NEW SOUTH WALES.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 6, Issue 279, 30 January 1862, Page 4

NEW SOUTH WALES.

Gossip about Sydney.—? lhe touowing j tilings are taken from letters, :n the Melbourne H eehhj Herald from a correspondent in Sydney. All over Sydney the streets present a most diversified appearance in consequence of the man; er in which houses of different classes are mixed up together. Alongside an edifice that Would be an uninnmnt. to. the east end of Collins .street you may see a hovel lit for Colling wood Flat. There is no regularity about'the buildings, and, but very little attention has-been paid to it in laying out the streets. One chain is the width of these. In some places the footpath m,<y be ten feet, and in others only a yard wide, whilst in others again there is-no foot path at all. the hoiises projecting forward in front of vly re if ought p, be. In oilier par s the houses recede from the street and leave a gap near the —pavement, I was going to say, but I musk modify the term, for only in very few of the streets is such a, luxury indulged in. In most streets, a stone kerbing, if even Unit, does duly for making oaf the footpath, and whether that is macadamised, or not, depends on a number of circumstances which I cannot attempt to ex plain. On the 31st August, 1860, steps were taken to raise Volunteer corps throughout the colony, and by a proclamation issued on the last day of the year, the old corps, raised in 1854 were disbanded, and many of the members of them are now identified with the present force. There are now altogether 25 corps in the colony, three of them being artillery, one cavalry, and 'twenty-one rifles. O'- llmst- 25 corps, the mounted, one, two ariillory. and 14 rifle companies, forming two battalions, are enrolled in Sydney and the suburbs, and of the eight other corps, seven are within a comparatively short distance. The 14 companies of the Sydney rifles are formed into two battalions, the six central companies of the city,—numbered from one to six,—and the South /Sydney and Paddington Companies forming one battalion and the six other companies funning the suburban battalion. The strength of the two battalions is respectively, 729 and 358, tiiU3 giving a total volunteer force in Sydney of 1348 of all ranks. As a general rule, the volunteers are regular in attending parades, Put of course, having been enrolled long after your volunteers, cannot compare with them in the alacrity and,' precision with which they go through their evolution?. At almost each parade, however, manifest improvement is observed, and this shews that they use every endeavour to attain a high degree of excellence as soon as possible. As in Victoria, we cannot b,nt he suuyk with the. large mm>. ber of youths in the ranks* it being more particularly remarked in sorue companies than others. Many of them indeed appear to be scarcely sixteen years old.

Sydney possesses two daily journals, the Morning Herald ami tlie Empire.. J'he former is b.y far the oldest established paper, and lias belonged to its present proprietors, the Messrs Fairfax, for a number of years. It. possesses a very extensive circulation, and may be considered, the organ of the liberal conservative party. As a general rule, it of course is opposed, to the policy of .the present Government, who however met until lately with a warm support from the Empire. The Empire is not the same paper fiat Mr Park.es formerly possessed, but some tiijie after that journal failed, the plant, etc., was purchased, and a new paper, bearing the same nomenclature, was established. The Empire is the property of Messrs. Hanson and Bennett, the former of whom gave up the post of Government Printer, where he was receiving <£7oo a year, to take a share in it. Mr .Bennett was the chief overseer of the Herald. The Empire is the organ of the ulta democratic party, and is, or rather was, closely connected with the Ministry, whose views it seldom differed from. Within this last few weeks a change has taken place however, and the Ministry comes w for a good share of abuse. The alteration is generallyTattributed to. some personal feeling. In Melbourne, the Government, when comraunicuting intelligence, almost invariably do so to all three journals simultaneously, regardless of their political bias. Hera the Ministry reserved

all tbeir-intelligence almost exclusively for the Empire, which published it as a fact, or as an on dit, according to whether it was intended to announce.an event or throw out a feeler. As/ have above observed, however, a change has taken place lately. The editor,—and in alluding, to this, / commit no breach of etiquette, the fyet haring.been publicly noticed in the press,—Mr. J. J’ehoihaphat Harper, has just . been returned, to the Assembly fpr . the di.-trict of Patrick’s Plains, on the Hunter. The Herald publishes a weekly paper called the Sydney Mail, which is very largely patronised, having, as was announced in its columns lately, a circulation of over 5000, 350 Q copies being posted to the country alone, The other weekly papers are the Freeman’s Journal, a "senii-religiuus paper, the organ of the Roman Catholic hody, the Bell’s Life, of course, the spurting journal. , There were also lately in existence the Mereai ti’e Journal and the Military Gazette and Volunteer Journal, both of which names sufficiently explain to whose interests they were devoted. Both papers, anp now, however, defunct. There are also several religious publications, published fortnightly, viz., the Church of /sngland Chronicle, the Church Advocate, p,ml Wesleyan-Record, and the Christian Pleader. I have observed that the Daily Press pays a great .deal rqore attention here to religious imitters than-it' does in Melbourne. /Scarcely a day passes that there i 3 not a full and particular account of some missionary meeting, or the welcoming of some miifister to a congelation in meeting assembled, where edifying speeches for the benefit of 1 young men and women are the order of the evening. Nor are these accounts confined to paragraphs or reports u column or so in length, but they suiuetiines cover the whole length of a page.

