FRIDAY, JULY 22, 1887.

Otago Witness, Issue 1861, 22 July 1887, Page 20

FRIDAY, JULY 22, 1887.

PASSING NOTES.

Mb J. Aitken Connell's "maiden political speeches," I learn by, advertisement, are on sale in Dunedin. That is well. I have read the said speeches myself with great advan* tage to my digestion, and can recommend them with confidence to any friends of mme — dyspeptic or otherwise — who want * laugh, and, as is fitting in these hard times, want it cheap. Mr ConnelTs.maiden political speeches are to be had, be it observed, at the reasonable price of Id. ' Buy the pamphlet, and ruin the doctors. In all the variegated literature of elections ' you will hardly find its 'fellow. 1 WHat one most :admires is the pluck shown in publishing along with fcbess

«' maiden speeches" all the unmaidenly interruptions that hampered their deliver}-. It is wisdom as well as pluck ; for, as Hamlet remarks, there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so. Publish at your own expense the spiteful criticisms of your enemies, show in that way that you think there is no mischief in them, and you will have half-persuaded other people to think so too. But it is not in reporting his enemies that Mr Conncll shows most courage, but in reporting himself. In witness whereof read the following : —

I say that when you send me to Wellington, — (Laughter.) Oh, you will do so ! (More laughter, and a Voice: "You'll never see ifc, old man.") I say that when you send me to Parliament, and when I am in power — and I shall be in power you may depend, sooner or later— (A Voice ; "We won't do it !")— that then I will not take away the money of the mass of the people to put a lot of you unemployed on village settlements and keep you there. — (Tremendous uproar, in the midst of which several men in a greatly excited state rose and pressed forward towards the speaker.) No! I'll see you damned first. (This was yelled out at fche top of Mr Connell's voice, and he emphasised it by a vigorous stamp upon the platform). There will be mourning over this in the halls of the V.M.C.A., where Mr Connell, before his evil angel tempted him into politics, had so often held forth to edification. For my own part, after reading all that led up to it, 1 feel that in launching that tremendous profanity Mr Connell reached the moral sublime. He himself takes another view — a view which will be much more satisfactory to the V.M.C.A. He says : — " I can only account for the uncontrollable impulse S. felt to use the expression on the ground of old habit, which I had imagined was long ago overcome, and which I think I am safe in saying had not been indulged in, at least to the extent of outward expression, for at least 20 years." Admirable in one sense, this ingenuous confession judged from the point of view of art is deplorable. Why weakly excuse, or painfully explain away, the very climax of the speech ? If I were an opponent of Mr Conncll, I should feel disposed to forgive him a good many things for the sake of that big, big D.

The real issue of the present elections is, we are told by the general consensus of opinion, retrenchment, but the perplexing fact is that no one has shown the least disposition to join issue in the matter. Candidates and electors are determined to fight tooth and nail for retrenchment, and they find themselves in the unlucky position of having nobody to fight with. This is disconcerting, to say the least of it. The blood of every colonist is heated for the fray, and behold there is no fray — no need for pawing chargers or glittering spears ; not even a chance, seemingly, of an unassuming row with a bit of a stick. Retrenchment is a shibboleth that everyone can speak. The Government profess that they have retrenched, are retrenching, will retrench ; the Opposition will retrench ; every candidate upon every platform will retrench. In the universal fury for retrenchment nobody who has his nose in the public corncrib is to escape,, from the Governor down to the Native Minister's office boy, Apparently victory must go to the candidates who cry economy loudest, or who insinuate themselves most craftily into the chinks and crannies of the electoral mind. There is room i'or diplomacy here. Electors are nowadays split up into Protection leagues, trade and labour leagues, financial reform associations, temperance unions, licensed vituallcrs' organisations, unemployed caucuses, &c, &c. To stroke one and all of these the right way and simultaneously, this is the puzzle set the Parliamentary aspirants. Apropos of such wiles as are necessary here is a story of a young New York minister who manages to be .favoured by bitterly opposed female sections of his congregation. He artfully leads influential indies, each in turn, to believe that they iiave inspired the best passages in his sermons. In making a pastoral call he picks out some utterance of his hostess, declares it admirable, and promises to use it on the ensuing Sunday. On that occasion the lady proudly hears him introduce an embellished form of the conceit with some such introduction as " One of the brightest minds I know has suggested," or " From a beautiful source comes the idea," &c, Sec. This young clergyman, needless to say, is now the lion of a, huncred parlours. Some equally sagacious course is evidently necessary to the successful Parliamentary candidate, owing to the exigencies of the times. Thus he should agree cordially and frankly with half the organisations that beset him, and speak of the other half as bodies of noble, earnest-minded men between whom and himself he is grieved to discover one or two minor points of difference. He will thus have a block vote from half the bodies and the individual votes of a number of the noble, earnest-minded men who have been struck by the applicability of his remark to themselves. This is making friends with the mammon of unrighteousness, and it is the way elections are fought and won in these days of progress.

