LOCAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 6936, 9 February 1884, Page 1 (Supplement)

LOCAL GOSSIP.

" Let me have audience foi a word or two." — Bhak3perc. The cricketers have had a very bad quarter Of an hour lately. The popular belief being that they want to filch a portion of the Domain from the public, quite a storm of indignation has been let loose upon tho heads of the wielders of the willow. They have been pitched into on all sides. The Press has fulminated against them, and the man in the street has held them up to public scornBat they have not been utterly pulverised. They continue to movo and have their being. In fact, far from being crushed and brokenhearted, they are quietly laughing in their sleeves at the hubbub which has been raised, It is all a big storm in a small tea-cup. The public are labonring under a delusion. The cricketers don't want to rob us of our Domain or any parb of it. They Con't <iven want to be vested with any special privilege in respect to the cricket ground. All they want ie that the Domain Board, or the City Council, or whoever has charge of the Domain, should have the power—which at present they haven't—of authorising them (should they see fit to do so) to charge an admission fee to the ground on any extraordinary occasion, such as an interprovincial or intercolonial match.

There is nothing very alarming in this proposal. It appears to me to be a very fair and reasonable one. The cricketera aro entitled to some little consideration. They play for their own amusement, but they also pay for it. They have really made the present cricket ground what it is. A few years ago it was a dismal swamp. It has been at their cost that it has been converted into a spacious green sward. They pay at least £100 a-year for the privilege of playing upon it. There is nothiDg, therefore, either presumptuous or preposterous in what they_ are now asking for, namely, that the authorities of the Domain should be vested with power to receive and grant applications from them to charge an admission fee to the great matches of the season. The idea that is abroad, that they want to have the cricket around handed over to them to deal with as they please is entirely fallacious. They want nothing of the kind.

The proposal of a sapient city councillor to dieband the fire brigade, as_ a means of bringing the insurance companies to their senses, is not altogether a happy thought. It would be something like jumping out of the fryingpan into the fire. But I suppose the councillor meant his suggestion for lurid joke. It is about time, however, that some.

thing was done to put the fire brigade on a more satisfactory footing, There is the question, for instance, of providing horses for the use of the brigade. It is a disgrace and a scandal to the city of Auckland' that its firemen should tie left to drag their machine through the streets whenever a fire ocours; arriving at the scene of operations in a thoroughly fagged condition. There was' that.disastrous fire the other day up the Kyber Pass-road. All that long way these brave and daring fellows had to pull and push their machine at a quick run, and when they got to the fire, blown and exhausted, had to buokle to and work like Trojans. Ob, it was pitiful, Near a wholo cityful, Horso they had none.

Everybody has hoard of the wonderful state of perfection of the San Francisco fire brigade. There, the moment the alarm is given at the station, the firemen, should they happen to be in bed, are pitchforked into their clothes by some ingenious mechanical device, the horses, ready harnessed, fall into their places in a twinkling, and everything is in readiness and the brigade Oα the way to the fire in—l forget what infinitesimal space of time. Of course we can't expect anything approaching that in this Corinth of the South, but we might have a couple of horses to drag the machine. Hasn't Councillor Crowther any suggestion to make on this subject ?

I noticed in the newspapers the other day that Mrs. Waddel was described as " the Lady Mayoress." This, of course, is a mistake. We have no Lord Mayor of Auckland, and therefore can have no Lady Mayoress. I believe it is a fact that thero are only three women in the British Empire who are entitled to be addressed as " Lady Mayoress." They are the wives of the Lord Mayors of London, York, and Dublin.

Here is a poser for the youngsters. There are four words in the English language ending in "dous." Here are three of them

—"tremendous," "stupendous," "hazardous. " Now I want to see how many of my young readers can supply me with the fourth word. Mind, they mustn't ask their "pa'e" or "ma's." They know, of course, and could toll them in a miuute. But I want the young people to find it out for themselves.

The Rev. Mackenzie Fraser tella an amusing story of "an error of the press," in connection with the rerjort of a sermon which he once delivered in Singapore. He had used the words ' £ the agencies which produce famines" in the nourse of his discourse, which had a bearing on thoße terrible visitations which periodically inflict; our Eastern Empire, but imagine his feelings next morning when he read in the local newspaper that he had eloqpenty discoursed on "the agencies whiohj'procure families." This, of course, was the mistake of the inevitable "comp.,"who is popularly supposed to take a fiendish delight in contorting, misrepresenting, and burlesquing the sense of a sensitive writer. But his atrocity in this case sinks into insignificance when compared with.the stupendous blunder which figured in an English newspaper a short time ago, and for which ho certainly could not be held responsible. Id. tho Eastern Daily Press a report of the funeral of the eminent bibliographer, philologist, and Shaksperian commentator, John Payne Collier, appeared under the head of "The Bray Colliery Disaster," and read as follows :—"The remains of the late Mr. John Payne, collier, were interred yesterday afternoon in the Bray churchyard, in the presence of. a large number of spectators." But mistakes of a remarkable kind occur nearer home sometimes. Last week a local print buried a deceased citizen the day before the funeral.

