Cirrus@Austlit

An advertisement, probably placed by Samuel Bennett (sole proprietor, printer and publisher of the Empire), for the sale of a single cylinder printing machine. The sale is being offered 'to make room for a new machine daily expected from England'.

An advertisement for the Royal Victoria Theatre production of Tom Taylor and Charles Reade's The King's Rival and Douglas Jerrold's Black Eyed Susan on 28 and 29 July 1868.

The 28 July performance was a benefit for Mr C. H. Burford.

This column reports on both the motion of condolence passed by the Unity Lodge of the Freemasons in recognition of the death of Dr William Bland and on Mrs Eliza Bland's response. (The lodge had been going to vote on a ballot for Bland's admission 'on the evening of the day of his decease'.)

The Empire reproduces a 'remarkable statement' from a Goulburn newspaper, the Southern Argus, in which the writer for the latter declares that Dr William Bland made a death bed conversion from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism. The Empire's writer notes several factors that mitigate against such a startling decision in Dr Bland's case.

Frederick Lee writes to express his dismay that both the Sydney Morning Herald and the Sydney Mail published details of the late Dr William Bland's convictions before the law, thereby besmirching the doctor's memory and, in Lee's view, committing libel.