MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.

Waikato Argus, Volume III, Issue 221, 11 December 1897, Page 1 (Supplement)

MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.

A conference is about to take placa between the Commandant of the Forces (Colonel Peaton) and Majors Sommerville and Collins (Chairman and treasurer respectively of the New Zealand Rifla Association), in reference to the future management of the association's prizo meetings. Colonel Pentoa proposes to carry out the meetings on military lines, as is done in the case of the Bisley meetings, and if that is done the Government will assist the association in various directions.

Thus Sir Robert Stout in his address to the jury in the Mills libel cction :—The evidence of the Hon. T. Thompson was to the effect that he was a perfect child, who sat in his chair and signed his name to anything Colonel Hume asked hiir. What humbug ! The Minister's own Commissioner swore that instead of these transfers being mado on their merits by the Department alone be had first to interview tha Minister about them. Small wonder that the police force was made such a political machine.

Phylloxera was discovered by Mr Schutz, the Government expert, among the vines first planted by Mr "W. H. Beetham, at his residence at Masterton. The vines there have been planted from seven to ten years. Last year they showed signs -of falling off, but Mr Beetham attributed the cause to tbe.encro?chmeiits of a macrocarpa hedge. As he gathered over 20001 b of grapes from an eighth of an acie Mr Beetham anticipated no blight or disease. The parasite is suppo?ed to have travelled from Auckland, where phylloxera has existed for years, but Mr Beetham is perplexed respecting it, as he has had no consignments of plants from the North. The insect has been detected on vines in one or two other gardens in the neighbourhood, and the necessary notices have been issued by the Minister of Agriculture with the view of eradicating the pest. As yet no signs of disease have been discovered at Lansiowne, where Mr Beetham has been cultivating vines on a somewhat extensive scale- It is Mr Beetlmm's intention to substitute for the infected vines, vines grafted on the disease-proof stock—viz., the wild vines of America.

We frequently see Government subsidised papers quoting from the Sydney Bulletin, but they appear to have overlooked the following par which appeared in that journal dated November 27 :•-" They run the party-govern-ment machine after a fine, high-handed fashion in Maoriland. Four Liberal members, who held that Premier Seddon should not be the paid servant of a British mining syndicate, and voted to that effect, have been thrown out of tho Ministerial omens, and have received information that they will henceforth be regarded as Oppositionists and Tories.of the worst description. The spectacle of a Premier using his Ministerial power to compel his followers to approve of his private jobs and syndicates isu't edifying, and Seddon's definition of a Liberal as a man who is in favour of Seddon making money any way he darned well pleases isn't edifying, cither. Premier Dick has strained the party-government machine nearly to breaking point by this time, and of late he has taken to hobnailed methods which will yet lead to disaster. The boot - marks of their vigorous leader are growing altogether too conspicuous on the aggregate hide- of the Liberal party.