LOCAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 8986, 25 February 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

LOCAL GOSSIP.

" Let us have audience for a word or two." ; —Shakspere. I observe paragraphs in the papers published all over the colony stating that St. Valentino's Day, the 14th of February, was scarcely noticed this year, and even the postmen in our large towns could hardly detect any increase in the letters they carried out on that day. Why this change should have come about is an un- ' .lived puzzle. It may bo that Love, like | everything else in this world, has its fashions, and that changes occur in the way of telling tho old, old story. Gradually, the sentimental valentine, with Cupid, hearts transfixed by arrows, etc., began to die out, its placo being largely filled by the satirical and comic substitute. But then this began to be thought rather a poor joke, and also died away. The facilities for sending valentines are greater than ever. They can be made of handsome form, and postage is cheap enough. Is the age becoming too material and utilitarian ? Perhaps the dying out of the custom has been accelerated in this Southern hemisphere by the fact that the anniversary is here in autumn instead of in spring. In this latter season wo are told on poetic authority that young men's thoughts turn naturally to love, and the poets who produced amatory verses always dwelt on the fact that about the middle of February the birds began to look out for mates.

Muse, bid the morn awake," Sad winter now declines ; Each bird doth choose a mate, This day St. Valentine's. This year hardly any of our Auckland stationers thought it worth while to display valentines in their windows. I am afraid that the Age of Chivalry is past, if it ever existed in Auckland.

Ever since I knew him, Sir Julius Vogel, when not engaged in negotiating a Dig loan, has been employed in getting up a big company. All of these companies have been failures, but Sir Julius—lucky fellow! — has managed invariably to make something out of them. One of the latest companies he had anything to do with was the Electric Light and Storage Company, on whose behalf he made a voyage to Australia. We all remember what a magnificent position he then assumed—how he would scarcely look at New Zealand and its paltry affairs. Well, the reckoning was summed up in a paragraph in the Herald the other day. At the meeting of the company a few weeks ago, the chairman said that of the £120, which formed the company's original capital, excluding vendors' and founders' shares, not less than £85,000 absolutely disappeared during the first year of the company's existence. Of this amount £45,000 in cash was paid for patents, besides £30,000 worth of shares. Then the company lost £5570 upon the purchase of the option of the Sellon-Volkmar accumulators, and the advertising trip of Sir Julius Vogel cost the concern over £5000, without any result whatever. Now, although I have a connection with literature, and am quite proud of that connection, I do think it is somewhat of a "come down" for Sir Julius to give up politics and great schemes of electric lighting, in order to work a " Picturesque Pacific Atlas"—to become, in short, a book agent. No doubt, his genius will be chiefly shown in the arrangements as to the company, with its "founders' shares," and so on. I don't know myself that the book is a "felt want." The Polynesians and Melanesians are not dying for want of it, and the people in Australia and New Zealand who take such an interest in the Islands as to lead them to become subscribers to a costly series, are very few. However, Sir Julius may get up a company, which is of course the first step.

But it is rather too bad of him to seek to forestal his friend Mr. Moss, who has been for some time engaged on a work of the same character. Surely something is due to a man who has on several occasions rendered Sir Julius such essential service. Could the enterprises not be combined ? Could Sir Julius not be engaged to undertake a canvassing tour for this book which Mr. Moss is now writing ? These are the days of retrenchment and economy, and perhaps Sir Julius might now take somewhat less than "over £5000" for an advertising tour.

But how about New Zealand politics in the absence of Sir Julius? What is the Opposition to do Their most creditable figurehead would be the Hon. Mr. Ballance, but it seems that a large section of the party would not act under him, and that nothing remains but a choice between Mr. Fish, of Dunedin, and Mr. Seddon, of the West Coast. Mr. Fish and Mr.' Seddon are first-rate at " slangwhanging," if that is the chief accomplishment in a leader.

The discussion which has been going on during the last few days about handwriting, and as to whether those boys who seek admission into the Grammar School having passed the sixth standard in the common schools, write well, induces remark about precept and practice. Mr. O'Sullivan, the late Inspector of Schools, was not in this controversy, but ' he figured strongly in a former one, when the merits and demerits of Vere Foster were in question. Mr. O'Sullivan had exceedingly correct ideas about handwriting, as to how it should be taught, and the style which, should be adopted, so that it should be legible when quickly written, but in his own caligraphy he set all his principles at defiance. In the present instance, the chief fault-finders were Mr. Bourne and Mr. Upton. Would they be good enough just to send in specimens of their ordinary handwriting, so that the boys in the public schools and in the Grammar Schools should see how the thing should be done to be accounted perfect ?

