MELBOURNE TOWN TALK.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 189, 30 August 1888, Page 3

MELBOURNE TOWN TALK.

(from oub own cobrespondent.') Since I last wrote Melbourne has been going through the experience known as “ settling down.” The Exhibition opening gaieties sadly disorganised her for the time being. There was too much feasting, too much merrymaking and too much speechifying. The city became feverish, her pulse got irregular, her usual quiet routine was disturbed. Now she is recovering from her orgie ; she is throwing off her incubus of visitors and guests, taking again to early hours, and making up her mind to re-establish peace and quiet. The Exhibition is now fairly afloat on its own responsibility, and the mother city feels that she has done quite enough in giving her expensive offspring a proper set-off With “ the secret consciousness of duty well performed ” Melbourne retires to the background, and leaves the Exhibition to take up the running. I am sure our good Governor, and his lady, and the Commissioners, and Ministers, and all the big wigs and haut monde, and magnijicos, and three-tailed bashaws of colonial prominence, must be pleated the festivities are pretty nearly over, for it has been an exciting time fnr all. Poor Sir Henry! I pity him, for he has had to bear a good deal of the heat and burthen of the day. And expense too—that must not be forgotten. Five thousand pounds were voted to him for extra expenses truly, but what is that? A mere bagatelle, dear readers, I assure you, in vice-regal expenditure. For instance, he gave two dinners last week to about five hundred guests, and paid the caterer fifty shillings a head. That makes £1250 out of the £5OOO at once. Then Lady gave two dances, which cost the long-suffering Governor little short of £BOO each. Add to all this the fact that there were close on a hundred guests stopping at Government House during the week of the opening ceremony, and I think I am safe in laying there will not be much left, after all is said and done, of the additional £5OOO voted by Parliament.

Fifty shillings a head my readers may think an exorbitant charge for a dinner, especially when the number of the diners goes into the four and five hundreds, and I must confess myself it does seem pretty expensive. But I hear it acknowledged on all sides that the two dinners mentioned were the best ever served in Melbourne, and that the wines were of the very choicest brands procurable. The caterer is a well known man here named Skinner, who keeps the Golden Gate Hotel in Snuth Melbourne. He has the Exhibition catering altogHh«r. and if he is not making his fortune he ought to be, considering his opportunities. Since the opening he estimates that he has dined over 20.000 people. On Saturday he had the Commissioner’s dinner d la Russe to provide for, over 800 guests being invited. The day previous he had as many as fourteen private lunches to look after. Indeed, the eating and drinking that has been going on is something to wonder at, and doctors chuckle and the chemists look cheerful.

Now as to the Exhibition itself—-that cause of all the excitement. It slowly approaches completion, and becomes more and more attractive as it does so. There is, however, a very great deal to be done yet, and I don’t think another month will see it thoroughly completed. In the meantime hammering goes on, cases lie about the various courts, and huge unsightly gaps now and again catch the eye. Punch, a week or so ago, had an excellent cartoon regarding the bickwardness of things. It was called “ Too many Cooks,” and shewed a kitchen, in which the Governor is taking nff a lid from a soup tureen, “ Whv ; how’s this?” he says to Sir James Mcßain, “ I’ve opened it. and found its only half done ” “ Well; it is a trifle that way,” answered the President. “ But you see, we spent all our time on the side dishes.” These are labelled respectively. “ The invitations muddle;” “the evening dress embroglin;” “the side show controversy,” and so on. The skit is a clever one, and hits the right nail on the bead.

Cowen’s music is par excellence the great attraction of the Exhibition and the ■ oncert hall is generaPy crowded during the performances. lam afraid, however, it will he found that his st a fiard is somewhat above the range of colonial tastes, for he gives extremely classical selections as a rule, and seldom descends tn operatic music or wellknown airs. However, if he educates us tin to a higher standard, so much the better I was speaking him on Saturday night at the German Club, where a smnke concert took place, and he told me he did not wish to flatter, but he could truly say he had never conducted a better orchestra in his life than the one now at. the Exhibition. A little practise wnu’d make them quite perfect, he said, and fit to m 'tch any orchestra in the world. He also spoke highly of the choir, which num’ er« 800. and promises to have them at a pitch of perfection in a short time. By the wav, rumour is already busy with Mr Cnwen’R name. It. is said that a match is on the tapis between Firn and the daughter of our Mayor, Aiderman Benjamin.

Like a good Victorian I have been giving special attention to our own Ourt. hut I will not say anythin? as to details until mv next letter, as T find my cavserie has already occupied much space I must, however, ♦©!! this story something I nverhe rd from the august lips of no less a personage than Lord Carrington. Two of the best, exhibits in the Victorian Court are those of the Red Cross Preserving Co., who make a fine show of jams and preserves, and Kitchen and Co. (the Apollo Candle Co.) As T stopped to look T noticed a clergyman admiring the cand’e exhibit, and an Indian the jam trophy. Just then Lord Carrington happened to s’rnll up with a friend. he said, pointing to the two men “ See how such an Exhibition anneal 0 the different races, or it were There’s a Ch ist’an clergyman admiring at th shrine of heathen mythology, and there’s a heathen worshipping at the Cross ” The ‘heathen mythology ’ I take it, was imper* sonified by the “ Apollo. ”

By-the wav, leaving Exhibit’on matters and turning to things more practical, Melbourne is threatened with a dreadful contingency that mav put an end to all our merry making. There is a prospect of a strike t 1 king place amongst the Newcastle miners, in which case we sh u’d have our supply of coal almost completely cut off. At present we have not more than a fortnight’s supply, and if the strike does come, it would hrin • on the city much of the terrors of a siegp. It is a doleful effort nf the imagination to pfctire Melbourne fireless and un? lighted, the trains more nr less on the lines, the trams arrested in the streets, the factories frozen into idleness And yet something like thi’ would be the case if our coal supply stopped, and at present whether it will or no hangs bv a thread. “What, nur supply of coal fail ?” exclaimed a member in the lobby of the Hmiße the o’her day, when the subject was first mooted. “Just my luck ! I have five hundred coal and coke hammers just out from home as ballast. They ar in the Bay now, and I suppose will he thrown on mv hands. Just my luck.” It is perhaps needless to add that fh*> speaker was au ironmonger as wel’ hr a member,