On Tuesday evening everything in the office was in 'its usual order, but in the morning, when the sweepers came as usual at 6 o’clock to clean out tbe Exchange, they at once detected the smell of fire, and on making search found that the Telephone Exchange Office had been in flames, but that the fire had luckily burnt itself out. The many wires leading to the switchboard were partially fused, the switch board itself was charred to a cinder, the roof of tbe office was blackened, and the floor was bespattered with the molten gutta-percha coating of the office wires. Outside, in Gresham-street, the telephone wire which leads to Messrs Montefiore, Joseph, and Co.’s es tabli-hment was hanging down fused, but the electric light wires were all secure and safe. It is said that about 2 a.m. there was a flash of lightning, and this may have caught a telephone wire and discharged itself in the office. On the other hand, Messrs Montefiore, Joseph, and Co/a wire hangs above and across the electric light wires, and if the coating chanced to be stripped from the latter, and a gust of wind brought the former into contact with them, the pent-up force of the electric light wire would be discharged into the tele phone wire. The latter, it is considered, is almost certainly the cause of the accident. Melbourne, December 15. An exploring party under the leadership of Messrs O’Donnell and Carr Boyd, the well knpwn explorers, have left this city for Sydney to buy horses for Port Darwin; thereafter they will explore a practicable road for stock to the Ord River, and inspect the country held by the Cambridge Downs Pastoral Association in the Kimberley district, West Australia. The other members of the party are Messrs Lenaere (Melbourne), O’Malley (Ballarat), and Well (surveyor, Melbourne). The Police Commission has strongly pro tested against the reluctance shown by the Government to deal with the case of Sub inspector Lamer, who was lately recommended for superannuation in connection with the charges of borrowing from publicans. Over a hundred claims for compensation on account of injuries sustained in the Hawthorne collision have been forwarded to the Board of Land and Works. A peculiar case came before the City Court, when Evan Rowlands proceeded against Samuel Greene, both parties being cordial manufacturers. 