ON October 15, during the Victorian centenary celebrations at Melbourne, the cottage from Great Ayton, North Riding of Yorkshire, associated with Capt. Cook, which was purchased by Mr. W. R. Grimwade, taken to Australia and re-erected in. Fitzroy Gardens, was formally handed over to the care of the Melbourne City Council. On the same day, at Great Ayton, Mrs. R. Linton, wife of the Agent-General for Victoria, unveiled a memorial which has been erected on the site once occupied by the cottage. The memorial consists of an obelisk of granite blocks brought from Cape Everard near Point Hicks, Australia, and is a facsimile of the obelisk at that spot, which states that Cook “First sighted Australia near this point which he named ‘Point Hick's after Lieutenant Zackary Hicks who first saw the land, April 19th (Ship's Log date), April 20th (Calendar date) 1770”. In reply to a vote of thanks to Mrs. Linton and himself, the Hon. Richard Linton said: “We stand to-day beside a granite monument. It is a piece broken of £ from that continent whose discovery by Cook began the process of events that gave Britain one of the most faithful and loving of her daughters. It has been sent you in exchange. We have taken from you the home in which Cook's father and mother lived, which this day is being opened in Melbourne in one of the loveliest of our gardens. Beautiful English trees overhang it, green English lawns surround it, and glowing flowers form its setting.” In the course of his speech Mr. Linton said: “Such men as James Cook are beacons. In our schools it should be our care that men like this should be held up to our children to follow, quite as much as those great warriors whose ultimate building lay through de struction rather than in construction.