How long would Victorians tolerate the delays to which the inhabitants of New South Wales are subjected through the absence of a. bridge across the river iVepcan, which separates Sydney from Bathurst and /Festern district. Several bridges have already been constructed over it, but none were sufficiently stiong to resist the floods. This last, session, Parliament voted £’2o, 000 for a new bridge, after being told that such a one as was required could not be erected under £40,000. If the money be spent, the ehaaices are that .the bridge will be swept away by the first flood that occurs after it is completed, but in all probability the vote will lapse, and drays may still be kept waiting several days, until a freshet subsides, before In-jug able to cross, should the flood be too strong for the punt to work. Railways, dignified by (lie titles of Great Northern, Great 6'outhern, and Great /'Festern have been undertaken. The first commences at. Newcastle, on the Hunter River, and proceeds part fl/aitland as far as Lochinvar, a distance of 26| ffiiles. There are two classes of carriages on it, the first and third ; the fares for the whole distance are respectively 6s. 9d ami 3s. 4d. The terminus of the other two lines.is at Sydney. For the first thirteen miles, viz., to the. ..Paramatta .Junction, the linos are one ; at that spot they diverge, the Great Western proceeding in the direction of Bathurst, a distance of eight miles to Blacktown, ami the Great Southern—the line towards Goulburn, and the Victorian frontier—being open as far as C'ampbelltowu, 34 miles from Sydney. On this line.there are three classes of carriages, ami the fares through from Sydney to (.’amphelltown are 8s 6d, 6s 4d, and 4s 3d. None of the lines are remunerative ; the Northern one barely pays its working expenses, but tbe management appears to be by no means of the best. The Sydneyites prefer the ,o!d plodding ways of the mother, country, ami in their slowness, console themselves will) the thought that, they are sure. Not only is it amongst the mercantile community that a want of energy is displayed, but it is exhibited even amongst the working classes. /Forkmen lieie are never seen to hurry; they take things coolly as if they thought that as long as the -work was dune some time or other, - that would be quite e:i»u«b. //ages are lower than in Melbourne, and the eight hairs’ system is nor as yet in operation except in a few cases. Great efforts, however, are being made to obtaiuit. Qne. bears a great deal of the unemployed in Sydney, but you very seldom see any of them. You never perceive the same number of able-bodied men lounging about here that one used to observe loitering in the neighbourhood of the old post-.--fii.ee in Mel bourne. At a meeting of the unemployed called some weeks ago to consider their grievances, only some twenty persons had assembled three quarters of an hour after the time appointed foi the gathering. Unit if there are not so many unemployed here as in Melbourne, there are, en revanclip, a far larger number of beggar?. In? deed, I have seen more beggars here in as many weeks, than I have seen in Melbourne in the same number of years.

Durability of Australian Timber.— A remarkable proof of the durable properties of the colonial hard wood, has ..been presented in some speoiment of black butt, to be forwarded to the International Exhibition. The specimens were taken from one of the ceiling joists of a house built about the year 1800. The timber has consequently been in use for sixty years. A large quantity of the wood obtained in taking dowiKthe old house will be used iu that to be erected on its site. It has often been noticed that in taking down buildings, 40 to 6,0 yrs old the colonial timber more especially the blue gum was always found souud and good, while the deals and other foreign woods were generally quite rotten. , Wool GRowiNG.-rr-Several remarks have latterly .been jpj*de from,our,.correspondents from different quarters of the colony, with regard to the advantage of close attention, to wool-growing. This can only be done where the sheep are few' in number, and consequent!} immediately under the master’s eye; and it lias been one of Mr. Tlobertson’s'grami arguments in favour of tlie laud scheme that t would raise up a class pf small squatters,

