A RECENT QUESTION.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLVII, Issue XLVII, 11 July 1912, Page 6

A RECENT QUESTION.

(To tee Editor.) Sir, —It is altogether too bad that- the people should be asking questions about Mt. Wm. Lock in your columns. It is a matter for congratulation that a coir. - paratively young and inexperienced member like our new member should be so fortunate in having Mr. Lock to assist him. With Mr Lock's large and varied European and. -American experience, to. say nothing of his long connection withi the politics of this dominion, it is questionable whether any of the newly-elected members of Parlament are so advantageously placed as our member is in" having Mr. Lock for a-guide, •philosopher ancl friend; the pity is that he cannot have Mr. Lock with him in Wellington, all the time. When out member attains Cabinet rank, which Mr. Lock has repeatedly told us he will, no doubt Mx. Lock will be in a' very proud position: A light will no doubt be placed an Tongue Point, and, if necessary, a brake on the tongue that has been advertising this electorate. ' I am, etc., BELL BUOY.

(To the Editor.) Sir, —The letter signed by the wouldbe masquerading above the title "Ordinary Seaman" in last night's paper has more than funny things in it. It is an attack' on o"ne of the best known and most respected of our public men, ,Mr Lock, to wit. Mr Lock's letter pointing out the discrepancy between "Own Correspondent's" reports of Mr Atmore's recent speech merely called attention to a difference which was remarkably obvious to all who read both the * 'Colonist" and the "Mail," and was merely an appeal for fair play, which the most bitter political opponent should not object to. "Ordinary Seaman," however, makes it an occasion, not only to question the purity of Mr Lock's motives, but to make fun of the proposalto put a light on-''Tongue Point/' Tera whiti. Now, there are some things which should be above the scurrilous flippancy o"f an anonymous enemy: one is .tbe integrity of an honourable man, another is the "proposal to safeguard the scene of the Penguin disaster To New Zealand the loss of the Penguin was as big a calamity proportionately l as the loss of the Titanic was to Great Britain and America. Mr "Atmore's efforts to have a lighthouse erected so as to prevent a recurrence of a similar disaster to that of the Penguin should receive the thanks of the whole community, instead of being made the peg on which t/t hang a fatuous attack on the member for the district and the chairman of his election committee. I am, etc., FAIR PLAY.