STRAY NOTES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CI, Issue 11884, 6 May 1899, Page 8

STRAY NOTES.

A Maori with an utterly unpronounceable name died during' the week at Kaiapoi. His full title was Hone Paratene Tamanuiarangai, but to save time and to avoid unnecessary and protracted struggles with the language, he was commonly known as John Patterson. But that is by the way. This note is concerned not with a point of nomenclature, hut with the history of a man who had lived through seventy-eight eventful years. Stranger than fiction must have been the story of this chieftain of his race. He was a spectator of the greatest changes that a man could witness. Ho knew New Zealand as it was in the early twenties. He had travelled from the sea to the hills, and from the Eangitata to the Waimakariri, and had seen no sign of the white man, nor any evidence that the kingdom of his own people was like that of Belshazzar, and about to pass. New Zealand was then a laud of solemn silences. There were wide, empty spaces, and weird unearthly forests, and long miles of native grass. But it was still a land of great silences. It was the land of the brown man, and the brown man left it to settle itself. Now the white man is here, and the Maori who sat in the Parliament of tho stranger must have asked himself whether he had died and lived again, or whether his previous existence was a dream. It is strange that one man’s life can bridge the gulf between the old Maoriland and the new.

If things go on as they are going at present, it will soon be time to start a society for the> protection of Stipendiary Magistrates. For instance—every creditable story should begin with for instance—there is Mr Beetham, who the other day fell a victim to something that might have been prevented. There was a lady in the Court, and as Air Eeetham’s ill-luck would have it, she was called on to give evidence. Now there are some women who can be silent in three or four languages, and there are others who can talk for half a day and use only one. This woman was one of the latter kind. She talked and still talked, and after she had finished with one subject she started on another. She talked until tho head of the nearest police constable fell forward on his chest, and even one of the office stools showed signs of going to sleep. She was still talking when Air Beetham, realising that the case had got beyond his powers, asked Mr Beattie if he could do anything. But •Mr Beattie admitted that’ he couldn’t. Then Mr Beetham subsided, and was beginning to reflect with intense bitterness upon his position when there came a temporary break in the storm of sound. The Magistrate noted it, and with the air of a man catching at his last chance, delivered judgment. After that, of course, it was all plain sailing. The lady was eloquent no more. But it all shows the dangers to which a-magistrate is exposed and the need for protection of some kind.

Everyone will be glad to learn that Mr John Duthie—Honest John Duthie, some of his friends call him, as if to distinguish him from another member of the family who is not quite so particular—has improved in health, and is not likely to retire from public life. Mr Seddon ought to be as pleased as the rest of us are to learn that the junior member for Wellington is to continue to adorn his place in Parliament. “ Honest John ” has a knack of saying the wrong thing at the wrong moment, which ought' to bo worth half-a-dozen years of office to his political opponents. His allusion to a number of eminently respectable Maori gentlemen as “ nigger landlords ” was as good as a thousand votes to the Premier at the next general election. Mr JDuthie’s explanation aggravated his offence; in fact, it was worse than the offence itself, and whatever else may- happen nex;t December, we may be quite sure that the Government will secure the four Maori seats. Mr Duthie put his foot in it again at Nelson the other day. Some disagreeable man in the audience he was addressing suggested that some credit was due to the Premier for the large increase in the population of the c-'-ny between 1892 and 1895. Mr Duthie was ready, in his own way, for this unexpected thrust. “ The people who came from Australia during that time,” he said, “ were all blacklegs or spielers.” The disagreeable man protested with a timid “Ok!” but the rest of the audience quietly accepted Mr Duthie’s estimate of the Australian immigrants. In a few days, however, some of these much-maligned people began to complain of the terms that had been applied to them. They numbered twenty-five thousand odd altogether, and included no less a celebrity than the genial editor of the Wellington “Post,” neither blackleg nor spieler, who had splintered many a lance on behalf of “ Honest John ” and his party. The editor naturally took the matter to heart, and is now much less cordial, both in and out of print, than he was a few months ago towards the junior member. It might, if the Opposition has really abandoned- its “stumping” campaign, pay the Government to engage Mr Duthie for the remainder of the recess. He would have only to speak often enough to drive every elector into the Liberal camp.

A peculiar light is thrown on the American character by two recent cable messages. The intelligent Yank is known to be a gentleman ■ who is not too slow 5 in fact, to use the classic language of the man in the street, he generally gets there before anyone else. But lately he seems to have been surpassing himself. He has been running races across that insignificant streak of water that divides London from New York. Two liners had a set-to the. other day, and the American arrived at his end of the journey exactly two hours and. thirty-two minutes after the other .fellow. The fact that the other fellow was not an American doesn’t affect the argument, which is that the typical American has enough superfluous energy to race all creation, and isn’t happy unless he is doing it. But this is only one of the two messages which, as already stated, show the American, man or woman, is always liable to do things in a hurry. Mrs Sloane, an American millionairess, was divorced from her husband last week, and four hours after the divorce she had married someone else. This is rapidity with a vengeance. It is now quite plain that the Americans can get across the Atlantic faster than any other people, excepting the British, and that they can get remarried at a pace that might fill even the British with envy if they were not paralysed with alarm. It is interesting to know that the local Tory organs have at ■ last discovered what they want. They have been all this time looking for a Premier who will stay at home, and go to bed early, and not travel about the country at all. Some dreadful things have been discovered about Mr Seddon of late. Instead of remaining in modest retirement at Wellington, and looking through a Government window in the daytime, preparatory to dozing at

night, he has actually been getting into trains and steamers, and things of that kind. Why/ he left Wellington not more than two months ago to go north, and quite lately he actually had the audacity to come soitth. The Tory paper that discovered this was naturally surprised and hurt. But what does the venerable mentor want the Premier to do ? Does it want him to remain in seclusion with his boots against the fender, and a copy of Marie Corelli in his hand? Or does it want him to stay at home and play dominoes ? It is a pity that there has been no explanation on these points, as we should then know what to advise. In the meantime, those people who want to see Mr Seddon are pleased to have the opportunity to do so.

The age of chivalry, as everybody knows, is past, but there seem to be a few crude romances of one kind and another still in existence. The author of these observations occasionally rambles down to Sumner, sometimes allured by natural beauty, sometimes with a view to seeing who is there. It was interesting, the other afternoon, to notice two people who were walking on the beach. They were kindred spirits; that was evident at a glance. The waves were far back on the sea-line, and the sands were bright,- as they generally are when the sun was overhead. The man and tho girl walked slowly, and occasionally looked at each other, • but they said very little. Presumably there was up need. There was an understanding between them, as anyone could have seen. They came forward slowly, and then the man, who was carrying alight cane, stooped and began to trace letters on thesand. He traced the letters once and then he traced them over again. It was a simple affair, and anyone with as much sense as the seagulls that were looking on could have guessed that* he was writing the name of the girl beside him. Then they came on together. The incident was of no importance, and scarcely one of the few people about noticed it. But half an hour afterwards the waves came - up and washed the letters -out. This, too, was of no importance, although an old seagull overhead smiled grimly to himself. The solemn old bird seemed to think thdt most romances, sooner or later, get washed out. ' j .