CONCERNING WETAS.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11319, 1 September 1899, Page 4

CONCERNING WETAS.

[By H. H. Murdoch.] Yesterday I received from a friend in the Wellington district a gruesome present, to wit, a glass jar containing five lively we'taS. I had longwißhed for all opportunity to examine safely these horrible creatures, and. upon my introduction to them I found them all my fancy painted them and a great deal more, and congratulated myself that they were inside the jar and that' I was outside it. They are something like grasshoppers, length about an inoh and a half, bodies dark brown or black with yellow bands, saw-like legs, horrid horny heads with vicious months of the lowest criminal type, and eyes and antenas like prawns,- Their rear ends are furnished with forceps like centipedes. They are good at jumping, malevolent of disposition, and venomous in their bite, as my friend found to his cost when one invaded his bed. I wish that I had not examined them before going to bed l^st flight,- for Instead of dreaming of inajeßtic bulldogs and fairy-like toy terriers, I dreamt of the wetas crawling in their jat. First inethought that one of them 1 had escaped in the train and gone back in it to Wellington, where, having evaded the guard, and the police, it had found its way to Seddon and bitten him so that he sickened and died, the la3t words of the great statesman being, " Oh, tny poor colony I What will become of thee when I am no more ? " Then arose great wailing from the drunkards who find the old age pensions such a comfort, from ignorant would-be sea captains, from M's.H.R. with axes to grind, and from the great body of taxpayers, who cried " Who will relieve us of our superfluous cash now Seddon the Good is gone?" Several Radical Ministers said that they would do their .best,, but still the people were not consoled. I took this sad event so much to heart that I could no longer stay in the colony bereft of my Seddon, and ! so I thought that I would take the remaining wetas to Paris, and by their means extricate the noble French nation from the ridiculous and ignominious plight in which M. Guerin's defiance had placed it. I wrote a label as follows: — "Liur figure cause la mort sons la forme la plus hidewse." Having tied this to the jar, I threw it into one of the windows of M. Guerin's house. There was a shattering of glass, an awful pause, and then followed fearful shrieks in male and female voices.. Then the sash was thrown up, and out jumped M. Guerin, followed by the other members of his household, four in all. (Ah, those sickening "thuds!") They were traitors, but I could not beaf to look upon their mangled corpses. I fled, but not alone. One of the wetas (whioh had unaccountably grown as large as a crawfish) pursued me with leaps and bounds. I found myself on the edge of a precipice ! •My fiend-like pursuer was close upon me ! I leapt into space ! ! Down, down, I fell for miles and miles! Crash!!! Then I awoke and found myself on the floor, " and behold it was a dream," Your anxious readers will be glad to know that I am going on as well as can ha fiTnifln.ftfid.