STRATFORD.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 143672, 16 December 1911, Page 2

STRATFORD.

fl'Vom Our Resident Agent.) Dec. 15.—There was, of course, not nearly so big a crowd gathered in Broadway Inst night as on the night of the Bret ballots. Inn alter the school entertainment was over Billy » thousand people were trying to look into .Mr. Newton Kind’s machinery room, where the rcMill.s were being displayed, h \v:i.s quite Mirprising what a number I>i Oppositionists wore in the crowd, but Uiif. week past it lias been noticeable that anti-Uovernineul .sentiments have on joyed tin won led popularity. Alter il’o'clock the street gradually cleared, people wending homeward in groups discuissing ihe unperlcctiy untlcrsiood situation, U w/j.s clear, Jkmvevor. that the great Government majority that iur lit years had withstood all assaults had at last vanished into thin air. A very big house greeted the periormers at. the school ciiicrtainnirnt. Un this occasion the children thc-msclves did mit comrihme so many items as usual, the unsettled state oi the .school, owing to rebuilding operation*, making the uecess/.iry training a difliiult matter. The t na-ralic. Society filled the hater hati <ii the hill with "Trial by jury.’’ given with the .mine evident enjoyment a* on the first occasion. The M’hijol lunds will benefit to the extent oi g2o by tiic entei tainnient, which will enable tlm ctnimiUee io he generoUa in the matter oi prizes \vhen tho scnoui breaks up on Thursday. The* Teiritonal oiiiceixs are very pleased with the manner m which Urn distric: has j expomn-d to the call lor nun and with the eager interest displayed by the young Seihovs in the coming training. There are no shirkers arid no sympathy with the silly proceedings that have disgraced a few places in the Dominion. There was a rush for Wellington papers at* the railway bookstall to-night. "Give us a Government paper.” "No, not the Times, that’s the Opposition paper now.” '\ liings. unfortunately, do not adjust themselves quite so quickly and easily a.s that, hut revolution ift in the air. One calls to mind the prayer of the Jacobite: "God bless the King. God bless the Faith’,*. Defender; God I>lets mo harm in blessing) the Pretender ; Rut which that Pretender is, and which that King (God bless us all!) is quite another thing.’’ Heading the final result of the elections makes one rub one’s eyes and wonder it the age oi miracles has returned. It approaches the miraculous that, in prosperous times, tiic parly in power, with its enormous influence through the pay-roll,s, should ho beaten at the poll. Why, in thus constituency "cupboard love” is good for 000 votes at least. In Wellington it has been estimated Hint one tliiid of the population is directly or indirectly dependent on Government. Yet on election night a certain wealthy baronet, not entirely unconnected with the party in flower, howKnl dismally because t heOpposition iiacl borrowed a few motor-cars to bring voters to tho poll, and the party newspaper had a long and rather insulting article on the working men’s wives and daughters who enjoyed a ride.