The restless genius which at different times has impelled our old friend Mr "Jock" Graham to found the High School, the Hot Springs Guide, the Eight Hours System, and the present depression, will not be quiet even in the seclusion of the Benevolent Asylum. Thither Jock has retired nominally for rest f rom the fever of the world, but has occupied himself instead in forging ' a thunderbolt which he proposes presently to launch at the .head of the member for Caversham. We may assume that the late editor of the Hot Springs Guide has a personal or political grievance against Mr Barron ; but what man would not think himself secure from a foe whom the gates of the Benevolent Institution had swallowed up 1 A delusion ; for the indefatigable Jock is scheming to wield mote power in his new retreat than he ever rti<l outside it. He has at once perceived thai by residential qualification he is now an elector of the Caversham district, and thaUhe 80 or 100 other inmates of the Old -Men's Home enjoy the same proud distinction. Mr Graham has thereupon set to work, held caueußee no doubt, and formally placed the names of himself and confreres «pon i the electoral roll, He is npw $ political leader with a compact and docile

following, and will probably have to be reckoned with, for a block vote of 100 is by no means to be made light of. This action on the part of the redoubtable Jock is indeed the kick of a dying gladiator ; and a well-intended kick. It has caused aflutter in official circles, and a legal opinion is to be taken as to the right of a pauper to vote. This will obviously be money ■thrown away, for there is not the smallest doubt of the legality of the case. A male' adult pauper with a residential qualification may vote, of course ; so may lunatics and even convicts if they can get to the poll. Here it is that Jock Graham, in his character of dying gladiator, will find his sandal pinch him. The authorities have allowed the members of the new political association liberty to put their names on the roll : will the gates of the institution by any unhappy chance be locked on polling day 1 It they are, the gladiator will have kicked in vain, and perhaps have sprained his ankle in the effort.

It is not surprising that a Celt should cry, " Dash down the Sassenacht," or that a Don Caesar (in the play) should exclaim, " To the devil with the Holy Week," but it does come as a slight shock to hear a total abstinence organ solemnly, and with emphasis, curse Sir Robert Stout. For a really popular politician Sir Robert has contrived to become obnoxious to a surprising variety of people. By the rarity of his appearances of late years as chairman at the Sabbath saturnalias in the Lyceum he has offended the Freethinkers, by accepting a title he has offended the Demociats, by talking police he has offended the University students, and now at last, by " truckling to a political mountebank," he has offended his own familiar friends the teetotallers. It is the Leader, an Auckland journal published in the total abstinence cause, which calls Mr Dargaville " a political mountebank," and which, discovering that Sir Robert Stout has been assisting him in his little games, considers this "most damning evidence of his un fitness for the position he holds." What next? The details of this quarrel are not easy to grasp, but it is the fact of the quarrel and the joint and several cursing of the Gospel Templars, the Rechabites, the bands of hope, fit Iwc genus ovine, that produces a melancholy impression upon bystanders. So far as can be gathered, Mr Dargaville has conceived the idea of extending the liquor traffic up the Kaihu Valley in the direction of some private township of his own, and by "diabolical scheming" (the words are the Leader's) has defeated opposition and got the locality proclaimed a new licensing district, The Premier's iniquity lies in the fact that " he, sitting in council with the Governor, actually allowed such representations to be made to his Excellency as to cause him to affix his signature to a document which purported to validate this grossly illegal division of a licensing district." Further, that when remonstrated with upon the subject Sir Robert replied hastily, "Oh ! you can upset it in the Supreme Court." Fine fun, screams the Leader, for Sir Robert to make work for the lawyers in this way. And then follows the formal casting off and anathematising of the great teetotal chieftain, and on the part of the , united teetotallers the confession of "a feeling of intense disgust." Here truly is a pretty how-d'ye-do.

