The Sun.
London, England, 1859-10-19 00:00:00

OXFORD UNIVERSITY.

The first parade of the corps will take place on
Tuesday, the 25th inst., at the Armoury, at 2.30,
when ail members are request to attend in uniform.
A course of musketry was to commence to-day.

A Cingalese tailor lately petitioned Sir Henry
Ward for leave to marry again as he had not seen his wile
for 20 years. Ho was thus made happy :—" His Excel-
lency the Governor having taken into consideration the
petition of B. De Hoon, of Randy, praying that he may be
permitted to marry again, has directed the petitioner to be
informed that the governar has nothing to do with settlin.;
matrimonial quarrels, but that his excellency thinks that a
lhau who has not seen his wife for 20 years, may fairly
assume that he will not see her again, and do his best to
supply her place."

AUSTRALLIX COLONIES.
The growing wealth, prosperity, and importance
of the Australian Colonies form one of the most in-
teresting and gratifying features of the present
time. The checks Welch they. have occasionally
experienced seem to have rendered their oaward
progress only the more sure and solid. From each
community additional proofs of clic:le-1y andenter-
pris(,-and of the success which waits upon these
qualities, are showered upon- us by every mail.
sixty years ago the colony. Of Victoria had not been
discovered, and even alter colonisation bud nomi-
nally commenced so much 'negleeted was it, that
the population t wo-and-t wenty years ago Numbered
only 500 acids. It now amounts' to between five
and six. hundred thousand, and is steadily in-
creasing. The productive and trading eaamcity of
the colony may be estimated from the fa that the
aggregate exports from Victorian ports in, the first
half of the present year reached thirteen million
sterling, and that during the last four years the
shipments of gold produced there have ranged from
ten to twelve millions annually. Its consuming
cnpaeity is attested by the magnitude of the im-
ports, which in the first half of the present year are
stated at an aggregate of £13,509,000, although
allowance must of course be made for the amount
transhipped to other markets. The ordinary re-
venue of Victoria for the year ending the 30th of
June last exceeded three millions sterling. In proof
of the vast extent of its general business, reference
may be made to the aggregate results of the re-
turns furnished by the nine Joint Stock Banks
existing in the colony. The active circulation
amounted to close upon £2,000,000, and -the de-
posits to no less than £6,332,020, of . which
£4,902,578 bore interest. The coin and :bullion
held amounted to £2,766,344, and the paid-up capi-
tal of the nine establishments to £5,853,134.
The other colonies of the Australian group have
made relatively less rapid progress, yet have al-
ready achieved a degree of prosperity otherwise
unparalleled in tile annals of colonisation. The
official estimate of the produce of the Customs at
Sydney for the current year reaches the sum of
L'572,250. The Sydnep Mint is coining at the rate
of £1,500,000 a year. From the Ist of January to
the middle of August the colony has shipped, al-
most exclusively to England, in addition to gold
and a large quantity of other produce, 37,303 bales
of wool, being 5,456 bales more than the quantity
shipped in the same period from Melbourne. In
the year 1853 the supply of wool imported into
Great British from British possessions, principally
from Australia, amounted to 69 per cent. of the en-
tire quantity imported. Many of the banking and
steal navi,,•ration companies is New South:Wales
are paying dividends at the rate of ten and twenty
per cent. per annum. Of the liberality of spirit by
which the Legislature is actuated no further proof
is needed than their grant of £50,000 a year for the
establishment of another mail service, and of £20,000
for the purchase-of the flock of alpacas lately intro-
duced. For one year-1858-zthe colonial Legisla-
ture authorised the expenditure of no less a sum
than £BO,OOO on the main trunk lines of road. The
large and increasing production of coal now forms
one of the most important elements of the prosperity
of this colony.

The progress of South Australia is at least equally
satisfactory. As regards agricultural, pastoral, and
mineral operations, internal and external trade, and
increase of population, the official tables psesent
results calculated to excite surprise, The revenue
for the year ending the 30th of June last reached
£464,320. The population increased between 1850
and 1853 from 63,700 to 118.340 souls. The value
of the imports in 1842 was £169,493, and in 1858
£1,769,351, the figures relating to the sxports of
the produce of the colony for the same years being
respectively £29,079 and £1,355,011. In 1842 the
number of acres of land iu cultivation was 19,790,
and 204,432 in 1858. The number of sheep in the
colony during the interval increased tenfold, viz.,
from 331,000 to 3,108,501. This colony possesses
an enduring source of wealth in its copper and other
mineral deposits, which are as yet most inadequately
worked, and would be likely to command increased
notice in the event of any check arising to the
pursuit of gold mining in the other colonies.
. Tasmania has just given a great proof of her ener-
getic and enterprising spirit in laying a submarine
telegraphic cable across Bass's Straits, by which
means she places herself at once in electric commu-
nication with all the other colonies of the Australian
group. Iler pastoral interests are thriving, and the
recent discovery of gold in 'quantities sufficient to
yield a profit upon the working may prove of great'
importance.
New Zealand now also claims to rank as a gold-
producing colony. The extent of her resources in
this direction remains to be ascertained, but there is
no doubt whatever that she possesses, besides gold,
coalfields, together with extensive deposits of copper
are and other minerals. The agriculturalcapaeity of
this infant colony, the area of which is greater than
that of Great Britain and Ireland, is almost illimit- -
• able. In the quarter ending March last the total
imports into New Zealand amounted to £360,820
- (being at. the rate of nearly a million and a half
per annum), against £224,690 in the corresponding
quarter of laseyear. The exports of wool for the
first quarter of the present year reached £211,240,
against only £54,118 in that of 1838. The local
journals refer in gratulatory tei ins to the growing
disposition of British merchants to participate in
trade to this colony.
The high credit achieved by the various Colonial
Governments, through a faithful discharge of all
their public obligations, is proved by the marked
appreciation of their securities in London. Colonial
banks may be classed amongst the most remunera-
tive undertakings' in which capital has ever been
embarked. The activity of the telegraphic com-
munication between one colony and another shows
that all of them are imbued with the keenest spirit
of enterprise, and indisposed to let older communi-
ties obtain any advantage over them. The zeal
with which the exploratim of the interior of the vast
continent of Australia is prosecuted likewise attests
their rising energies. The electioneering excite-
ment reported by the two last mails from New
South Wales and Victoria is rather a promising
feature than otherwise, as denoting the deep in-
terest felt by the colonists in the working of their
representative institutions, and their resolve to
place them upon a stable footing.
It is equally the.duty and the interest of the Go-
vernment of this country, which has not yet entirely
released the colonists from leading-strings, to pro-
mote. their progress by every 'legitimate means.
When the co-operation of the Imperial Government
is solicited, whether through the medium of her
Majesty's representatives in the colonies or through
that of the influential colonists residing in England,
the appeal should be met in the most liberal spirit.
This is the only way in which the rich young com-
munities at the Antipcdes, whose value we are
only just beginning to recognise, can be knit firmly
to us.—Daily News.