PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2237, 14 January 1897, Page 38

PASSING NOTES.

(From Saturday's Daily Tunes.) In politics when ore is accused of an offence ifc is considered a sufficient defence

if it can be proved that the accuser was himself gailty of greater offences. Two blacks are tbui held to make one white, and tbe throwing of political stones is by parliamentary convention the peonliar privilege of those that are without sin. One is therefore constrained to ask where alLthe virtuous and public spirited politicians are ; — even as the little girl, wandering through the cemetery and reading the eulogistic epitaphs, asked her mother where they buried ail the bad people. Mr Seddon has been repeatedly taunted with- the cost of his famous trip to the Uriwera Conntry. The doings of the .party on that historical excursion have been sufficiently placed on record — sufficiently, that is, lor all who are incurious about the details. As tbe kings of old carried a bard ia their train so did King Dick number a scribe among his retinae. Is it not writ in the book of the records of the royal progress ? But the cost must remain unknown until & hostile Minister for Public Works fills Mr Seddon's place, and produces from the archives* the vouchers and memoranda setting forth the expenditure in minutest detail. It is one of the drawbacks of a limited monarchy that the monarch baa not absolute control of the public money. Harono al Rascbid could replenish biß purso at will from his coffers and sally forth to give largesse with none to say him nay. Haroun al Seddon may give largesse indeed, bnt the auditor, like Nemesis, dogs his footsteps and unfeelingly scrutinises each item. This is one of the shackles that our colonial monarch might have been expected to bursb ere this, but I have looked in vain in the Estimates for any indication of a vote for the royal " privy purse." The only hope is that Nemesis may have leaden feet.

Mr Seddon, taunted, as I have already said, with profuse expenditure, hollowed that he was no worse than his predecessors, and to prove it caused to be produced a return of the expenditure of a party which examined the line of the North Island Main Trunk railway in 1890. The Ministerial party, it appears from the return, which now lies before me, consisted of Mr Fergus and Captain Bnssel), some tame engineers, and a cloud of Maoris clustering like flies on the welcome banquet. With merciless exactitude every item of expenditure ia set forth, and it may be gathered that Ministers in their moments of relaxation live like fighting cocks and spend like princes. It took 90 tins of preserved meats, 50 tins of fisb, marmalade, jam, cheese, bacon, biscuits, butter, tinned milk, pepper, Worcester sauce, mustard, pickles, in various quantities to support Ministerial ardour under the very trying circumstances. Accidental contact with undesirable immigrants was provided against by laying in two tins of insect powder, and excess was foreseen and one box of pills provided ; also a tin of vaseline, for Ministers, like John Gilpin, were not inured to riding on horseback, and vaseline is a sovereign remedy in such cases made and provided. Tin-openers, tin plates, pannikins, billies, spoons, knives, and forks — all were provided in large numbers. It came very near being a teetotal expedition also, for I observe that only one corkscrew vras purchased, though the inference might be drawn that each Minister carried his. own. There was, it is true, an item of £3 12s for spirits for the use of the party, but this was smuggled away through somebody's imprest account. Nor was entertainment lacking. Captain Russell appears to have been delighting the untutored savage with a display of equitation, for I find an item " Gratuity for loss by death of horse at Taumaranui shortly after its having been ridden by Hod. Captain Russell to Te Poro-o-tarao and back, 9th to 11th April, £5." Another horse was damaged and left behind, and its owner consoled by a solatium of £12. It must have been a bigger horse than that which suffered under Captain Kussell, and probably bore Caesar and all bis fortunes in the shape of Mr Fergus. Everything in tha return pointß to the enjoyment of a blessed time. The Maoris particularly must have smote their chests and ejaculated " Kapai ! " especially tbat one who received £106 for canoe hire. A Ministerial visit to the Maori Country cometh as the gentle rain from heaven to the

dusky Maori. It Is hardly surprising that Mr Seddon is occasionally pleassd to fignre as the providence who controls it.

I claim to rank as one of the most ardent admirers in this colony of Mr John M'Kenzie. His public appearance never fail to giro me unalloyed pleasure. I know that a good many of my friends do nob ihare my opinion of bim, but that is because they do not look below tho surface. When almost everybody else saw in his threat to heave a pickle jar at Mr Fish's head an indication of atavism I oould see the delicate irony of the movement;. Ifc was only his. playful way o( showing regard, just as rustic lovers pelt each other with apples. Bat most of all ha wins my admiration when holding forth before the Gaelic Society. It is then that his chest expands under tbe tartan vest reserved for buoli occasions, ro!o relio, it is said, of the attire in which he surveyed from Pukatupa tbe smiling valley^ of the Sbag Elver and foretold that one day ho would be ohinf over it all. Hypercritical Lowlanders and Sassenachs and other persons whom an allwise Providence has sent upon the earth for some mysterious reason, may complain that such utterances indicate a limited mental horizon, and that we have heard about Oulloden*and Alma, Balaclava and Imclcnow, usque ad nauseam, but they forget that limitation U an indispensable condition of intensity. It is far botter to fix your mental eye upon some little group of historical facts than to go rambling about all history only to find perhaps Borne poking body with a notebook waiting to take advantage of the emallest slip. And what could be more happy than his expression of regret that the Twelve Apostles were not Highlanders, however mach I must differ from him and his apocryphal lady authority 1 Pater certainly was not a Highlander, for no Highlander would have drawn his sword and smote off the ear of the servant; of the High Priest : be would have slipped his dirk into him. But a libellous Sassenach has contended that Judas as certainly was, for is it not on record that he acted as treasurer for the Twelve. That circumstance alone proves his unbroken descent from tho person who apoke Gaelic in the Garden of Eden.

