MUNICIPAL FRANCHISE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCIX, Issue 11540, 29 March 1898, Page 3

MUNICIPAL FRANCHISE.

TO THE EDITOR. Sib, —I beg to draw your attention to an error in your report of my speech at the open-air meeting on Saturday night in connection with the Socialist Church. The figures I used were:—On the roll for Christchurch at the last election, 9290; on the municipal roll, 2461.—1 am, &c., J. A. M’CULLOUGH..

FRANCE AND HER PEOPLE TO THE EDITOE.

Sik.—“ H.C.” is sorry if he has ruffled what he styles my “ prominent characteristics —my sensitive delicacy and tender equanimity.” It would seem that he has just discovered that such feelings exist, and must, therefore, he pardoned in the hope that he will be more considerate with other people in future. I, too, am' sorry if I have misconstrued “H.C.’s” disposition towards the French. I read when in France that somewhere in the British Islands—l can only guess where —intense love for your friend was best shown by knocking him down. This must be one of “H.C.’s” prominent characteristics. What must his others be like? Your correspondent states that of late years there has been a growing feeling amongst Englishmen that under the present armed state of Europe it would be well to cultivate an alliance with France, and that Englishmen are gradually getting rid of their prejudices against foreigners, Frenchmen in particular, as their knowledge of them increases. This naif view of the position throws a brilliant light on his mental “methods,” but however much it commends itself to him, it certainly will not meet with the approval of the typical Briton. The movement that is being made on both sides of the Channel towards a permanent entente cortUale between the two nations, so far as Lean gather, has its origin in far higher grounds -than those which “ H.C.” has so artlessly described. At the meeting of the Franco-. Scottish Society, held last month in Edinburgh, the Marquis of Lothian, who presided, pointed out the mutual benefits which would he reaped in science, art and manufactures by the promotion of social intercourse and friendly relations between the two countries. These sentiments are held by the majority of the most public men of my- country.,

There are, it is true, a number of writers of the class referred to by “ H.C.,” who are only too glad to put the worst construction on anything that happens in the British dominions, but like a similar class of Englishmen, they represent only an insignificant section of public opinion. A perusal of the reports of M. Zola's trial now to hand has dispelled some of the mist in which H.C. has lost himself. They show that M. Zola, being unable to substantiate his charges against certain army officers, endeavoured to make' the accused provide evidence against themselves, which they naturally refused to do. Hence the decision of the Court—lam, &c., W. 'S. MALAQTJIN.