A VOICE FROM AUSTRALIA.
[To THE EDITOR or THE " EIPECTATOR."]
Sra,—Not long ago a middle-aged couple entered a Perth suburban train. Both sat silent, and the woman, looking neither to the right nor the left, kept on counting one—two—three- -on her fingers. Some young people in the carriage exchanged smiles, when the man turned and said : " Don't laugh at her. She is my wife. She has lost three sons at the war, and I am taking her to Claremont " (the hospital for the mentally afflicted). It was kind of you to refer in the handsome way you have to the great refusal of Australia on October 28th, and perhaps the supreme sacrifice of this poor mother may in some measure atone; but I and many other descendants of the old pioneers shall always look upon it as the blackest day in Australian history.—
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