The Sun.
London, England, 1858-01-09 00:00:00

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AUSTRALIA.

MEL BOURNE, MONDAY, Nov. 16.
The Columbian, with the September mail, did not
arrive until Saturday, being nine days after her
time. Repeated derangement of her machinery is
assigned as the cause of her delay. The City of
Sydney, chartered to convey our November mail b
Suez, came into port at the same time. This is a
repetition of what occurred last month. It gives
our merchants and others about 36 hours, including
Sunday, to answer their letters ; but it deprives
the Sydney merchants of the opportunity of so
doing. If we are discontereed wi!h the miserable
arrangements of the European and Australian Royal
Mail Company, the New South Wales people have
much greater reason for being so, and they and
their correspondents at home will have an additional
motive to promote the establishment of the Panama
hue.

The information (indictment) against the mates
of the Lady Bird and the Champion, framed on
the 239th section of the Merchant Shipping Act,
was tried before Judge Barry on the 24th and 25111
October. Mr. Chapman defended the former ; Dr.
Sewell the latter. The Crown put up the former
first, as they seemed to have 'assumed that it was
the stronger case ; but after an investigation of 8
hours and a-half, .and an adverse summing up by
the learned judge, the jury acquitted the defendants.
On the following day the mate of the Champion
was-tried, but the witnesses contradicted their evi-
dence of the previous day, and were contradicted
by Qther testimony, and the judge stopped the
case, and directed an acquittal. It would be tedious
and useless to go over the whole ground again, and
there can be no doubt that the officers on board of
both vessels were greatly to blame ; but tha case
was not fully and completely got up.
The press very naturally complains of the absurd
conclusion that, after a collision between two
ateatners on a clear night with all their lights pro-
perly burning and avowedly seen nine miles off,
"no one is to blame." So far as the jury was con-
cerned, however, it cannot be denied that they were
entitled to expect better evidence. This decision
will not protect the owners from actions for pecu-
niary compensation at the suits of the personal
representatives of deceased paasengers. 'We have
in this colony a recent instance of a civil jury hav-
ing given several thousand pounds damages to a
widow after a verdict of acquittal for manslaughler.
The Assembly met again on the 3d of November,
and has since then been chiefly occupied in giving
completion to Bills which it had previously passed,
and which have since been returned, with trifling
amendments, by the Upper House. The moat im-
portant feature of the session is, that the two
Houses will have passed all the necessary legislation
for the prosecution of two lines of railway ; one to
Sandhurst via Castlemaine, and the other to Ballarat
from Geelong.
Last Monday was our Lord Mayor's-day, and Mr.
John Thomas Smith was chosen Mayor of Mel-
bourne for the fifth time.

A good deal of not unreasonable alarm has been
excited among all classes of our population in con-
sequence of the appearance of smallpox in the city.
A ship called the Commodore Parry arrived about
a month ago, having had several cases of smallpox
on board. This fact was, however, concealed
from the health officer who boarded her at
the Heads, and the s'iip was passed. Not long
after, first one and then another person was at-
tacked by smallpox, and it was ascertained that
they had belonged to the Commodore Parry. The
ship was then sent into quarantine, and the cap-
tain and surgeon were arrested, but the magis-
trates dismissed the case against them. In
the meantime fresh cases occurred, and are Mill
occurring, in the suburbs of Melbourne; and it is
said one or two have made their appearance at a
distance.

The state of trade is not satisfactory. The sup-
ply of almost all kinds of goods, except the produce
of the East, has been for some time getting ahead
of the demand, and the stock of goods in first
hands is now very large. The supply of gold keeps
well up.

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