CATTLE TRESPASS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XII, Issue 734, 19 November 1859, Page 4

CATTLE TRESPASS.

To the Editor of the Lyttelton Times. Sra,-In your last issue there is a letter, addressed to the members of the Provincial Council by Mr Stoddart, severely condemning the amendment' recently proposed by me on the Cattle Trespass Ordinance I should not have felt it incumbent on mo to reply to Mr. Stoddart, had he confined himself to the merits of that amendment, although he has taken care to give only a one-sided and therefore false view of the whole question : but Mr btoddart has been pleased to ignore the rules of debate and descended to an unworthy personal attack on my character as a landlord, a neighbour and a member of the Provincial Council Nay more, he insinuates that the large number of respectable settlers who signed the petition in support of my, motion are sycophants and cravens, who meanly bow their necks that I may put the yoke

uponi them. Now, Sir, all this is very unworthy Mr. Stoddart knows well (unless, as is not unlikely' ho Is blinded by personal ill-feeling toward £' that my object and the object of the petitioners was to secure iair-play and justice for a large numT/er of sheep and stock owners, whose interests, un r he present Ca tie Trespass Ordinance, are cXIe XI oed to great peril from the injustice and selfish™«« *r one or two individuals like Mr. s Z\Z f who wiA to gather all the proflt. of agriculJ^thou^fS filling the duties incumbent on them as agricultu-

The district proposed to be affected by mv %mon(] ment contains a number of dairy farms omhnwlZ 2000 head of cattle, and say 6000 to 10,000 sheen Tho country they traverse is so rugged and mountainom that there is little chance of any considerable portion being useful except for pastoral purposes. Jt must be patent to the common sense of every man thar the pastoral interest in that locality should be protected, particularly as it may be done without any injustice to others. y

Mr. Stoddart wilfully misrepresents the case by stating that the proposed amendment would reduce the penalties for trespass upon freehold and improved land to a nominality. If he had said unfenced land he would have given a more correct description of the proposed amendment, which would give full damages for enclosed land, and ordinary damages in cases where crops were sown and left unfenced as a trap for neighbours' cattle. Mr. Stoddart, or any other man, actuated by malevolent feelings, might under the present law, cultivate a small patch of ground and leave it unfenced, in the midst of a country surrounded by dairy farms, by which his neighbours' interests would grievously suffer and no party be benefitted. It is the remedy of this evil that I propose by my amendment, and at the proper time and in the proper place I trust to make its reasonableness apparent. In conclusion I would suggest to Mr. Stoddarfc that to impute improper motives, and to insult an influential body of enterprising, industrious settlers, is not only in bad taste, but is also ungentlemanly, unneighbourly, and unkind. Your obedient servant, E. H. KHODES.