The promoters ot the meeting and presentation to Bishop Nevill on Wednesday evening on the eve of his departure are to be congratulated upon the secrecy with which they surrounded their intention. Their plans roust have included a oonspiraoy to keep tho bishop in the dark. Probably they suborned the domestic, whoso duty it is to take in the Diily Times iv tbe morning, so that his Lordship might not see the advertisement, and be able to say with entire siDoerity that he was taken by surprise. The Intimation of the bishop's intentions with respect to his movements at Homa must have aroused mingled feelings among his audience. Speaking out; of the fulness of experience, be said he did not intend on this occasion to spend so much time preaching in- village churches, nor in great cathedrals, for the purppss of raising funds. His beloved flock need therefore be under no anxisty lest he-was about to allow others to usurp their privilege of giving freely. Theimplied trust in his people's lioeraiity was great— it wan even sublime. Something there was, too, of righteous indignation in his recapitulation of the slights ho bad endured daring his last toray amopg Jibe faithful in England. To preach to a highly connected and well-to-do audienoe in a snagniiicient bnilding and then be rewarded with about £4, out of which had bo come travailing expenses from London, doeß not, as the good binhop truly aaici, amount to much, and we cannot wonder at his determination to withhold from these callous people the light of the episcopal countenanoe in future. If he should be tempted to try it again he might be recommended to take a few Maoris with him, and to keep his eye firmly fixed upon the person who takes up the collection.

Do bishops ever use bad language, I wonder ? It is on record that a T/ismaniaa bishop was visiting a well-to-do member of his flock, and during the evening they were enjoying a quiet game of billiards. The bishop was sadly out of form, and made some most provokingly bad strokes. Nevertheless, he maintained his. dignity. At length he made a most atrocious shot, and, fairly exasperated, he struck the edge of the table a mighty blow with his cue, smashing the ' sfclok to atoms. Appalled at his own explosiorj, he profusely apologised to his host, who begged him to say nothiDg abont ib, adding that ho was amply rewarded by witnessing wbat ho had long desired to see— namely, what a bishop would do when really in a rage. Ido not snbmic this an applicable to Bishop Nevill'B frame of mind when he counted the £4 collection, but the following may be so. An archdeacon, also a Tasmanian, was playing pool for threepenny lives, and was getting put down most unmercifully by his player. He kept calmly paying out threepenny bit after threepenny bit, until at last the winner remarked, " Ah, archdeacon ; I see you have been putting your hand in tbe collection plate." This was more than archidiaconal patience could endure, and the reply came : " Yes sir, I have ; and I am surprised that yoa should have the confounded impudence to recognise your own contribution."

I wonder whether any one recognises this description of a local option poll : — " The liquor trade organised a Liberty League, secured the services of the most presentablo females of a certain class to the number of 4:0, paying them 7s 6d per day down and 5s per day additional if successful at the polls. They made a contract with every owner of vehicles of every kind, securing their exclusive use on eleotion day at from L 3 to L 5 each, stipulating not to pay them till the 25th inst., thereby evading the Corrupt Practices Act. The publichouses were closed till 7 p.m. All their employees and wives surrounded the polling places with red rosettes, and behaved in a manner tbat was very disgusting to a stranger. When the result of the poll was known the wildest Bacchanalian orgies weie indulged in by gamblers, spielers, blacklegs, courtesanß, and all those interested in the continuance of tbe liquor traffic. All are agreed that if another vote had been taken on the following day, without oabs. and no bull-

dozsra allowed around the polls, prohibit tion would have- been carried by 8 to 1." Continuing, in answer to a correspondent, the writer saya : "His description of tho 'gaunt, wild-eyed females terrorising tho voters an. they entered the booths' is not oamplete. He should add ' beer and whieky soaked'; then this would be a correct picture of the females who favoured liquor. As far as I caw, the friands of prohibition in New Zealand, both men and .women, are the moral, intellectual, and financial backbone of the oountry, and are as sure to carry prohibition as the sun is to rise to-morrow." With this effaslon before un, -who shall lay the prohibitionist* are violent ? It appears in a Sydney paper, and purports to be a description of what ooonrred in Auckland. It may be presumed that the liqnor people pursued the tame tactics everywhere, whence we must oonolude tbat the Syrens who' surrounded the doors of tbe polling booths iv Dantdin were engaged by advocates of the " traffic" It it not the , conclusion I should have come to\ but when your thorough-going prohibitionists casts a stone he does not oare who or what it hits in the rebound. Sometimes it hits himself, and hence, no donbt, the profound silence where there was so ranch noise beforo. " The raor-j], intellectual, end financial backbone of New -Zealand."' -Yes, also the most generous, fair-minded, truthful, and courteous. " •