LOCAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11878, 1 February 1902, Page 1 (Supplement)

LOCAL GOSSIP.

- " Let me hare audience for a word or two." —Shalcespero. . I think that the City Council could be prosecuted in about a hundred ways for what they have done or left undone in the matter of the water supply. They could certainly be attacked by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The other night they started to cut off the water in the lower districts of the city; and in the Herald office, where numbers of men are employed in a hot atmosphere, not a drink could be had for love or money. If this is not cruelty to animals I don't know i\ what is. I have seen cases of prosecution of men for neglecting to supply water to horses or cattle, and I don't see why the City Council should not be prosecuted for failing to supply water (which 1 they had contracted to do) to human beings. It may be all very well for staid citizens who get ■to bed betimes, and find water all ready for them in' the morning, but what about unfortunates who have to be about and active till the dawn '! And then, at ten o'clock, all beer, which might be fallen back upon, is cut off as firmly as the water. Surely men are more patient in these days to all who assume to command them than they ever were before. The City Council are now at the'acma of barbarism and inhumanity, and have refused a cup of cold water, asked in the name of citizenship. Where are the pro-Boers, whe hold up their hands in horror at the treatment in the concentration camps ? I am quite sure that they do not refuse them there a drink of water.

■■ It seems there is an ineradicable tendency in the human mind to look upon any great convulsion of nature as a punishment for human wickedness. The great leading case is that of the Cities of the Plain, as to which the Scripture leaves us in no .doubt whatever. Readers of Goethe's life will remember how profoundly he was 'moved by the accounts which reached his parents' home of the devastation caused by the great earth- * quake at Lisbon, and how he then reflected upon the justice of God. But as against Sodom and Gomorrah, we have the assertions of Jesus, who cited the case of the men upon whom the Tower of Siloam iell. They were not in any .way specially guilty. The recent discussions about the eruption of 1886, at Tarawera, have revived recollections of

au incident. • On the Saturday morning after the great explosion I got out to Te Wairoa. ; "just «s they were digging out the remains of Mr. Bainbridge, the young English tourist , who was killed by the falling ashes. I met there an old Maori, who was lull of the idea that Te Wairoa had been destroyed because of the wickedness of the people, who had been led into all manner of debauchery by English tourists. He described instances of drunkenness' and vice amongst the score or two of people who had lived there, and would have it that the eruption had come about to punish them. I argued with him that all the possible wickedness at Te Wairoa was as nothing compared to the great masses of vice in London and other large cities, and ret they had no earthquakes. It is needless to say. that I did not convince him. Sins -always bring their punishment, even to nations, but it is not necessary to have a volcanic eruption for the purpose. The cfi'ence and. the expiation are much more closely linked together.

I have referred to the case of a man who made a needless and insulting narade of pro-Boerism, and who was punished by the cutting down ot his fruit trees. Mr. H. Glasson writes on . this subject. He says that • " whatever may be the faults ". and mistakes of British pro-Boers they appear to be mild and inoffensive persons for the most part." I don't know about that. I ; 'don't know any persons who have been guilty of so much bloodshed. Surely Mr. Glasson .would not account the fiery Mr. Stead i writing and oratorising' in London its it he were a paid agent' of Kruger and Leyds (which perhaps he is, seeing that he could afford to throw £260 back, at our Premier), as a " mild and inoffensive person." There : are two things which have encouraged the remnant of the Boers to the desperate resistance they have made— 3iope of foreign intervention, and the efforts of the pro-Boer party in England to drivo 'the Government from its .position of refusing to grant, independence to these Dutch "States. Of any kind of intervention there ..must now be very little hope; of the latter there really seemed some danger at one time, which probably would have been greater had it not been for the 'demonstrations made by the colonies. L think the British Government are at fault in not laying by the heels such men as Stead and Lloyd George.

