait April assizes;-so as to relieve Judge Williams of the necessity of leaving home at the present .moment. The latter Judge will, therefore, take the Christchurch April session ;' Judge Gillies will take Auckland, Taranaki, and Nelson; and the ChiefJustice will take Dunedin, as before arranged.

Qua attention has been directed to a now not uncommon practice adopted by our evening contemporary, of reporting the proceedings of the City Council’s committees, before the reports are brought up. This is clearly irregular, and is in the nature of a breach of faith unless by express sanction ot the members present. Such sanction, we suspect, has not been given, as it would be a slight upon the Council itself. No reporteris present at committee meetings, wherefore the information, such as it is, must fie supplied by one- of the members. This is scarcely fair to his colleagues, who Cud their reports.anticipated, at least in part, by previous newspaper publication. Of course, the desire of our contemporary to furnish the earliest information on civic affairs to tho public is highly commendable ; but there is a limit even to enterprise of this kind, and we think it stops short of violating the confidence and secrecy of a committee-room.

We have received a long letter from a correspondent, in vindication of Captain Campbell, of the ship Dallam Tower, which we regret we cannot find space for. Our correspondent is justly indignant at the spirit displayed in the letter of the man Lewis, which we published along with Captain Campbell’s defence ; but wo think that he attaches far too much importance to it. Whatever may have been the man’s hostility to'the captain of his ship, he concealed it till his arrival in port. Nothing could well be meaner or more contemptible than the spirit displayed in that letter, but it had nothing whatever to do with the acts of insubordination on board. The conflict between Captain Campbell and Ilia crew arose from other causes entirely. Now, bur opinion was based upon what transpired in court, on evidence led by Captain Campbell himself, and wo have not modified that opinion simply because that gentleman has broadly imputed perjury to one of the men. We have no doubt there were faults on both sides. Our correspondent thinks . Captain Campbell has entirely exonerated himself from blame, and points to the address from some of tho passengers oh arrival, in support of thht opinion. We published that address most willingly, and as far as it goes it is certainly favorable to the captain ; but again, we say it, has no bearing upon the dispute between Captain Campbell and his crew. The following concluding paragraph from the letter sums up our correspondent's arguments :—“ I repeat, Sir, that, looking at Captain Campbell’s communication as a whole, I cannot but think that he lias unjustly suffered condemnation; and I look anxiously for some expression of opinion from,you upon the defence—now for the first time;made public—of the man whom your judgment has so seriously compromised. The 1 despotic power ’ which the captain most righteously claimed upon his own quarter-deck (which claim the man Lewis, relying upon the conventional interpretation of the word ‘despotic,’ adduces as an example of ‘tyranny’), cannot but bp seriously interfered with by an expression of’.opinion adverse to the competency of the commander ; it is our duty to see that so dangerous an interference is not caused by a censure plassed without the most thorough and complete justification."

Wb find the following in the latest number of the Australasian. It will he observed how trifling a cause may lead to serious commercial inconvenience;—“A curious explanation is now given of the raid made by a New Zealand bank on the Victorian money - /market. Mr. D. A. Murdoch, the inspector of the Bank of New Zealand, writes to explain the motives by which his bank was induced to advance the rates of interest offered by its Melbourne branch for deposits. It is not, As r ' charitably disposed people thought, that the area for the application of capital is expanding in New Zealand, that new opportunities are offering for the profitable "employment of money, and that under these circumstances it’was desired to hold out such inducements,- as would allure Victorian deposits in that direction. Nothing of the kind. The sapient reason given by Mr. Murdoch has nothing whatever to do with business or finance. The motives which lie at the bottom of the action taken are not more elevated than those which lead two quarrelsome Billingsgate fishfags to tear each other’s reputation

to pieces, regardless of the havoc their own sustains in the contest. It seems that some Melbourne bank has a branch in New Zealand, and has lately raised the rates of interest on deposits. Hereupon the astute management of the Bank of New Zealand rushes into the Victorian money market, resolved that it will smite the aggressive bank by bidding for its business at its own headquarters, and thereupon announces the increased rates that have lately puzzled finan-, ciers and fluttered the money institutions of Melbourne. Of all the reasons imagined, none so absurd or childialj. as this was contemplated for a moment; and the case will stand as a lesson that, when a solemn banking institution suddenly strikes out some new and startling policy, it may be worth inquiring, before looking for more recondite and profound causes, whether it may not be brought about by a simple fit of biliousness on the part of its managing director.”