What their average profits amount to, is a piece of information which it is not to be expected that they will care to make public. Some of the gentlemen con nected with these institutions make very light of their business in this colony, and talk in a cool nonchalant way of its unimportance to the wealthy corporations of which they are officers.'.and hint that very little would make them withdraw the Queensland branches altogether, and leave the colony to an unhappy fate. All this will be, taken for what it is worth, against it being set the fact, that for the very insignificant business being done in Queensland some half-dozen banks think it worth their while actively to compete and to maintain large and well-paid staffs aud hand some establishments. But be the profits what they may, it is very obvious that had we a National Bank, the principal commercial transactions of the colony would be carried ou through that medium, and a large proportion of these profits would be retained in the colony. IUIMVAT FROM NELSON TO THE WEST Coast.—The Examiner of August 11, in its lefl(lingftrticle,says:-Woawait,and with some anxiety the intelligence that the necessary powers have been granted by the General As sembly to the Provincial Government of Nelson, to alienate a certain portion of the waste lands of the province to any company which will undertake the construction of a railway to the West Coast. A bill for this purpose, to be introduced into the House of Uopresentatives, was sent some time ago to Wellington, and the Provincial Solicitor dis covered, on his receut visit to the seat of Government, that nothing was known of it. Another copy has since been sent over. It is to be hoped that the Government will promptly bring the measure forward, and that it will shortly pass through all its stages. We gather from a letter from Mr. Young, of Melbourne, to Mr. Coe, C.E., that the firm of which the former gentleman is a partner is contemplating the acceptance of the terms which the Government propose to offer. Mr. Young speaks confidently about the matter, and bel-eves that large capitalists will be willing to engage in the undertaking. He re marks, however, that sufficient trouble must be taken by our Government to put the offer into a business-like 1 shape, in order that it may be noticed. 