AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume II, Issue 495, 29 November 1877, Page 2

AUSTRALIAN NEWS.

[per alhambra at the bluff.] Mklbourne, November 21

The question of payment of members is exciting considerable attention in political circles. The amount will be placed on the Estimates, and a crisis is then imminent. If the Council lays the Appropriation Bill aside (which they will do if payment of members is included), the Government will not then prorogue, but adjourn, a3 by that course t'.e payment of members will still continue, the present Act remaining in force until the end of the present session. Supply Bills will be sent up to the Council from time to time, which containing no objectionable item, will be passed. The Ministry have tho support of the Governor, and his Excellency's position in the matter has been strongly animadverted on. The Forts aid Armaments Bill, providing for the whole of Sir Wm. Jervoise's scheme, and a working expenditure of L 380,000, passed the Assembly in a few hours.

Sir Wm. Jervoisc visits New Zealand in the middle of December, if the Adelaide Parliament is up at that time. Tiie Council have furnished their reasons iu favor of their amendments in the Railways Bill in nearly the same shape as before.

The Government talk of closing the session by the end of the present month, but in that case a large number of Bills will have to be abandoned.

The Wolverine and Sapphire are both at present in harbor here. At the Presbyterian Assembly on Monday, great fault was found with the Governor for travelling from Hamilton in a special train on a Sunday. Dr. Cairns said that the Queen would not do so, and such an act in her representative was simply intolerable. When the steamer left Batavia, the repairing ship Edinburgh was still repairing the Batavia and Singapore cable. She would then proceed to the Port Darwin section.

Tlte Indian Famine Fund amounts to L 21,700, and the Hospital Sunday Fund to nearly L6OOO, being in excess of last year. At the Presbyterian Assembly last night, the Rev. D. Sydney, of New Zealand, gave an account of the state of the Presbyterian Church in that Colony. Mr. George Petty, a former owner of the Maribyrnong estate, died yestvrd :v. Wheat, scarce, and wanted at 5-*. 6d. to ss. 7d. ; oats, improving, New Zealand. 4s. 7d. to