The other day Parliament was most suddenly and unexpectedly dissolved in Melbourne.  In a place where political feeling runs so high, the greatest excitement might have been expected over such an occurrence.  But ‘Reuter,’ who may be considered an impartial authority, merely cabled to New Zealand, ‘The dissolution.’

Chiefly owing to the impossibility of bringing about an international football match, the popularity of football is more local than that of cricket; but in Melbourne I think it is more intense.  Patriotism cannot, of course, be roused when no national interests are at stake, but club rivalry is decidedly stronger.  Some measure of the popularity of the game may be gathered from the fact, that the member who has sat in the last three parliaments for the most important working-man’s constituency, owes his seat entirely to his prowess on behalf of the local football club.  In no other way has he, or does he pretend to have the slightest qualifications.  Of course there are numbers of people amongst the upper and middle classes who still have a holy horror of football as a dangerous game, and the want of unanimity in rules prevents the two principal colonies from meeting on equal terms.  In the older colony the Rugby Union rules are played.  Victoria has invented a set of rules for herself—­a kind of compound between the Rugby Union and Association.  South Australia plays the Victorian game.  I suppose it is a heresy for an old Marlburian to own it, but after having played all three games, Rugby, Association and Victorian—­the first several hundred times, the second a few dozen times, and the third a couple of score of times—­I feel bound to say that the Victorian game is by far the most scientific, the most amusing both to players and onlookers, and altogether the best; and I believe I may say that on this point my opinion is worth having.  Of course, men who are accustomed to the English games, and have not played the Victorian, will hold it ridiculous that the solution of the best game of football problem should be found, as I believe it has been found, in Melbourne.  But I would ask them to remember that the Victorian game was founded by rival public school men, who, finding that neither party was strong enough to form a club of its own, devised it—­of course not in its present elaborate state—­as a compromise between the two.  In corroboration of my opinion I would point to the facts that, while Sydney is at least as good at cricket as Melbourne, there are not a dozen football clubs in Sydney (where they play Rugby Union), as against about a hundred in Melbourne; that the attendance at the best matches in Sydney is not one-third of what it is in Melbourne; that the average number of people who go to see football matches on a Saturday afternoon in Sydney is not one-tenth of that in Melbourne; and that in Sydney people will not pay to see the game, while in Melbourne the receipts from football matches are larger than they are from