Si; Hercules Robinson, Governor of New South Wales, having to
entertain the Governor of Victoria at Albury, a frontier town between the two colonies, made on October 31 a strong speech in favour of Federation. He pointed out the necessity which is spring- ing up for a common system of defence, of railway gauges, of tele- graphs, and mail communication with Europe, of immigration, and of dealing with the great problem of Chinese labour, and drew a brilliant picture of the possible future of Australia in the year 1950. It would then, he thought, contain thirty-one and a quarter millions of people, and be one of the great Powers of the world. Sir George Bowen heartily coincided, and added that Australia, with her two millions of people, and fourteen millions of revenue, and ninety millions of trade, was already among the ten or twelve great nations of the world. An Australian Republic, with thirty millions of people, and an India to her hand in the islands of the Indian Archipelago, ought to be a most powerful factor in the world ; but she has some serious problems to solve first, and among them, how to overcome her burning local jealousies, which are at present as bitter as the feeling which once existed between England and Scotland.
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