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Oamaru Mail, Volume XIX, Issue 6047, 12 September 1894, Page 2

Our Waimate correspondent writes : —A public meeting was held in the Waimate Temperance Hall on Monday evening to discuss the new Licensing Bill. Resolutions were passed expressing the opinion that the validity of the polls should not depend on the number of votes recorded ; that licensing elections should be held irrespective of dissolutions of Parliament, on a day separate from that of the Parliamentary election ; that the simple issue of "license or no license" only should be placed before the electors ; that Licensing Committees should be elective, and have discretionary powers to reduce licenses up to 25 per cent. Clauses 12, 43, and 72 were strongly objected to by various speakers. Mr T. Brown occupied the chair, and the meeting was addressed by Messrs Bannerman, G. Dash, J. Manchester, J. Smith, and Ellis. By an error the charge for admission of adults to the Otepopo Athenaeum concert was advertised at 2s, instead of Is. An amended advertisement appears in another column. A meeting of laclies willing to act on the Naval Band Bazaar Committee will be held in St. James' Hall on Thursday next at 2.30 p.m. The Bishop of Christchurch is petitioning Parliament for an alteration of the law -to secure the exemption of all property held for religious and educational purposes, or for an alteration in the Land and Income Tax Assessment; Act which would exempt from liability to the graduated tax the endowments held by them. The petition has been referred by the Public Petitions Committee to the Government for consideration. It is not at all likely that the Government will favor such a request. To exempt Church property from taxation is only another way of endowing religion. It is State aid smuggled in by the back door. The day is past for this sort .of thing. The tendency is all the other way. Besides, if the endowments of one or two of oar religious sects were to be exempt froifn taxation, it be necessary that all the other sects, ,to be even, should be presented with endowments which could also be exempted. John M'Clusky, chargpd with forging a cheque on the Colonial Bank for 1.6, was brought before the Stipendiary Magistrate this morning and remanded to Dunedin where the offence was committed, to appear before the Court there at 11 o'clock on JFriday morning. •Several columns of detail in English -papers are devoted to the new prince, j Boiled down to the restriction of ojir spape he appears to be "pale and interesting, blue eyes and pink cheeks "—in fact considerably mora b»by than prince,

Mr Scobie Mackenzie is to bo given another banquet; but not in Bellamy's, because the Premier was so rude as to make uncomplimentary remarks in referenco to holding the Roll'ston banquet within the precincts of the House. They will ffitc Mr Mackenzie away from "the madding crowd," where vulgar taunts cannot reach their consecrated ears. But why all these banquets! Are the Tories flying to drink, to drown their sorrows, or are they celebrating, in a vance, their resumption of power in tho dim future? It cannot be that the traditional upholder of what is, seeks to bewilder and daze the political world by a winey-beery demonstration of political virtues which one only reads about—which glisten brightly in the Tory swamps, but can never bo clutched by the mud besmeared wight who pursues them. It cannot be, we say. It is not as though Mr Seddon; or the ** Hon. John," or Mr Ward was in the question. A banquet to one of these would bo ono of those horrid things which, to the aristocratic mind, demands the services of a policeman, without benefit of a cab. Mr Scobie Mackenzie and his hosts—though hosts no longer in multitude—have our best wishes. We never jeer at the attempts of the vanquished to seek consolation anywhere (hey may hope to find it. Even in a public-house, in the midst of beer bottles and ill-smelling cigars, and linguistic ebullitions of warmed-up political rot —far from the other M'Kenzie and tho taunting Mr Sedcon—they may enjoy Toryism to their hearts' content, for aught wo care.

The poll for the election of one Councillor for Severn Ward will take place to-morrow. The candidates are Messrs W. H. Frith and John M'Dowell, and the poll will bo taken at the Oddfellows' Hull, Coquet-street, between the hours of 9 a. in. and 6 p.m. The following will represent St Patrick's Gymnasium Club against tho Excelsiors on Thursday T. M'Grail, W. Ah Tong, Maxwell, H. Keane, Byrne, Power (2), Hauley, Halpin, Slines, M'Klheney, M. Connelly, Crosbie, Martin, D. O'Brien. Reserves— E. Barry, M. Hauley, F. Ongley. At the Magistrate's Court this morning before Major Keddell, S.M., Maurice Cleary (13i) and denry Kay (18) pleaded guilty to breaking a pane of glass in the window of James Ogilvie's shop, valued at 15s. Detective O'Brien stated that the two boys had been indulging in horse play outside the Public Hall and Kay took refugo from Cl;ary in Ogilvie's shop door. (Meaiy discovered him there and pushed him violently against the window, causing him to break it. He stated that Cleary had been previously sent to the Industrial School and had apparently been let out to his parents again. He had telegraphed to the manager for particulars but had not yet received a reply. His Worship said that Kay was apparently not to blame. He was not an active participant in the affair, and would be discharged. Cleary was remanded pending the result of Detective O'Brien's inquiry. A gentleman who was before the Court to-day on a charge of forging and uttering, complained of the lack of courtesy on tho part of the Magistrate in being four minutes behind time in taking his seat, " keeping respectable prisoners waiting. He ought to be fined for it." Subsequently, on being remanded, he returned thanks, anil suggested to a fellow prisoner, " C'omo on. Let's go and get some dinner now." The charge for admission to the Otepopo Athenaeum concert is Is for adults, not 2s as previously advertised. At a meeting of Masons, held in Ngapara on Monday, the following were elected to hold office for the coming year; Bro. Geo. Livingstone, I.P.M. ; Bro. Thomas Little, R.W.M. ; Bro. John M'Culloch, S.W. ; Bro. W. Howden, J.W. ; Bro. Geo. Nimmo, S.D. ; Bro. Robert White, J.D ; Bro. T. Paterson, treasurer; Bro. H. Webber, secretary ; Bro. A. Orr, LG., Bro. J. Don, 0. G.