Rather than pay his little bill for board and washing, Sydney Taiwhanga elected to take it out in Wellington Gaol. By-aud-by, however, a change came over the spirit of his dream. He knuckled down, paid the money, and was let out. lam rather surprised at this. I would not have been the least astonished if hard labour had been enforced, because no Maori likes to be compelled to work, and Mr. Sydney Taiwhanga just as little as any of his race. He had also plenty of time for sleep. But, then, it was inconvenient to be cut off from the usual social pleasures, and the gratification of discussing politics on Lambton Quay and in the Parliamentary Library. I don't suppose that the sentiment of degradation counted for much. Sydney's plea for non-payment was logically bad, and was regarded as legally bad by the Court. He could not pay his board, he said, because the Government would not pay a claim he had against them on account of an old land transaction. It was shown that he possessed the money all along, when he relented and paid during the time of his imprisonment.

Greatness has its penalties. Some persona, envious of Mr. Garrard, now that he is a municipal official and Dog-catcher Extraordinary to the City Council, have been circulating malicious libels about him. One of the latest is that he run in the Admiral's dog. Now, as an old man-of-war's-man, having served in H.M.s. Terrible in the Crimean War, Mr. Garrard has too keen a feeling of comradeship and of what is due to the service to let up on the Admiral in that fashion. The real facts of the case are that the Admiral lost the dog, and asked Mr. Garrard, for the sake of old times, to keep an eye to the dog ; and on this slender peg has been hung the scandalous rumour about the dog having been run in.

The conduct of the sailors of the squadron has been, on the whole, excellent. No greater contrast could be found than between the tar of twenty years ago and his representative of to-day. At that period, when they came ashore, they were bound to go " oft the wallaby," perform a series of antics seldom to be seen out of Bedlam, and wind-up with a fight with the police. What do we see now Sailors going out to temperance picnics, delivering temperance speeches and recitations, and contributing temperance entertainments. Last Saturday evening, at the Tabernacle, a sailor was delivering an evangelistic address; at the Salvation Army Barracks another was " testifying a third was at the Freeman's Bay Mission ; while a fourth was giving a, street) discourse at the foot of Grey-street,

a mate leading the psalmody. Dibdin's bones would rattle in their shroud if he could again see the "sea-dogs," whom ho immortalised as apostrophising their eyes and shivering their timbers, at this new work, and he would infallibly come to the conclusion that '' tho service was going to the devil!" Still, withal, tho consolation is —one thing changeth not, whether in the line-of-battleship, with its snowy canvas, or in " the hogs in armour"— hearts of oak of old are the hearts of oak still.

I saw a letter at the municipal offices during the week addressed " Messrs. City Council." That tho writer hud made a mess of it there is no doubt, but it is melancholy to look upon a superscription of this character and then think that the country is paying half a million a year for education.

The difficulty of securing a conviction for Sunday liquor trading is proverbial, but in few instances have there been such peculiar developments as in a case recently heard in Onehunga. Dr. J. Foster-Wanstall was seen by the police coming out of an Onehunga public-house with a bottle of stout in his possession, and the worthy doctor gave as one of the numerous reasons why he required " invalid " stout, that a few mornings previously while bathing he had been scared by a shark, and him nerves were shaken. There is a delicious sense of novelty in the statement of the doctor which may afford a wrinkle to future witnesses in cases of this sort, and if it is accepted as a valid excuse by the Courts, then it will be utterly hopeless for the police, under any circumstances, to endeavour to secure a conviction, for where is the man whose nerves have not boen shocked at some period more or less remote, and who may, therefore, think himself entitled to the refreshing sedative contained in Ehrenfried's invalid stout?

The ghastliest joke in connection with the Calliope Dock " incident," it is stated, was that an offer was made to utilise the Naval Volunteers of the guard of " honour" in assisting the police to " maintain order !" at the opehing proceedings of the dock. It is rumoured that when Inspector Shearman saw Leßoy's Lambkins, or at least the rump" of the guard of honour, waltzing round Castle's store-room, he came to the conclusion that they were more dangerous to their friends than their foes. It goes without saying that the police 14 assisted to maintain order" to the finish by acting as " chuckers-out "at the luncheon-shed. As tho committee of the Squadron Sports in the Domain on Monday have decided that there shall be no beer casks on tap, and no drinking-booth permits, it will be a matter of curiosity to note the contrast between " the more excellent, way" now introduced and the Calliope style—even though five hundred menof-warsmen will be on the ground. If such a practical contrast will not convince men that there is a right and a wrong way of doing everything, they would not believe even Moses and the prophets.

The Newmarket Borough Council are experiencing the usual difficulties in regard to the removal of nightsoil from the borough. A good many ratepayers, rather than employ the nightman, have, it appears, been in the habit of burying nightsoil in their gardens to the annoyance of their neighbours and to the great danger of the health of the borough. But the Council have grasped the difficulty, and in future no burgess will have any excuse for evading the nightman, for the Council have accepted a lump sum tender, and to meet the cost will strike a special rate. Under these circumstances all must pay whether the nightman is employed or not, and I venture to think that under those circumstances there are very few indeed who will not see that he performs his duties so far as their own personal premises are concerned. It is a step in the right direction, and in the borough of Newmarket the nightman will no longer have to collect his own fees or complain about tenants leaving without paying up. Another thing, it will save incoming tenants from having to pay arrears due by their predecessors, a very fruitful source of complaint and annoyance hitherto. Mercctio.