CONSCIENCE MONEY

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 90, 16 April 1920, Page 8

CONSCIENCE MONEY

Restitution, of "conscience money", haa been made to the manager of a Wellington business firm in somewhat unusual circumstances. Accompanying the money was the following interesting letter :— "In my desire to mak& good, I have to appeal to your kind assistance, In order to restore the enclosed amount to its rightful owner, which service I feel you will gladly render,, arid thereby help to appease the conscience of my unworthy self. Just prior to the beginning of 'the" war (I cannot recollect the precise time, but it would be about that time) I picked up! the enclosed sum in an envelope, in which also was an account by. your fimi to someone residing in Timi-kori-road, whose name I cannot remember. The loss was advertised per medium of The Post, requesting the finde.r' to return to Macky, Logan and Co., whicn I, unhappily, ignored, it would .appear that the. debtor to whom the account was made was proceeding to your office by way of Manners-street to settle Same, and, unfortunately, lost it. I have no doubt that the account has long ago been,settled, and with the aid of your account books you may be able to trace who the debtor of Tinakori-road was. Perhaps some one of your firm will recollect the loss, and subsequent advertisement for the recovery thereof.\ I wonder, after all that I have gone through in this war, that I had not made restitution before. Fancy a soldier going through all the horrors of war, never knowing'the hour'or the moment when he would go under; conscious all the time of this dishonest act. I am not" by any means religious, but I havt learned this : That for individual , wrongs the innocent -suffer also. Who knows but that this money belonged to people who had little to spare, and are greatly in need of it, to whom'l trust you will be successful in returning it. If unable to restore please hand,.it to some institution that has for its object the uplifting of unhappy and repentant creatures like that of 'Returned Digger.' " The firm has. been unable to trace the account mentioned by the correspondent, ami has forwarded the money (£7 10s) to lhe Evening Posts to be handed to a deservJ ing institution.

With reference to a prosecution made by .the police earlier in the week against Mrs. Florence Edith Caroline Black, on an information alleging that she had made a false declaration regarding the paternity of a child, Mr. H. F. O'Leavy, who appeared for the defence, has asked that it should be made clear ■ that tha defendant did not plead guilty to 1 the offence, for, although she admitted that her declaration was not in .order, she had not-considered that she was guilty-y of any offence when making the declaration. In describing the child as thechild of her husband,, from whom she was living apart, instead of as the child of another man, she had believed that she was following the proper course. The Magistrate dismissed the information. The council of the Wellington Philosophical Society decided last evening to set up a museum, scientific library, and research committee, from representatives. of the society and such other persons as may co-operate, to urge upon the Gov- : eminent the immediate need for a new, fireproof building for Hie Doninion Museum, the establishment of a scientific and technological library, and the sotting up of a Board, of Science and industry. : " That in connection with the gazetted price of fowl wheat this union records its emphatic protest against the actionof the Board of Trade in continually ignoring the representatives of the retail trade when preparing retail prices," is the text of a resolution carried at a meeting of the Wellington Grocors' Industrial Union of Employers this week.