I suppose by this time the gorge of every sane person experiences a movement of ascension at the very name of jubilee. But one of the most touching exhibitions of jubilee loyalty should not be allowed to pass by without admiring recognition in Passing Nctes. We have had poets, parks, preachers, and processions, but for sheer unsophisticated loyalty commend me to plain Hannah Brown. This worthy creature, compelled by force of circumstances to appear the other day at our local Police Court to answer a charge of vagrancy, delivered herself of the following affecting and praiseworthy speech :—": — " She was an Englishwoman, and as such was willing to work for the Queen. If she was sent to gaol she could make herself useful there. If not, she had nothing but a bad life before her, and she did not like the idea of that." The bench sent her to gaol for three months. Now some people might wish to know what had brought Hannah to the necessity of " working for the Queen " ; but I leave that to Mr Rennie and other economical philanthropists. I desire to look at the incident from what Mr Swinburne calls an "unmoral " point of view — not " immoral," which is a very different tiling. Looked at thus, is not Hannah's speech indicative of a beautiful and truly jubilatory frame of mind ? "Is it not lis it not ? " And that brings me to my principal object in writing this note. I wish to deserve well of my kind, by gratuitously commending the above episode to the poet Stenhouse. He has already presented a marvelling public with " The pathetic history of Lucy Brown, barmaid " ; let him indite, as a pendant to that soul-enthrallingi narrative, the story of her sister Hannah, vagrant-loyalist. He will be able to show with explanative fullness how "misfortune's bitter rubs " (in the shape of want of board and lodging) may be "the spirit's clarion call " to devoted loyalty and cheerful though ill-paid industry ; how (to quote the less " beautiful and sublime " words of a poet who owes his greater fame not to superiority of genius, but to having devoted himself to the muses from his youth upwards) " men "—" — not excluding women — "may rise on step-ping-stones of their dead selves to higher things."

If nagging and nastiness can produce' war between great nations, there will be an outbreak on the European continent ere long. Although the storm cloud has appeared to roll by, it has not rolled very far, and a change of wind may bring it . back speedily enough. What is to be seen at present is "not peaGe, but a general scowling and biting of thumbs ; , and prodigiously tender and ticklish are all the parties concerned. England is one day warned against a suddenly aggressive policy meditated by France. Next day we learn that Russian merchants on the frontier have been ordered to dismiss all German clerks. Loud above the universal growling the 1 French populace continue to shriek " Vive Boulanger ! " and would cry "A das Bismarck I " if they dared. They have thrown things at their respectable president H. Grevy, this fickle French mob, and have hung wreaths about the statues

of Strasburg and ' Joan of Arc. What will they do next 1 The Parisian papers help td swell the chorus, if indeed they do not initiate it. A cablegram on Monday in^ ( formed us that " Count Munster, the Ger- ' man Ambassador, complains that M. Fleu- (j( j rens' Radical paper is inciting the populace j against the Germans and insulting the j Embassy. M. Flourens expresses Iris grief." ■ This is evidently the least that M. Fleurens could do in the circumstances, and he did it no doubt gracefully and with cmpressement. ' He laid his hand upon his heart and professed himself desolated and in despair, but he didn't promise to muzzle his editor. There must be an end to this kind of thing, and it will come when diplomatic forbearance is exhausted on the other side. Little forbear- , ance need evidently be looked for from France ; press and people are incapable of it. The reported self-control of the Parisian press during the Schnaebell incident turns out to have been humbug, for the, papers figuratively yelled and tore out their hair by handfuls. The journalists who spoke of the calmness of the Parisian press were either unable to read French or were accustomed to tornadoes. The priggish divinity student (excuse the tautology) of Wendell Holmes' boarding house said one morning that there was no power he envied so much as seeing analogies and making comparisons : whereupon the 11 infant apostle " very properly received a ponderous snub from the philosophic autocrat. I may' observe, without a blush, that I have sometimes thought Passing Notes not always utterly devoid of apt analogy and quotation. But I bow to my superiors, without envying them, when the superiority is apparent. Matthew Arnold is one of them. In the last available number of " The Nineteenth Century" the famous poet-satirist, in the true spirit of Unionist profanity, applies to the Gr.O.M. the following passage from "An eccentric funeral sermon on Frederick Prince of Wales" :— " He had great virtues— indeed they degenerated into vices ; he was generous, but I hear" his generosity has ruined a great many people ; arid then his condescension was such that he kept very bad company." There can be no question as to the effectiveness of this from the writer's point of view, but it is capable of a far more telling application. If only Mr Arnold had an intimate acquaintance with New Zealand politics and our own Sir Eobert ! He would assuredly have sent that paragraph to " Civis " instead of Mr Knowles. It " pans out" so beautifully. Sir Eobert Stout has had great political virtues — though many of them lie " banished, but not quite vanished " on the further bank of the Eubicoos of Vogelism and knighthood. Amongst them was an ardent faith in democracy ; but this has deteriorated into as ardent a faith in Sir Robert Stout as the synonym for democracy — an hallucination for which vicious is scarcely too strong a designation. His political views, again, are very generous, and though they have not been allowed quite to ruin the colony, it seems to be generally felt that a less theoretically benevolent but more practically efficacious Minister is a crying desideratum. While as to the condescension to very bad company, " fond memory brings the light of other days around me," when an alliance with " rare Sir Julius " would have been anathema manmatlia to the Kadical protagonist of the Lyceum. Truly Sir Eobert's fall was never more succinctly epigrammatised than by that ancient and eccentric preacher. Go to, let us weep !