A good-natured friend has found me out in a very small misquotation, in ascribing a remark to Gilbert's "Pirates of Penzance" instead of to his " lolanthe." Here is the letter conveying news of, the detection .. ■ i

Dear Mercutio, —From my earliest youth to the present day I have taken a great interest in all your writing?. I have in those years absorbed, so much information on every conceivable subject that I became imbued with the idea that if Mercutio gave a-quotation it could not fail to be other than correct, as there was no greater authority to appeal to. But alas! oye gods! how he has fallen from his high estate. Whilst perusing last week's paper 1 earne r,cross this quotation: "And every child that's born into this world alive is either a little Liberal or else a little Conservative," and, oh horror! imagine my feelings when I saw that these words were reputed to be uttered by a character (un:mentioned) in "Pirates of Penzance." Now as it is only a month or two ago since "lolanthe" was performed by the Auckland Amateur Opera Company I am surprised that you ha\ forgotten Private Willis in his one son;;. lam afraid thot you could _ not havo appreciated •" that prefect man," or your memory would not have failed you so soon. lam afraid that it will be some time before my shattered nerves recover their equilibrium after such a shock; and do not be; frightened if you receive an account for expenses incurred at Rotorua.—l am, etc., Ax Old Friend.

I am glad to hear that I have a character for accuracy in making quotations, as I was not aware that I deserved it. I will strive ,to act up to the mark in future. But does not Hamlet say that the memory is deceitful above all things, and desperately untrustworthy?

It was scarcely necessary for Tom Mann to come to New Zealand to hasten the advent of complete Socialism, as we are going fast' enough on the road to attempt it under the guidance of our Government. However, he has come, and has commenced his campaign by a lecture in Wellington entitled, "Socialism: Is it Coming? Is it Desirable?" the answer to both questions beyig, of course, in the affirmative. Tom Mfftm is quite convinced that Socialism is the future system of government for the world, and he lias come to this colony to study the steps that, have been taken to carry it out and to aid in the advance towards the Socialistic goal.

■ _It lias been explicitly and authoritar tively stated, and the statement is being cited at Home as being conclusive on the • ' -whole. subject, that the employers in New Zealand are delighted with the Conciliation and Arbitration Act. It would be - 'interesting to have some evidenco and : Proof of that fact, as to which, I, as Mr. Fowlds would say, "hae ma doots." Now my proposal is that His Honor Mr. Jus- ' tice Cooper should put in the box the re- • presentatives of the employers who aro ! now in Court, and elicit from them on ■; _ ■ °ath a statement of their entire satisfac.•J/'t tion with: the Act. I observe that some 'of the witnesses have stated that if the . demands of the union are conceded freights . ; ' J on . : produce consigned by, settlers will have «-'to be raised. In such a case settlers should be put in the box to say how i '•*'< ''V easily they can pay heavier. freight charges considering the : high .: prices they obtain m town for fruit and other produce,. S '

[ On a 'bus one hears many interesting items of news, including occasional bits of information not intended to be shouted to the four winds. One also hears reminiscences of the early days. One little incident was recalled the other day by an old 'busdriver, which will be remembered by all old residents, the murder of a settler's wife towards the Ivaipara by a Maori, and the escape of the daughters through the bush, one carrying a child for several miles through the dense tea-tree. The driver was among the children who, " with the women, were brought into Auckland as the news of the murder spread, .and was magnified into a native rising. The Riverhead millhands armed and. set out overland for Hclensville,. and Sir George Grey called out the militia and took steps for the protection of the inhabitants. But the Maori chiefs denied all cognisance or responsibility, and offered to marshal' their men so that one of the murdered woman's daughters could pick out the guilty one. Passing down the rank on the arm of the Riverhead millowner the girl suspected a man whom she had passed, and whose hat was pulled over his eyes. She turned back, and the hat was pulled off. " That's him! That's him !" she cried, poking at him with her parasol! Thus nearly are the pathetic and the ridiculous allied. The poking of the. Maori murderer with the point of a parasol has lived in the memory of those who witnessed it when more momentous details have long been forgotten.

The Maori was hung, of course. But another and more valuable life perished before his. Coming back from the Kaipara along* the tough track one of the Riverhead men accidentally, let off his gun, and a comrade was killed. "Yes," said the 'busdriver, explaining, "that was in old Sir George Grey's time. Old Sir George Grey that was!. He was the" man that- smoothed the Maoris with flour and sugar, and he got the capital shifted from here to Wellington, he did." And in his tone was an ancient grudge, a grudge which can only be understood by those who remember the collapse of Auckland after the withdrawal of the troops and the removal of the capital. Yet the facts are true. The "smoothing" of the Maoris and the shifting of the capital are good or bad according to the way you regard them. Few policies axe universally popular, and these were not universally popular at the time. Mehcutio.