THE TOWN BOARD AND THE WATER COMPANY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 382, 12 March 1863, Page 5

THE TOWN BOARD AND THE WATER COMPANY.

(To the Editor of the Daily Times.).

Sib.—-Tn your issue 'of fo-day the" Town, Boaid finds a champion ia one of its members. Prefacing his remarks with a horrible attempt at a pun upon the "weather," the "fashions," and "yourcorrespondents." he undertakes on behalf of the Town Board to reply 'o the correspondence which has from time to time appeared in your columns, having refe~ence to the shortcomings of the body of which he is a member.

When he retires to his " domestic peace," he says with the "comfortable reflection" that "the best of his ability, nay better, for does not my best aVlity give its quota to. the best o/ the. ability of the whole Town Board,, in an average in which ray own shortcomings' must surely be: neutralised." Lindley Murray come .to my aid and enlighten me as to the meaning of this abstruse quotation. What a blessing, Mr Editor, that this "memberof the Town Board" has had the patience to suffer with praiseworthy -endurance the; calumny which has been heaped on the heads of the members of that Board during the last three months, and thus save your readers from the infliction of reading such effusions as he has favoured (!) them with to-day. He professes to compliment me as being " the most voluble of your correspondents," but he accuses me at the same time of bad grammar, because, in inverted commas, I quote tho language of the Engineer to one ot the queries of the Board. The words I quoted, and the words the ' ngineer employed, were.tliese — " Therefore the Town Board of Dunedin are the legitimate parties, &c," but without desiring to dis cuss grammar with the " Member of the Town Board," the author of the effusion in question, I will pass on to the subject matters which have drawn him out of the shell he has been ensconced in for the last three months, and which have evidently disturbed him in that " domestic peace" he usually "retires to after a meeting of the Town Board." He clenches the argument of " Broadway" very. abruptly, but I think very satisfactorily, when he tells him (Broadway) " that his idea of private jobbery cannot very well be superior to those of the committee of the < Town Board, who carefully considered it (the private jobbery) before consulting his Honor the Superintendent." This remark has reference to widening the streets of Dunedin. What a very nice but delicate question it would he to put to his -Honor,- when he next addresses the electors -as to - the part he took in this private jobbery transaction referred to. Then the'" Member" attacks unfairly, and I think in a most inhuman - and unfeeling manner "A Sufferer." We are, Mr Editor, all more or less sufferers under the mismanagementof the Town Board although we do not acknowledge • it, but when one, confessing that he is "A Sufferer,?; and groaning under the inflictions of-the want of metal in Stuartstrfet, makes his complaint known, it. is more than humanity can bear to .read the castigatfon this poor " Sufferer" receives from " A i Member ,of the Town Board." The member says "get'your embankments properly repaired before "metal can. be nut upon it," but he also adds as a still more conclusive answer to your poor " Sufferer"' and similar complainants '"' that too much money has already been expended in making streets badly, and ' •if all the works which require immediate attention were to be executed within the next three months,- twenty engineers could not keep pace with the work,'' and then he attempts to console " A Sufferer" with the reflection that if lamp-posts were erected what would he say to the rale papers 1 ,■■■■ • Without any desire to follow your correspondent into the nuisance at the south end of the town, in which he wishes to envelope Mr Cargill and the Idspector of Works, I would ask him in what way Jias he- attempted to prove that I have jumped at wrong conclusions as to the object the Town Board had in view when .the Board asked the Engineer to answer certain, questions as to the advisability of taking up the question of water supply ? When I addressed my first communication to you, I did it on public grounds, bfoause.4 saw the ambiguity in the answers of the Engineer to the questions propounded by the Board, and my first impression was Ihat the answers had bien1 concocted before the questions were put, and through nn error in judgment of the member who nioved the questions, they were improperly put to the Encineer, whose answers .were; already prepared, I That there was some underhand wflrk.in the business is now to me very'clear; for, from the communicationof " AT Member of the Town Board" under review, he shields .the Town* Board; by "taking "ad- | vantage of the blunder in the composition oKthe' [ Questions and-Answers referreJ to,' and oiow publicly states "that the Board has never ;yet expressed anopinion about water supply.'' • ~ •'; .Out upon you, Mr Membei^you- and jour Board find'public opinion against you, and you shirk the responsibility of gQ^g: any farther in the matter of

water supply. You find that " twenty engineers" cannot aid you with the necessary works in hand. In fact, you want another Millar (I c., Henry Miller, of money notoriety), to hflp out of the dilemma you have pot into by undertaking responsibilities you have neither the means nor energy to prosecute. Apologising for taking up so much of your valuable space, I remain, Sir, ■••••■■ - ■■■ - ■■■•■ Yours&c, '. "■" " . Yemtas. Dunedin, 11th March, ISi3.