I note with satisfaction many signs in the press that retrenchment of the education vote is not thought precisely equivalent to knocking a hole in the bottom of the ship. And, indeed, in the innermost circles of the Premier's electoral camp at Dunedin East are there not questionings as to the folly of making education free up to the Sixth Standard in the vain hope of abolishing " class distinctions ? " As evidence whereof perpend the following :—: — THAT POOR OLD FLAG. (As sung every night— in a minor key and with much feeling —at Sir Robert Stout's committee rooms). " Only a bit of bunting."-- V. P. Only a bit of bunkum — Only a platform brag — That we'd fight like bricks for the Standards Six And the De-mo-eratic Flag. — Who cares a dump for the Standards ? Who reckons them not a sham ? Yet till all is blue, now we've got the cue, Must we fight for the reign of cram,— And the poor old tattered flag, my boys, The wilting, half-mast flag; Though Stout's made a knight we must still ahow fight For the De-mo-cratic Flag. 'Tia not for the drawers of water, 'Tis not for the hewers of wood, 'Tis not for bakers or candlestick-makers, Or butchers all dabbled in blood To hope for the luck of lawyers, — We may never be C.M.G.s ; But if they play no tricks with the Standards Six We at least may be LL.D.'s, — And echo the same old brag, my boys, The un-gram-matic brag — That there " ain't no classes " (where all are asses) 'Neath the De-mo-cratic Flag. Six Standards in the Acb there be, — Six Standards in the Schools ;-— Add yet a Seventh — and soften our brains Till we're imbeciles and fools. Then long as the fipell of bunkum holds Shall Stout keep the power he axes To put the country up the spout And double all our taxes. Whilst ours to be gay with the flag, my boys, The all-consoling flag, — With hook in snout to be led by Stout And the De-mo-cratic Flag.

I close my budget this week with a scrappy •note of odds and ends. A correspondent Sends me an advertisement cut from a Dunedin paper announcing that on the 22nd inst, the " ball of the season " would be held in the " Lyceum Hell." A printer's error — but an evangelical printer, I fancy. Character, beliefs, prejudices, like murder, will out, even in our blunders. Another ball advertisement, sent me from Invercargill, contains the ambiguous • line "Dance tickets limited to size of hall." Halls must be small in Invercargill, or tickets large, , Better than this is an advertisement about' left 1 off cloth- ' ing : — " Mrs Samuels having left-6f£ clothing

of 'every' 'description! respectfully invites in"spectipn: 5 " This 1 comes from, Milton!' It is a veritable" newspaper cutting, but from what paper the" sender sayeth not,' 1 have my doubts about Mrs Samuels. .^Shcisan invention, I : am afraid, of, ttiatuntraceable authority to i whom we owe so many good things, Ben. Trovato. More authentic ■is a story— possibly old, but new to me— about the eccentric and sharp-tongued 'Colonel. Brett, of Canterbury. The colonel was disturbed whilst reading his newspaper in the Christchurch Clubby the persistent chatter and clatter of a stranger, a swellish globetrotter introduced by one of the members. He remonstrated, and got in reply what was meant to be a crusher : "Do you know that I am the eldest son of Baron D ? " "I do not know it," replied the colonel, ", Ido not know it ; and now that I do know it, I have only to say that I wish to goodness your mother had been barren too." The honours of war remained with the old campaigner.' Civis.

