Intelligent Vagrant.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 209, 11 September 1875, Page 13

Intelligent Vagrant.

CJuis scit an adjiciant hodiernal crastina summit; J empora Di Superi.— Horace.

His Excellency Brigadier Connnodore-in-Chief Captain Louttit, has been good enough to send me au order to apologise. I suppose it is all right, but I really am not conscious of Im\ ing ever mentioned the great man’s name. 1 hat will not, however, prevent my doing the proper thing under the circumstances. I desk e, therefore, to express my most sincere heartfelt and thorough regret that poor Leßoy should have fallen from the topgallant yard of the Rodney, and been killed, and should have been subsequently buried in au unostentatious manner. Can X say more ?

Mr. O’Shea, I congratulate you. Your definition of the qualifications necessary to become a leading politician had all the merit of candor and simplicity. I agree with you entirely that to take such position one must bo ostentatious and unquiet, and above all have plenty of brass. I regret with you, sir, that the lack of these requisites was a fatal obstacle to the progress of Mr. Gisborne. But lam comforted b/one thing. I hear you are not without an intention yourself of having ago j u at politics. Permit me in our mutual faith to predict for you an entire and complete success.

Nothing annoys me so much as to hear au honest gentleman speaking with sincerity to au utterly unappreciative audience. Need I therefore mention the disgust with which I saw the effect, or want of effect, of Mr. Dignau’s speech on Thursday in the House of JLlepresentatives. But if the members failed to appreciate him, he was not left unrcco-'-nisod by a stranger. I heard one gentleman, when leaving the public gallery, say to another : Is it I at Dignan ye inane ?' The gratest thrate of the dibbate, sor His spache

smelt of the ould sod all over. Whin lie implored lion., numbers to pause on the pat they wor pursliooiug, begorra I almost cried hare, hare ! Av anyone but O’Rorke had been in the cheer I couldn t have restreened niesilf, but respict for a pathriot made me dumb.”

Those members who got supplements printed for their little paper friends are naturally indignant that one of their dearest privileges should bo done away with. lam not argue the right or wrong of this matter! I am merely anxious to put a question and tell a little story. First for my question : Please Mr. O’Conor, you said that you sent your little broadsheets to the newspapers published in your district for distribution. Then may I ask you, without notice, to tell ine how many you sent to. the Westport Times and Bailer News respectively ? Bearer waits. And now for my little story : During a session of Parliament other than that now going on, a member had 1000 copies of a speech of a Minister printed at the Government Printing Office, and then distributed them amongst his, the member’s, constituents by means of 0.P.5.0. envelopes. It was a patriotic action, and it economised in the way of posta o stamps.

I am not unaccustomed myself to settling with my creditors either by recourse to a bankruptcy court or by the less expensive process known as a “judicious slither.” When I say anything about such matters then, I am able to do so with an utter absence of false pride. My young friend Ivafoozle found occasion to leave Wellington lately. It was to his advantage to do so without giving any unnecessary publicity to the fact. On the wharf, looking at the steamer by which Ku foozle was to depart, was his bootmaker, ME Hopper, in whose books he occupied a prominent position. Ivafoozle,. seeing this, wrapped a comforter around his throat, and was assisted in a feeble condition up the gangway by a friend who sympathised with him. Hopper ran on board after him, and inquired solicitously where he was going. He said to the genial climate of Nelson for a week ; that he had been suffering for some time fi oni congenital fissure of the sternum, and a few friends had provided him with the means to take change of air. He further hinted that it was not improbable that on his return his friends would help him out of his pecuniary difficulties. Hopper stood a glass of stout (as a liquor suitable to the complaint under notice), and went ashore. When he heard afterwards that Ivafoozle was off for Melbourne, he made an entry in his books under that gentleman’s name—“ Settled by hooking it.”

I am not a supporter of Mr. Thomas Russell. . Ido not care for capitalists, and sympathise with those who dislike them, recognising that the minute a man becomes a capitalist he is necessarily placed in antagonism to those who have not capital, and, in obedience to the dictates of human nature, uses his position to the disadvantage of the community. For this I blame the capital rather, than the man, for I am certain that there is not one of us hut who, if he became a capitalist, would be just as averse to a. property or income tax as ho is now friendly to. it. But this is a digression. Not being friendly to Mr. 1 homas Russell, I am delighted to see that the newspapers have cornered him. First there was an outcry that he was being, largely paid directly by the country for his services at Home. When under the heading “ Payments to Mr. Thomas Russell ” there appeared the entry “nil,” it was refreshing to find that, even if lie had not received a stated payment, he was certain to have recouped himself in some indirect manner. There is an honesty of purpose about thus insisting that a charge is correct, somehow or another, that commands my admiration.

I flatter myself that no one knows what my politics are. If they do, they are my superiors in knowledge. I make these remarks in order to .clear the ground before me, and prevent my being misinterpreted. In a Tasmanian paper lately, I. read a little jocular synopsis of the Ministerial measures there, and I am tempted to reproduce this synopsis, on account of its apparent applicability here, with a few alterations to. suit local circumstances. But in doing this, I do not wish to be misunderstood. I have not the least doubt but that if those who are now in Opposition were in power tomorrow the synopsis would be equally applicable to them. It is this 1

Ist. A. Bill for dissolving old-established principles into new theories, and for defining State expediency to be the exact measure of a Minister’s own personal requirements. 2nd. A Bill for removing all doubts as to the meaning of political honesty, by enacting that it shall in future mean personal interest. 3rd. A Bill for declaring that a largo expenditure for roads and bridges is necessary. 4th. A Bill .to declare it unlawful to give an\ assistance to the construction of roads and bridges, until Bill No. 3 has been among the Statutes for at least fifteen years. sth. A Bill to relieve the present and all future Ministers from even the apprehension of responsibility to the Legislature. Gth. A Bill for effectually seeuringWthe moral and political purity of all electors and then- representatives in New Zealand, «\ bringing them under the operation of the Scab Acts. 7th. A Bill to increase, if possible,’’ the confidence and respect of the people for their benefactors, the members of the Ministry, and by providing that no persons, shall presume to address them m public, except while bareheaded, or dare to make any remark of, or relating to them either privately or publicly, unles.-> their names, when mentioned, are prefixed by “Honorable.” The pio\ isions of this Bill are to extend to the Honorable gentlemen’s “ laundresses and “boots,” who are to

exhibit their reverence for the Honorable proprietors’ soiled linen and boots when receiving their pious porters, by humbly touching with respectful lips some portion of the hems of the one and the toes of the other.

A good many members are complaining that Mr. Stout talks too often. The same complaint was made in the British House of Commons of John Pope Hennessy when he got in there. But the qualification to the complaint which was admitted in Mr. Heunessv’s case is quite as admissible in Mr. Stout’s. He never talks without knowing what he is talking about. It would be difficult to predicate the same of many other members.