ASMODEUS CONTINUETH TO EARN HIS FEES AS INSPECTOR OF MORAL AND SOCIAL NUISANCES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 6099, 4 June 1881, Page 6

ASMODEUS CONTINUETH TO EARN HIS FEES AS INSPECTOR OF MORAL AND SOCIAL NUISANCES.

Month by month, week by week, yea, day by : day doth the never-ending .Sisyphean task of Asmpdeusrecoive a fresh, beginning. Timeously, as above set: forth, doth ■ the evidence of the moral putrefaction -of Miiddleheadism rise in festering biibbles to the surface of the pool of society ; and no sooner.has' he, in his capacity of .Moral. Sanitary Inspector, laid bare some malodorous iniquity,, than another claimeth:his attention; indeed; as far .as Muddleheadsareconcerned, there reihaineth lio rest for the people of Austral Gotham, and consequently., none for himself either—• yea, verily, as Figaro hath it, it.is "Asmodeus hero, • Asmodeus,, there, A-who,;, A-whcre, A-higb, Alow,;,A-epnie, A-go,;thus like a shuttlecock, tossed to. and fro, here, and there, and there I go"—O-o-ch,ho o-one ! ; The latest development of the aforesaid mental scrofula ycleped Muddleheadism is to be. found in the Grammar School fiasco. Here|s a, v palatial building, put up > at an enormous: but !it..is' hardly finished, when presto-pass they: find it to be quite unsuitable ; and they want.to expend about £5066 mpre ; in. repairing their-.error, and building, fanother.. Not a vestige of shame, nor even the slightest consciousness of error tinges the rplacid , countenances of the Governors as they tell the public that the public money they have spent is fairly chucked i away. :-No sensation of qualmishness obtaineth, with them ; nor is there shown a scintilla >{: a feeling that the boot-points of Austral. Gotham should approximate to their centres of gravity, for their deliberate and self-confessed mistake in building such a costly, school and 'then finding out their blunder after our money is spent. But oh ! ye Austral Gothamite's, more liath yet to come —gird-up thy loins for yet another Muddlehead burden to be laid on thy .shoulders unless thou kickeat it off before it is strapped on. ■-..;,. : ■- . - -

Asmodeus had occasion, some time ago, to hint parabolicr.lly that the Domain Board was "no better than ifc should be , ' in the treatment of the ewe lamb of Austral Gotham, to wit the IJomaiu thereof. He described how that Board had maltreated the unfortunate lamb, and hail shorn off all its locks and cut off its tail, out of pure Muddlehead wickedness ; but .it was then too late to-stop" the mischief. Now he warns ye ;beforehaud, O, Austral Gothamites, that, grown bolder, by: the impunity with which their former maltreatment was carried out, they are now canmbalisticaliy inclined towards the juicy and succulent joints of the aforesaid ewe lamb, and wish to make a paschal lamb thereof, by cutting off one of its legs and serving up that section thereof with the mint and cummin of public robbery as a. sauce; or, in plain English, they are' gravely proposing to cut. 25 or 30 acres off the public . domain for a grammar school, ;• and also to .turn'the boys of the aforesaid < "school'lpose.On.th& finest cricket-ground in' 'N(Jw Zealand; made so by private funds, ; arid-by"the associated cricketers of Austral Gotham !'",/'; I

" Already the Muddlehead re2itile ia convolutiiig its'slimy, folds around the coveted log of, your ewe lamb, and it will soon be licking it over, preparatory to .degliitition, unless a nipdern St. George arisetli, and with the. sword of Public, Eight and Public Honesty, deliveretli , our lamb from the fate of Laocoon.: Arise, 0 inhabitants of. Austral Gotham, arise; in your might, arid let your watchword be "Death to -Muddlebead Malversation .of Public Trust!" ; ! i'; /.' : , ' ,■" .

.Nor is'this" all tho .work for the aforesaid St. George... which they are about to surreptitiously tranform into a I school playground,. is the object of still further machinations. Do the Austral,Gbtliamitcs know that they are turning heaven aiid earth, to get leave to charge the public for admission into that part of the; public estate whenever it seemeth good in their eyes to do so; Justin the same way, .that they have attained the to char'gej for admission • into, the Acclimatisation Society's grounds, which is also public property? One section of the public estate (i.e. one slice of the ewe lamb of Austral Gotham) has already gone, and in the form of that Society's grounds'; another is about to go, in the shape-'of- , admission fees to the cricket-ground ;< and a third slice is now to be cut from the unfortunate beastioy in 'the shape of - 30 acres for a •grammar school (to. be probably botched like the present one); with all the concomitant hordes of young ; larrikins turned loose on the leafy glades of the Domain, to complete the destruction of what the Muddleheads have spared of the original beauty of the place. : Dear me ! cannot the patriotism of J. B.'-Ri-- induce him to become the hereinbeforementioned St. George, who is to slay this Muddlehead dragon ? If not, will not the blessings o£ posterity be sufficient fee to him therefor ? ■ ■ . ;'• . . . ■

Nor need that sighed-for St. George be at all ultra-heroic or over-anxious to meet with non-possumus bogies to slaughter. He would only have to bear down on the Muddlehoad den, heedless of tho phantom lions-that with ferocious aspect paw the air and roar at him from a distance ; and lo! they will turnout to be jackasses ■ iu lions' skins, or pasteboard dummies. Take, for instance, the transfer of the City Park, from the Muddlehead regime to the paternal care of tho City Fathers; Think of the money squandered, ! and the seven -'years lost since the Improvement Commission 1 had that estate ; and now tho park is only just commencing, because that Muddlehead body hath moribunded. Well! just look : at ,the roaring lions, and the bulls o' Bashan of all sorts that the Muddleheade cast ia the way of our getting our park, even when they could or would do nothing with it themselves. If the City Fathers had ,been appalled at their rumbustious arid rampshanklious' roariugs, nothing would have been done for the next generation ; but, recognising that fact, they charged straight iit -the.i.first; lion in the way, in the ■shape of private enclosures of part of.the public estate, and down . went that lion, roaring as sweetly as any sucking dove ; and down went the enclosures and fences along with 'it; : ' Up popped No. 2, in the shape of a demand for! half of the ground for a larrikin playground. ."Charge Chester, charge ! on Stanley, ; on 1" said the "Civics," and forthwith the roarings of No. 2 died softly : away in the;-limbar.echoes of Dreamland. Then the Governmental Bull o.' Bashan. was set to roar at the innovators,.and he roared so loudly, 'aneht the. retentiou of the Earracks and other [buildings, that the Civics felt Belshazzarish about their knees, yet, plucking up heart, they boldly advanced, when, lo! the roars became bleats, yea, promissory bleats, to the tune of " just a little longer," which bleats died away i a a helpless wail when the Civics bore down ou the pasteboard castle of obstruction that had stood so many former assaults (because assaulted from the 5000 yards range) and demolished it. "Jim along Joe," O thou St. George in posse if not in csse, for our hearts are burnt up, even as overcooked meat, in the fervour of our desire for thiue advent. Yea, with pen poised behind his ear, ready to chronicle thy doughty deeds ia melliftuic rhythm Carlylian sentences, or Sadlerian concatenations of verbosity, waiteth also thy humble servant, Asmodeus. Auckland, May 2G, 1881.