There has been a very noisy correspondence concerning. the fruit industry, which generally may be confined—correspomdence and all—to_—- Victoria and Tasmania. There are a number of private jam manufactures and private _camneries, and the management of these has sought to cover up its oww deficiencies, and the threatened reduction of dividends, by explaining to the growers of fruit two main assumptions, first that they have grown more fruit than is required, and next that unless the manufacturers and canners are given a free importation of sugar nothing can be done. The Federal Government, being temporarily controlled by Dr. Page, leader of the Country party, is most anxious to help, and is offering the canners a substantial bonus not only upon what they produce, but also additionally upon what they export. The amount offered is something like £195,000, but the worthy canners object—not that it is too much or too little, but that the conditions insist upon their paying certain rates to the growers of the fruits.
In brief we seem to have the same old story, which prompted that Cobdenist axiom of supply
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.