who, having but few sheep or cattle* would be able to give them more attention and thus considerably enhance their value to the country-.; -We have been led into these obser.Yiitions' from having, seen three fleeces of wool, produced-from sheep the property of Mr. P. Andrews, of .Petersham. Two were Southdowns, and the third a half-bred merino ; they have been kept as pets on Hiis farms, and tbe merino has been reared by him from, a lamb, and is now four years old., the /Southdowns heing the same age. 2'liefleeces were weighed in a bag, and weighed gross. 24£ lb, Taking tbe weight of the bag to be 3|ib-/-3 lb being the ordinary al!aw : - anee, we the three fleeces. .The fleece of the merino, however, was previously ascertained, to be 8 lb./ With such a return o,f wool as this, squatting and sheep tending on a small scale so that,proper care and attention can be given to every individual sheep, offer a tempting inducement for the enterprise of persevering farmers. The fleeces are to be seen at Mr. C. Hearn’s inn at (9. M. Herald. Progress oe New South Wales.— On the first day of July last, a period of ten years bad elapsed-since the Port. Phillip district had been separate/( from New .S'outli /Fales. The quarter ended on the 30th September, 1851, was therefore the first in which the bank returns comprised only the transactions within the colony thus disnn mbered, It may be interesting to trace the progress of affairs during the ten years

the progress op ten years.

* 7'liese figures, the index of weighty facts, are well worth attentive consideration.

Mormon Marriages. Besides the ordinary poiygynic marriages of the Mormons, they have four kinds of marriage by proxy. First the glorifying ; second, the retroactive ; third,' the substitutive ; and, fourth, the redeeming proxy. The principle of these marriages is the same ns tliat implied in the injunction given by A/"ses, ‘to raise up children for the deceased brother.’ By the .glorifying proxy is meant the act by which a believer marries for time the female survivor of a marriage made for eternity ; the issue of such a marriage would, in he.tven, belong not to their natural father, but to the first hu-band, who was sealed to their mother. .The re-ir-'activc proxy applies to women wh.o, de.situuo of becoming, in eternity, the brides ol persons who have died.in the odour of sanctity, marry living men. who contract, these unions in the name of the deceased. It was thus that. Brigham Young consented to marry in time a woman who desired to be in eternity, one of the Queens of Joseph Amilli. The children who are born of marriages contracted under the .system .of retroactive proxy belong naturally, according to Mormon principles, to the eternal husband, and not- to their natural father. Some forward spirits would go so far as to say that the retroactive proxy permits women of the nineteenth century to become the eternal wives of Abraham, and to rear up in Utah little ones who will be the leifitimate children of the blessed patriarch. 7’he substitutive proxy is for jtlie-especial benefit of the Mormon missionaries. These hemic labourers for the promulgation of the faith are often culled upon by the heads of the Church to leave their wives (ranging from one to twelve in number,), their children and homes, ami to start on di tart missions to various parts of the globe at .only a few days’ nolice. Seeing lmw much their .families mioht have been increased during the period of their absence, had they stayed at home, and; how much, therefore, their prospective glory in the celestial spheres will he diminished in consequence of their missions, it is considered hut just, that children should be raised for them in their absence. Hence, an agent or proxy, discharges the duties of the absent missionary to iiis wife and children. The redeeming proxy is a consequence of the idea that there can be no perfect salvation without wives ; that is to say, without marriage in this world. 2’lierefore, men who are so unfortunate as to die before having entered into the blessed state of niatrim -ny, remain in the next world in a sort of purgatory, unless some kind friend will delivtr them by marrying at least' one woman on his account, and by raising up children for him by which he may be. redeemed from Ins hopeless position. Besides these various forms of marriage, the saints have one of a more sentimental kind, analogous to the relationships known amongst, the Gentiles as platonic. 7’his is a spiritual marriage and is called sealing. It also is based upon the general doctrine that the more wives a man lias, the more acceptable he must be in the sight of God, and the greater, therefore, tbe fulness of his eternal glory. Being purely spiritual, this marriage, while gratifying tlie feelings of a couple attached to each other by a sentimental alliance, avoids tbe possible jealousy and unhappiness which the actual practice of polygyny may induce, /fence, without marry lig men of their choice in time, women are not uufrequently sealed to them, thus becoming their wives for eternity, and proportionately augmenting their eternal glory. ‘Could we depend upon some apostates,’ says M. Ileiriy, ‘we must believe that, according to the Mormons a woman married only for time to one man, can be married for eternity to another man of her choice. Some people go so far as to say that these so-called spiritual marriages are sometimes contracted without the knowledge of the temporal husband.’ Westminster Review,

1851. 1861. Increase Sept, pc sr cent. Population . 2(12,000 350,000 76.2 Number of Banks 4 8 . 100 Note circulation £202,800 £885,500 237 Circulation per head £1 Gs £210s 92 Deposits £1,128,800 £5,109,900 353 Deposits per head £4 12s £14 7s 155 Coin £570,200 £1,561,800 174 Discounts £1,220,100 £5,475,900 347 Paid-up capital £1,959,300 £5,955,000 20'4 Reserve £158,800 £1,229,800 674 Dividend £69,900 £351,500 403 Rate of Dividend 8,‘ p. c. 14 p. c. 32 Working capital £531,200 £2,358,800 344