Its constitu encies are too large to be canvassed by any one, and it is not subject to dissolution ; consequently, it never reflects popular opinion for more than a day oi tv oat a time, and the inevitable result of its supremacy would be the popularising of i -s basis until it was very closely assimilated to the Assembly as it stands, whereby we should lose the power of check entirely. In spite of the assertions to the contrary it is held that Mr Munro will accept the Agent-Generalship, but it is strongly suspected that. nothing definite will be

done in the matter until Graham Berry returns Berry may prove to lie quite out of touch with the Radical party, in which case there would he a chance for the con tinned supremacy of Munro. Oh the other hand a coalition between Berry and Deakin would leave Munro. who is person ally unpopular, out in the cold. In such a case the Ageut-Generalslup would afford Munro a safe, dignified, and lucrative re treat with the good chance of a knight hood. Munro and Berry are old allies. Berry engineered the outer circle here by which Munro made his fortune, and Mumo in return steered Berry into good things. But Berry lost the money with which the genius of his colleagues had endowed him, and then Muuro’s scornful asseveration ■ that the country should entrust its affairs to men who know how to conduct their own business successfully’ cut Berry very deeply Indeed, when Munro made his speech at a Geelong banquet with the Marquis of Normauby present, the then Premier left the room, and waited in the passages of the Geelong lowu>hall until the special train’s departure. Clever as they all are they have all been hit by the fragments ofthe last explosion of the land boom. Many of them thought themselves safe ‘They had got out m time.’ but what is the use of ‘ getting out in time ’ that is of selling at a high price to a bomis bank pioneered by brother specu lators, if just when you look to receive your plunder the bank bursts, and the orders a compulsory liquidation in scathing terms. 