FIFTY YEARS AGO.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXXIII, Issue 15920, 4 May 1912, Page 9

FIFTY YEARS AGO.

(From the " Lyttelton Times" of Saturday, May 3, 1862.) The election of members to represent the town of Akaroa and the Wainui. and Bays districts in tho Provincial Council took place on Monday, April 28, at the Court House, Akaroa. The returning officer (O. W. Weston, Esq.) having read the writs, Mr C. J. Waockerle proposed, and-Mr J. D. Garwood seconded, James Edward Fitzgerald, Esq., for the town of, Akaroa. Mr George Haylock proposed, and Mr George Scarborough seconded, George Armstrong, Esq., for tho Wainui district. The Rev H. Torlosse proposed, and Mr John E. Thacker seconded, Robert Heaton Rhodes, Esq., for the Bays district. No other candidates being' proposed, the returning officer declared the above gentlemen duly elected. A vote of thanks to the returning officer closed the proceedings.

' The Post Office at Lyttelton . ~ . is utterly unfitted for the present requirements of the place, and imposes an undue amount of responsibility upon the Postmastor. Nearly every one is acquainted with the mean looking patched cabin to which we allude; its measurement is, we believe, about 28ft by 12ft, with a lean-to measuring about 14ft by 10ft. Of the English mail, which now consists of from twenty-eight to thirty-two boxes, not more than onehalf can be admitted into the Post Office at one time, that portion filling all the availabjo space. Five or six individuals are, on the arrival of the mail, crammed in to tnis office, and have to perform their work under very great difficulties, resulting from want of room, and from the unceasing demands of the public on their already occupied attention.