It is not altogether easy to believe all one reads about the coal troubles of New South Wales, but it does seem as if there may be a prolonged difficulty in bringing about a settlement between the miners and owners in the 17 collieries on the Maitland field. On other coal fields throughout Australia no trouble is being experienced, and while in Victoria some gas companies and factories complain of shortage of supplies, there seems no real reason to believe that they are seriously embarrased. Probably they have got so accustomed to the cry of "wolf" from the daily press, that hitherto they have never given themselves time to consider what they would do if the wolf really come. The Commonwealth Government, which possesses large reserve stocks of coal, is distributing these where shortage is most acute. But lately, in the extreme South, coal has been arriving both from Queensland and New Zealand and, though the Melbourne Gas Company threatened a short time ago to cut off gas owing to coal shortage, an agitation for expropriation appears to have brought that monopoly to its business senses.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.