We are certainly surprised to find that some of the supporters of the Thames Hospital continue to think that the establishment of the Miners’ Accident Relief Fund will be antagonistic to the interests of that most useful institution. We are so well aware of the value of our local hospital that we should hesi tate to say one word in favor of the Accident Fund did we believe there was the slightest ground for believing that the one could alter or injure the other. We know that in the sister Colony of Victoria the Miners’ Accident Relief Fund has been one of the best supporters of the Hospital, and they have worked for the mutual benefit of each other. That is a fact beyond dis pute, and why these institutions should not work as well here as there we can not understand. We believe the establishment of a Miners’ Accident Fuud at the Thames to be one of the pressing wants of the locality, and, if once fairly established the funds will be amply sufficient to pay for every patient who is a subscriber to the accident fund. The feeling of independence which this would give to the sufferer is, we believe, of itself worth a great deal, and would tend to produce a calmness of mind which would contribute very much

towards cure in very many cases. The feeling that a man is dependent upon charity is humiliating and depressing to all of sensitive ami proper feeling, and that it exists amongst the miners to a very great degree, there can be no doubt whatever. There arc many cases also in which a man might be treated at his own home in case of accident, out of the accident fund, without his going to the Hospital at all, and this, in the case of married men especially, is a point which should not be over-looked. The only argument used against the establishment of the fund which has any apparent weight, and we believe it will prove to be entirely a mistake, is that miners who subscribed sixpence per week to the fund would not sub scribe at all to the Hospital. Now, the fund is established to meet cases of accident alone, and does not provide for cases of sickness. 