The funeral of the late Sergeant-major Stevens, which took place on Sunday afternoon, was perhaps the most imposing military funeral that can be remembered here. All the Dunedin volunteer corps were represented, and there was a fair muster of each ; while a cortege of some 150 persons, amongst whom were many of our leading citizens, followed the gun carriage on which the coffin was carried. The streets were literally lined with spectators, the majority of whom accompanied the procession to the Southern Cemetery, where another large crowd had assembled. A contingent of the City Guards formed the firing party and led the way with arms reversed, and the other corps followed, the bands playing, of course, " The Dead March." The last corps was the Naval Brigade, and behind them walked Lieutenant-colonel Wales and the other staff officers. The procession was at least a quarter of a mile in longth, and judgment had to be exercised to prevent unseemly crushing at the cemetery. The Yen. Archdeacon Edwards conducted the funeral service at the grave. The deceased to whom such marked respect was paid was an old army officer, who for many years past has acted as drill-instructor at the public schools. Sergeant-major Stevens enlisted in Ireland in 1840, and nine years afterwards went with the 70th Regiment to India, where he served during the Indian Mutiny. He was at Kyber Pass, and while at Peshawur in 1857 he received a sunstroke. In May 1861 he landed with his regiment in Auckland to take part in the Maori War, and at Taranaki he received a slight wound, from the effects of which he never thoroughly recovered, In November 1861 he came to Dunedin, and some time afterwards received the appointment of drill-instruc-tor, Fe received both the Indian and New Zealand medals. HOur cablegrams this week state bhat a rather serious collision occurred off Portland between ELM. ironclads Devastation and Ajax. The Devastation is one of the first-class ironclads of the British navy, having armour of 12in to 14in in thickness, carrying four 35-ton guns, with a displacement of 9387 tons, with engines 6652 indicated horse-power. She is a mastless ship. The Ajax, which appears to have sustained the least damage, is of the second-class, and was only completed in 1882. She has armour lOin to 12in in thickness, carries four '2s-ton guns, with a tonnage displacement of 8492 tons, her engines indicating 6000-horse power. She is constructed for ocean warfare, and is of the same class as the Independenzia, built to the order of the Emperor of Brazil, and purchased by the British Government for £640,350. \ The Education department has received a letter from the Agent-general enclosing the prospectus of the colonial scholarships proposed to be founded by the Oxford Military College. Two scholarships of £50 and £25 respectively, and tenable for three years, will be offered in • each of the principal colonies ; competitors to be between the ages of 14 and 16. If the proposal should be approved in the colony, the college will ask the universities of New Zealand and Otago whether they would be willing to conducb the examination of New Zealand candidates. The Bulli Relief Fund now amounts to £37,500, of which the Victorian contributions represent £11,800. It has not yet been decided how the fund shall be distributed. At Wednesday's meeting of the • trustees of the Benevolent Institution the Glenore School Commifceee forwarded £3 2s, the result of a service of song held under their auspices. They regretted that the contribution fell so far short of the requirements. The School Committee of Clark's Flat forwarded £2 13s as the proceeds of a dance. Th«y also regretted that the nmcmufc tv.as so small, but the weather was bad and tho mode of support was the only one appreciated in country places. At Tuesday's meeting of the Waihemo County Council the following tenders were opened and the lowest accepted :— Contract 82, formation of road to village sc ttloment, Goodwood bush— William Meadows, 8s 6.1 per chain ; Fitzgerald and Flanagan, 14s 6d per chain ; J. Hepburn, £1 15s per chain. Contract 84, supplying and spreading 12 chains of gravel on Robertson's road— Wm. Paul, 18s 9d per chain; Wm. Rendall, 19s 6d per chain ; Thos. Houslin, 21s per chain. JMessrs Reid, Maclean, and Co. will hold a clearing sale of Mr Robert Laurence's horses, implements, &c , at M'Douald's yards, Clinton, on the 29th mat. The third quarter of the Otago Boys^ and Girls' High Schools commences on the 20th met, The address o* Niclio'aa O'Connoll, formerly of Canada, is Inquired for. Messrs Do-mid Reid and Co. will sell a 14 years' lease of the Dunrobin Farm, East Taieri, on the 23rd inst. Messrs Beid, Maclean, and Co. will sell shares in the Mountain Kace Gold mining Company (Blue Duck), Tinkers, on the 28th inst. The address of Elizabeth Gardner, or Whyte, is inquired for. Mr W. Qnin will sell merino ewe 3. in lamb to Border Leicester rams, at the Merino Downs homestead, on the 29th inst. ' ' Messrs James Samson and Co. will sell Mr J. M'Neill's furniture, stock, &c ,at Brighton, on the 4th prox. Mr Fulton will address the electors at Kurl Bu3h on Monday evening next. The New Zealand Canning Company (Mr A. Dornwell) will sell their products' at from 2d to 6d per tin. Par.ioulars will be found in our advertising columns. A sale of thoroughbred and h'alfbred horses (Sir Chas. Strickland s stud) is announced to take place at York (England) on August. 5. Neave'S Food has been carefully analysed by Dr Cameron, Mr Bartlet.t, and othtes, who all report it as containing 14.*7 of prot itiao oub flesh-forming matter, and adequate rjchntb. in phosphates and j potash. It is claimed to have stood the test of long ! use, and Is reported to be especially useful as a food .in the prevention of infantila dlarrhcea.— British Medical Journal,