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Record.

At the meeting of the Wellington Branch of the Institute of Journalists, held on 23rd December, Mr. R. A. Loughnan in the chair, a motion, expressing the regret felt by members at the loss of its late Secretary, Mr. H. R. Dix, and sympathy with his family, was passed, and directed to be sent to Mrs. Dix. Mr. C. Earle, who had temporarily carried out the duties of the office, consented to continue to act until the annual meeting, and was thanked for his previous services. The Council was asked to hasten the steps to incorporate the institution under the Act of Parliament already passed.

The Hon. W. Jennings, M.L.C., has been elected President of the Auckland branch of the New Zealand Journalists' Institute.

The Auckland Instititute of Journalists gave a harbor excursion in honor of Mr. Cooper, editor of the Scotsman. Dr. Hocken, of Dunedin, was among the guests.

At the annual meeting of the Auckland Typographical Society on 15th February, it was stated that there was a credit balance of £214, an increase of £39.

A young man named Leonard Cole, a compositor, one of a holiday party, was accidentally drowned in the Manawatu river, near Foxton, on the 20th January.

Mr. W. H. Smith, editor and proprietor of the Palmerston Daily Times, has, on account of failing health, retired from the field of journalism. It is his intention to engage in farming. We hope that in his new sphere he may have every success, and find renewed health and strength.

The wayzegoose of the Wellington Times and Mail was held at Ross's Gardens, Hutt, on the 20th February, some 200 people being present, and passed off very successfully. A tug-of-war, Compositors v. Machinists, was won easily by the compositors.

During a fire which occurrred at Arrowtown recently, several bystanders (says an exchange) thinking that the office of the Lake County Press was in danger, started to remove the plant, the result being that all the type set for the next day's issue was transformed into pie, and the journal made its next appearance in the form of a single sheet printed on one side only.

One of the proprietors of Stone's Directory, visiting Wellington, picked up in a bookseller's shop a copy of « Haggen's Shilling Almanac and Directory, » just issued. Opening the book, his eye fell on an error, which he recognized as a misprint in his own book that had caused him some little annoyance. Further investigations showed that the directory consisted of the city names copied bodily from his own work without taking any account of the changes of some nine months. The publisher refusing to make any amends, an injunction was applied for and issued by the Supreme Court, stopping the sale of the book, costs being given against the pirate.

The journalistic obituary includes the People, a weekly paper established in Wellington about a year ago by Mr. E. A. Haggen to advocate protection, bimetallism, state banking, land nationalization, collectivism, and a number of other ideas too « advanced » for the daily press. With the People, a number of other ventures pass out of existence, as during its career it absorbed a variety of small organs, all more or less shaky—Daybreak, a woman's paper, the Fancier's Gazette, and lastly the Weekly Herald, of which the less said the better. In November last, business suddenly and unexpectedly called Mr. Haggen to the United States. The People was then in difficulties, and the concern is now in liquidation.

With the close of 1896 the Napier Evening News expired, after a troubled career, financially and politically, of twelve years, in which time it probably changed proprietors and editors more frequently than any other paper in the Colony. Insolvent during the greater part of the time, it adopted the peculiar expedient of « sending round the hat » to avert the threatened crash. A

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sum of £1500 was asked for on one occasion, and about half that amount was actually subscribed by political sympathisers, whereby the inevitable collapse was staved off for a time. The News has had the advantage for the past six years of special favors in Government advertising, but it has never succeeded in gaining popular support. Towards the last it became exceptionally bitter and personal. « Very few people, » a correspondent writes, « outside the select circle who had a monetary interest in keeping the derelict afloat, will be sorry to see it disappear beneath the billows of the sea of oblivion. »

A strike of the compositors engaged on the Melbourne Herald occurred at the end of December, but the paper was published as usual.

A man named Webb, printer and stamp-dealer, was arrested in Melbourne early in January, on a charge of extensive frauds by removing the postmarks from stamps and re-selling them. Webb afterwards confessed that by means of a solution of salts of lemon he was able to do this. The Victorian stamps, he explained, lent themselves admirably to the process, but many of the stamps of the other colonies were useless, because the color ran. Accused admitted having cleared £400 worth, and a search revealed £500 worth of Victorian stamps in his house.

Cardinal Moran, one of the New South Wales candidates for the Federal Convention, took occasion in an interview with a reporter of the Daily Telegraph, to propose a boycot of the Sydney Morning Herald, one of the oldest and most influential journals in the colonies, which he denounced as « the organ of the Congregationalists. » The cardinal saw his mistake too late. On the same morning as the report of the interview appeared, the Herald contained an article favorable to his candidature, and sternly deprecating the sectarian spirit which would exclude any person from the convention on the score of creed. Thenceforth, however, the Herald made no further reference to the cardinal, completely ignoring his candidature.

Our French contemporaries report the marriage, on 5th October, of M. Paul Bluysen, editor of the excellent weekly Revue des Arts Graphiques, to Mlle. Marguerite Commaille.

On account of the strenuous support given by the Electeur, the liberal organ at Quebec, to the recent Manitoba schools settlement, it has been interdicted by the Roman Catholic Bishops. Its publication has been suspended, and a new journal, the Soleil, with the Premier as one of the directors, has been issued in its place.