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Lyttelton Times, Volume LXI, Issue 7229, 1 May 1884, Page 4

It is said in the streets that Mr Rolleston was jubilant after the defeat sustained by his colleague in the Tuam street Theatre. Now, joy is so rare on the Rollestonic visage, that, assuming it to have been visited by traces of that unaccustomed emotion, the cause becomes of the utmost importance. It is impossible to hold -with a mean nature that this unwonted cheerfulness was due to the undoubted fact that the Premier's defeit was considerably greater than the disaster at Papanui. There is a far more feasible explanation. Had the Premier scored a victory in Christchurch, the result of the Papanui election would have been to show that in Canterbury the Jonah of the Ministerial bark is Mr Rolleston. The sequel to that might have been, so hard is the political world, " man overboard." As the Avon whale would not have swallowed him, his chances of getting to the firm land of political life and preaching dolefully to a wicked race of Parliamentarians would have been remote. It is easy to picture the anxiety with which the Minister for Lands awaited the result of the Christchurch meeting. It is equally easy to understand that after the result was announced, the Minister for Lands should have gone about the streets with that pleased expression of face which seems to have startled people. We beg to assure those who have been startled, and, perhaps, pained, by the curious circumstance, that it is not a sign of impending natural dissolution. It is evidence of joy that the danger of, political individual dissolution has for the present passed by. Mr Rolleston's constitution is not breaking up. His unrivalled power of repressing a smile has failed to prevent him from showing pleasure in the thought that he has not already broken to pieces. During the present voyage there will not be a Jonah. When the proper time comes the whole crew will sink together.