New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TRUESDAY, JUNE l4, 1877.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5062, 14 June 1877, Page 2

New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TRUESDAY, JUNE 14, 1877.

The telegraph Hue from Adelaide to Port Darwin has been interrupted for a couple of days; but last night we received a message stating that communication had been restored, and as a result we this morning publish telegrams from Europe and Singapore, giving news to the 11th June. In connection with this subject, it may be mentioned that the work of receiving these and other telegrams has been much facilitated by the use of the special wire recently erected between the Telegraph Office, Wellington, and the editorial rooms of this journal. In the case of any message arriving we are at once notified, and, the length of the message being stated, we are enabled to arrange for its publication up to six a.m. In case of special messages from correspondents to the New Zealand Times, running to a considerable length, by using a recording instrument they can be taken off at the editor’s table, and, after supervision, passed direct to the composing room. The telegrams received by us at twenty minutes to i o’clock this morning are full of interest. The utterances of the Marquis of Salisbury and of Lord Derby are of course only non-committel in one sense, and in another show plainly that the British Government will not depart from the firm attitude they have happily assumed since hostilities between Russia and Turkey commenced. The fear of an Ultramontanist triumph in France will, it is to be hoped, prevent the happening of such, and so give no power to those with fancied "injuries to avenge. But it is as respects tho operations of the Turks and Russians that the telegrams give us most information. In Asia, the Turks who conquered their opponents at Batum have turned the Russians right wing of invasion, and have absolutely, in a sense, reversed the position, being themselves now invaders, and advancing along the coast line of the Trans-Cauoasaiau provinces, which, with their evident possession of Sukhum Kaleh, gives them command of one base of supplies to the Russian forces, as they will occupy the terminus of tho Tiflis railway on the Black Sea. Of course, the Russians have still got the Caspian Sea open on the other side of tho threatened provinces. In Europe the Russians have been repulsedintbo attempt to cross tho Danube at Nicopolis, and though we are told that they are massing opposite this place and Rnstclmk, the fact that their right wing has fallen back to Putinei, shows that tho passage of the Danube is not likely to bo accomplished. Both Russia and Turkey are insolvent. Of the two, the latter can best stand a forced loan, which she

evidently does not hesitate in levying. The definite announcement by the Russian press that the country and people will not he satisfied with an ignoble,, peace, shows the power behind the Tsar which we have noticed before, which Mr. McKenzie Wallace’s book fully discloses, and which” might in certain events destroy the autocracy that has so long ruled the Slav. As we remarked in a previous issue, Turkey has not got her hands so full but that she can meet and defeat the Montenegrins.

In another column appears a letter concerning the Corporation officials, from a correspondent signing himself “Horatio.” In a specious manner, but not altogether without an apparent show of wisdom, and with no little wit, “Horatio” endeavors to show that nothing should be done as regards the Corporation officials until after what may be called the general municipal elections in September next. Now, it is easy to show why “Horatio’s” ideas should not be adopted. In the first place, the present Councillors should not tshirk their responsibility, and relegate to others that which they ought to do themselves. In the second place, by postponing the question of reform of the municipal administration until after the elections, that question would become a sort of test one at those elections, involving no little exertion of side influence of what is known as “back stairs” exertion to prejudice one side or the other, and finally, showing that what the present Councillors were afraid to do they left possibly to others. There should be no mistake about the matter. Reform is needed, not in one or in two directions, but in every Municipal department, and this reform the City Council should carry out. Of course, through interested motives, one journal or another will confine its remarks to the supposed deficiencies of a particular official. The New Zealand Times has known none of these motives, but demands, what the public also demands, a thorough change.