Seeing mention of Auckland cigara in the Herald the other day, reminded me that the article has been proved years ago. and that in doing so Mr. Justice Gillies, thocgh a Scotchman, managed to perpetrate a pleasantry. Perhaps, it would be more correct to say that he "had" a

number of people who thought they were clever, which is not so rare a thing for a Scotchman to do. Some tobacco leaf was grown near Auckland, and made into cigars. Mr. Gillies, then a member of the House of Representatives, took a number to Wellington, and distributed them to connoisseurs in thejsmoking room, asking for their opinion on the. new brand. Ono said they were Havannas, another, would have it they were Gubas, another that they were Manillas, and so on. They were all very much astonished when Mr. Gillies gave the information that they were of native growth and manufacture. The law now gives an advantage which was not afforded then, and if care is taken, Auckland tobacco and cigars should become famous.

There is no breaoh of privacy ia speaking of Sir Frederick Whitaker's horror of the sea, and his certainty of sea-sickness whenever he goes on board any vessel. That has been often referred to. He always disappears when he gets on board ship, and is not visible until the ship is again moored. I am told that a- gallant captain who has had a long experience in carrying Governors and Ministers, declares that the membere of the present, or the late, or, I shall soy, the Continuous Ministry, were immeasurably inferior to their predecessors, if not as politicians, at all events as sailors. A Ministry which contains Mr. Bryce is heavily wei«hted in the matter of sea-sickness, for while on board a vessel he has hardly any life left in him. Major Atkinson is nearly as bad. Sir George Grey and Mr. Sheehan, on tho other hand, never felt a qualm, either of conscience or of stomach, however the winds might blow. But on his return journey from Sydney, the splendours of his approaching title must have acted as a preventative on Sir Frederick Whitaker, for here is what a fellow passenger of Sir Frederick says:—"Leaving Sydney by the s.e. Wairarapa, one of the Union Company's fastest steamers, I landed in Auckland after a quick and eujoyable passage of but a little over four days. . . The passengers were all very sociable, and the eve of Christmas was heralded by Welsh ' rarebit' jand a musical entertainment, presided over in a very able manner by the Hon. the ex-Premier of Now Zealand." Those who have seen Sir Frederick on board a steamer will hardly be able to conceive his presiding over a jollification, and consuming liquors and Welsh rabbits.

Some people appear to have put what we believe to be an utterly mistaken construction upon Sir Georgo Grey having got Mr. Reos to read the extracts in his speech at the Choral Hall. For instance the Timam Herald says :—" It has been rumoured late y that Sir George Grey i 3 failing a good deal both, mentally and physically. The latter portion of tho rumour ie probably true, for we see that in the course of his address at Auckland on Tuesday, Sir George borrrowed Mr, Recs' lungs to relieve him of the labour of reading lengthy documents, That very same address, however, is a sufficient proof that the decline of his mental power 3 has not yet set in, It ia one of tho ckverest addresses he ever delivered, and its cleverness is of a kind essentially characteristic of Sir Georgo Groy." It is quite a mistake to infer that tho fivct of Mr. >tces having been asked to read the extracts, is a proof of physical failing on Sir George Grey's part. No doubt the plan to some extent relieved tho speaker, to an extent which men a great many years younger than Sir George Grey would be glad of, but I believe that the chiof object was to relieve the audience. The reading of :n extract by another person than the speaker clearly distinguishes it as an oxtraot, aud prevents it from gaining any sympathy it might obtain fiom being delivered by tho person who cites it to criticise it. Further, it is a relief to the ears of tho listeners to have a change of voice and attitude for a time. When the speaker begins again it is to the audience as if he had started afresh. It is surprising that the writer in the Timaru Herald, who always finds that Sir Georgo Groy has some clever and cunning reason for what he does, did not find out the above and half a dozen other motives,

Several visitors to the Domain have been much, oxercised as to the brilliant groen crop which Mr. James Mason is now growing in his nursery ground, The enterprising gardener has had many inquiries as to the particular' kind of this garden produce. Is it cabbage? No. Spinach? No. Is it maize? No. Then what is it? Tobacco, quoth the nurseryman, to the amazement of the inquirers. Meroutio.