The Bruce Herald. "Nemo me impune lacesset". TOKOMAIRIRO, JANUARY 31, 1879.

Bruce Herald, Volume XI, Issue 108, 31 January 1879, Page 4

The Bruce Herald. "Nemo me impune lacesset". TOKOMAIRIRO, JANUARY 31, 1879.

A good many of our readers know a Tuned in Attorney, Mr Denniston, who, "in the discharge of his duty to his clients " was rather remarkable for getting into row* with the Resident Magistrate, aud with some of his brother lawyers. We do not mean by this to say tbat Mr Denniston did anything reprehensible. On the contrary, we are certain that Mr Denniston was always convinced that he was iv the right, and that those opposed to him were in the wrong. But thisctitic of others, tbis gentleman, who, as reports of Court proceedings show, can be very severe in his denunciation of all who ate against him, has felt aggrieved, go it seems, at some pleasant comments made upon him in his publio capacity, by a public journal, the Duuedin ' Age.' And so ag- 1

grieved has he fell, that h-» has entered a i Supreme Court action aarainst the ' Age,' laying damages at £1000. The cisc being now subjudice, we, of cou se, do not intend to make, any comments on it. or on ] its meiitß. The 'Age' bas very fdi-y \ accepted the gauntlet thrown down, ami has invited the irate attorney, if he wants , damages, to get them by pursuing his action. Therefore, so far as tbe case itself ; is concerned, everyone should be silent. But on the principle involved' in these continual libel actions, or threats of libel actions against the Press, something may be said. Of course, there is a liherfciuisin in journalism, which the law, if appealed to, shou dputdown. But we may very much question whether, after all the wriiiug of an outrageous libel, doe 3 not carry with it its own punishment, and in the end benefits the person libelled, whi st ib only injures the writer, and this without re course to Courts of Justice. At the same time, there is no doubt that there are a number of people, lawyers, and public men of all kinds, who consider forensic insolence and spoken impudence as thei* right, bub bitterly resent any comments upon themselves, their public conduct, or their pubic u'terances by the l'i*e>s We do not say that Mr I>E> T NISTON is in the pofci-ion of either of tb s^ parties ; bub we have at this moment to consider that a contemporary has, doubtless in what it considered the interests of the public, made ct-rttin com mfiits upon a lawyer iv his public capac'ty. That lawyer is now a'louo to treat onr contemporary to an upp treaty long and expensive law sut. Iv this case the awyer will get all h=s wovk done ior him on what is popular y known as " the cheap," owiug to a recognised rule of the. profession ; but our contemporary wid have to pay for all the legal piocesses it must undergo before the case comes to trial. Under these circumstances, we think it would be only a fitting ac 7, on tht the part of New Zealand jourualiam, to ste that, pecuniarly at least, the leg-d battle was a fair one. Thab one party should not geb all the kicks, whilst at. the same time it had to spend all the half pence. VVe leive it to some metropolitan journal to take the lead in this matter ; and now content ourselves by saying, th<t i r ' a subscription be got up amou-st New Zea'and journals to help the ' Age ' against a lawyer's cheap iaw, we shall be prepared to subscribe as much as we can to the same. It would be contempt of Court, perhaps, or some other awful offence, t > wish the * Age ' success in this matter, but we can at least endeavour to prevent its being unfairly handicapped by having to pay for these weapons of offence and de fence, which the custom of the profession will furnish gratis to its opponent. The practical commencement of the Waimea Hlains Railway, by the ceremony of Monday last, has evoked favorable comment throughout New Zealand. The 'Lyttleton Times,' amongst others, says : — " The District Railways Act deserves all the praise which Mr Bai lance g ive it. It was one of the good ideas of the Atkinson Ministry, devised by them aa a division of labour by which the work of constructing trunk lines of railway should le the work of the State, and the construction of brauch lines was to be t ie work of private enterprise Last session the Alt was amended so as to give greater encourage ment to private enterprise without diminishing the Minis -trial control necessary in the interests of the public. The first fruits of o( tbe Act are tbe lines of ihe Waimea Plains Company and the South Rakaia Company, both now in course of construction. The next fruit will probably be the subdivision ot large prope'ties, tbe multiplication of homesteads, tbe increase of the Colonial credit, and the threatened fiusrratL.n of railway management for want of rolling stock io deal with the increased production. The chance* are that the next time Mr Ballance travels South by railway he will n«t have, in one County at all events, to deplore the absence of homesteads. No wonder he found it a pleasing duty to turn the first sod of the vYaimea Plains Branch Railway." Mks •"•qttbehs thanked God that she was no grammarian, and the editor of the ' Otago Daily Times ' may be grateful to the same power for the same cause. In our contemporary's issue of Wednesday ia a leading article which opens thus — "Some very interesting information ou the mutual relations, past and present, of England, Russia, and Afghanistan have lately been made public." And a few lines further on we find this sentence—" Warned by the disastrous results of her interference with tbe internal distentions of Afghanistan in 1840, the British Government has been very chary of committing itself to any pledge on such matters since that time." We did not read any more of the article under notice. When an Editor tella us tbat information "have" been made public, and writes of Eabl Beaconsfield's Government as ' her,' it is time to give up. Of course after this the 'Otago Daily Times' will 'scarcely consider itself an authority ou the Education Question.