Progress of Melbourne.

Manawatu Standard, Volume X, Issue 16, 17 June 1885, Page 3

Progress of Melbourne.

Melbourne wonlrl appeaf* to be - m. a prosperous condition. The gossipy correspondent of the Sydney Moraing Herald writes : — " For all this war en- \ thu3iasra we do not neglect oiir domestic -.^ .affairs'. Moreover, we never were more •prosperous. A revolutioh' : o£ City property has just taken place, and it has resulted m an increase of £10,000 to the municipal income. ' Building is .going on more actively than ever, and bricks cannot be made fast enough. The public buildings are all to be enlarged or completed, and there is even talk pf- finishing; the Parliament Houses.. "Trie" contract for the extension of tKe'j'b'st- Office" is; i. said to ba signed, and'that for -Prince's Bridge certainly is. The EpiscopalianCathedral is to be finished wholly instead of only partially. Sanguine people be- . iieve that the new railway station will be, begun soon. New churches.: are springing up .all over Melbourne and the sub •■\ ftrbs, and the mewfronf; of jthe Athenseum ■'"iV; to be. commenced next week. The ground is being cleared for a new theatre , jo Exhibition-street, and the old Princess . would have been taken down preparatory to the erection of a new theatre on the aame'site, but that the lease of the hotel portion has some weeks to run, and the proprietor will not moru out. In % the suburbs whole streets are m progress. • Tramways are- being laid./^own 'on- the principal lines of road, and, although ' they have not jret begun to break .up the r -' highways within the contour of the city proper, they soon will. People telk quite cheerfully of a war tax. Fighting, they say ; is expensive, and we pannot build forts and snips, and equip arms for noth r ' ing. Tlip question is asked, Will it be an incoifte tax? We 'fcopennofc^ Nobody) likes direct, taxation. An income .-tax is ©f necessity inquiHttorial. One resents tile official insolence which compels a man , to pay how much a year he earns."