The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-04-06 00:00:00

A USTRALIA.

ARRIVAL OF THE MARCO POLO.

The Black Ball line of packet ship Marco Polo,

Captain Clarke.. arrived at this port on Saturday
night, after a passage of 76 days from Melbourne,
having left that port on the 17th of January. She
has brought home 2,500 bales of wool, a general
cargo, 15.000 ounces of gold, and 94 passengers.
The steamship Royal Charter sailed in company
with the Marco Polo, for Liverpool, with a full
cargo, 200 passengers, and over 100,000 ounces of

gold.
On the 6th of February the two vessels were in
company, and so remained for three days, when the
Marco Polo left the Royal Charter astern. At the
time the two parted company the steamer was

under sail with a fair Wind.
The accounts from Australia by the Marco Polo
are a week later than those by the White Star.
The London mail ship Orwell, which sailed on
the 3 tst December, has not yet arrived.
The political intelligence is not of the least
moment. Mr. Chief Justice taleckett was to receive

a pension of £1,200 a year.
It was currently reported that Mr. Edward Bell,
late Immigration Agent at Melbourne, and who
proceeded to England per the Copenhagen is to be
Immigration Agent 6-eneral for the colony, under

the proposed new system.
The Government had placed themselves in com-
munication with the authorities of Swan River.
respecting the Penal Department, and a gentleman
named Dickson, residing at Perth, was spoken of
as being likely to receive a high appointment in

Victoria.
Amidst the Parliamentary papers recently pub:

_ -
lished, is-one (says the Melbourne Herald) entitled
a " Report of the Murray River District, in refer-
ence to its geology, soil, prospective resources,
proposed means of better communication, &e.," by
Clement Hodg,ikinson, CE. Valuable as the
document really is, it is impossible not to
cavil somewhat at its title, from which the

reader would certainly infer that the whole
river was meant, and not the compara

... _
tively small portion comprised between the
Albury and Echuca. As, however, much of what
Mr. Hodgkinson writes respecting the Murray,
from the conflence of the Ovens, respecting its

aridity, is true to n. greater degree of the country
below Maiden's Punt, it is satisfactory to

know that the opinion universally arrived
at by the settlers on the river, as to the unsuita-
bility of the district for agriculture, has now
received the sanction of scientific authority.

- Intelligence bad been received of a bush fire
which, commencing near Lake Halbert, had spread
across the Avoca, and ravaged the whole of the
country front the western malice to the Loddon.
On several runs Wore WEIS literally no teed what.
ever, and considerable damage had been done to

the huts and fencing.
The Avoca Forest station. in the Avoca district,
a large, but somewhat scrubby run, and without
stocko had been purchased by Mr. Hugh Glass
for the sum of £3,000. This does not look as if
capitalists thought squatting property was much
injured by the proposed alterations in the law.
A. few days previous to the departure of the
Marco Polo a most atrocious attempt was made

to poison a whole family of persmis, but provi-
dentially without success. A Melbourne paper
says :
Two householders occupy premises in a certain street in
the pity, and they were usually supplied with water by the
same carrier. Last week a load was divided between the
barrels in both yards, and all the members of the family
partaking of the water in one cask were seiz. d with a sort
of simultaneous illness, and it was a matter of much
surprise to account for so extraordinary an event. Poison
was at length suggested! and on ex imining the, barrel a
quantity of tarnr emetic was found therein, which at once
remoV ed all doubt as to the cause. Medical aid was
promptly procured, and although the father was for som->
time insensible, he and all the others who were unwell were
with much care saved from an untimely death. The
circumstance hP.s, w.e believe,- beel reported to the police
authorities, and we trust no exertion will be spared in
endeavouring to bring to justice the prepetrators of so
diabolical a crime. If ever there was a case in which the
government should offer a large reward, this is the one,
for from such fionds as could antimonise a water cask few
are safe, _ _

The same caper contains the . following para-
graph :
We are glad to find in a Sydney cotemporary, a state-
ment to the effect that telegraphic communication between
the two colonies is likely to be accomplished within a
. .

few months. The telegraphic wire is undoubtedly destined
to be the immediate precursor of a more material alliance
between the Australian people—a union that will afford to
each and all the aggregate benefits of thought and action
which at present have only partial effect, because
"cabined, cribbed, and confined" vrithin the narrow limits
of mere municipalities. The intercolonial telegraph is in
fact the " looming " of federation. _ _ _