THE COMING ELECTIONS

Observer, Volume 3, Issue 57, 15 October 1881, Page 68

THE COMING ELECTIONS

Training Notes. — Sir George Grey remains at the Kawau until next week. Cause — ill-health. — Mr Jas. Mackay's friends are discussing the chances of running him for Waikato against Mr Whyte. — A draft of Dr. Wallis' " Parsimonious Candidates Bill" will be published in next week's Observes. — Major Jackson considers himself cock sure of defeating Mr F. A Whi taker if the contest is not disturbed by a Greyite candidate. Those ifs ! — Dr Wallis, in his letter to Messrs Peace and Hill, calls himself " a plain, practical politician." This is the first we have heard of it. — Why are Eden, Newton, and Waitemata left like aged spinsters to sit like wallflowers out of the fun ? When are the wooers coming ? _ — Election cry for City West, re the^extortionate habits of newspapers : — " Scots wha ha'e \vi' Wallis bled!" — Burns (not the Majaw !). — Amongst the coming candidates for the amended district of Parnell are Mr G. Raynes and Mr W. E. Saddler. Why does Strange 'hide his light under a bushel ? — Mr Edwin Hesketh, warned by the example of Mr Stout, is not disposed to enter the political arena, but prefers his big briefs and consultation fees for the present. — In case of emergency, on the West Coast, the Government might get valuable reinforcements from the candidates for Coromandel. There are already ten Richmonds in the field.

— Mr Shechan has definitely decided to run for the Thames Borough. In a telegram to a friend in Auckland, lie says, "Have decided to stand for the Thames after matiu*e deliberation." — Dr Wallis thinks the newspapers should advertise his election addresses, etc., gratis. Query : Did he ever do anything for anybody gratis ? ■ — Jack Lundon has arrived, -wearing a paper collar, and with a cut lip. This is understosd to indicate that John has been practising a determined expression of countenance in order to show that he means business. — There is not the smallest chance of Dr. Wallis getting back into Parliament. The working men of City West are now dead against him, and would rather attend his funeral than give him a vote. — Mr Buckland thinks that the Government should adopt a " sit-down policy," just as if lie had discovered something new. We always thought that sticking to their seats was the great feature of the Ministerial programme. — We rather think Dr Wallis will not care to cross swords with the Star again in a hurry. The editor of that journal seems a mild man, but when he is roused he " goes for" his victim properly and on Tuesday evening the learned doctor got a scarifying he will long remember. — Of course the Attorney-General must be exonerated from any complicity in a recent nefarious piece of G-overnment jobbery in connection with " fat printing," inasmuch as his business confines him to the drafting of bills, and opinions on legal questions. — Dr Wallis need not be afraid that the newspapers will ever get the best of him. He gave the Herald one small advertisement announcing his meeting, and when the publisher asked the usual five shillings in payment, beat him down to three-and-sixpence. Verh. sap. —Mr Grelli brand, whose name has been mentioned as a probable candidate for the East Coast, has been down at Waiwera, drinking in political inspirations from the medicinal waters, and, like Demosthenes, strengthening his voice by addressing the wave-beaten shore. — Mr G. Hutchinson informed the electors of Wanganui, the other day, that Major Atkinson " had. worn Mount Egmont on his sleeves." This is the biggest thing in solitaires we have ever heard of, and we think the "Majah" ought to get out a patent for it. — Dr. Wallis, at his meeting last week, compared New Zealand, with its heavy annual drain of interest for borrowed money, to the " dying gladiator," 6lowly bleeding to death. Very well put, doctor ! Now, we want you to put your finger on the spot and stop the hemorrhage. — Mr Buckland told the electors at Otahuhu that they had hitherto sent men to Parliament who merely represented their own interests ; but he had as large an interest in the district as any of them (not to speak of having " run about it when a boy ), ami he wanted them to send him up. Go in, my buck ! Nothing like candour at election time. • — -The Corrupt Practices Prevention At-t is not stringent enough for the representative of City West. He would make it a penai offence foxnewspapers to insert an advertisement of a candidate's meeting. Of course it would also be a deadly crime if they did not insert gratis whatever twaddle lie chose to send them in a telegram ! Oh, these selfish newspaper men ! — We observe that Dr. Wallis " was, as usual, very angry with the Auckland newspapers," and broadly charged the Herald and Star with giving garbled and incorrect reports of Parliamentary proceedings. As he exempted ourselves from his scathing denunciation, we indulge the hope that we have not, like the others, been " made tools and fools of " in our Wellington telegrams., but have fairly represented Auckland affairs as they transpired in the Legislature. Thank you, doctor, for your " honourable (lack of) mention." — We should be the last in the world to disturb the happy-family -like harmony that appears to subsist between certain of our local contemporaries, but a regard for an average amount of truth compels us to denounce, with all due deference to their apparently fixed views, that black is not white. For instance, when the Herald says that, at Mr F. Whitaker's meeting, a "vote of thanks" was passed, while the S/ar calls it a "vote of confidence," our inner consciousness suggests that the two statements are simply irreconcilable. Our special reporter, a mysterious, ghostly sort of person who is more or less übiquitous, informs us that the advertisement fixed no hour for the meeting. Mr Sloane, however, thought to execute a coup d'etat by passing a vote of confidence, and had his men in I readiness, but the othernd;, being a little earlier on the gui vive, mustered i. n stronger force, and when the hands were counted it was found that there were seven for the vote of confidence, and seventeen for that of mere thanks, which in the political electronometcr is one of blank courtesy. Of course, a gathering of twenty-eight is a " large and influential meeting." — Scotland was, to a great extent, originally populated from Ireland, say the historians. This may account for the most delicious " bull " which Dr. Wallis perpetrated in addressing the CityWest electors. The worthy doctor said that not only had he been a Chartist and Radical in the old coimtry, but all his feelings and aspirations were still with the labouring classes. Warming with the subject, he declared, "I belong to that class myself. My father was a labouring man ; so was my mother .'" A roar of merriment greeted this declaration ; but the speaker, with true Scotch density, seemed at a loss to understand •where the laughter came in, and afterwards puzzled to know how to extricate himself. Dr Lee came to the rescue with the whispered suggestion that " man was a generic term, embracing woman ;" and the orator, seeming to grasp the bright idea, hastened to explain that " it was wellknown that all men were women, though all women were not men !" The audience let him go " scot free " for this second blunder, perhaps out of sympathy with his ideas on " women's rights." — It was pleasant — nay, it was grand — to hear Dr Wallis praising his countryman, the " fine, noble, honest fellow, Macandrew," and everyone admired this generous tribute to a political opponent. When, however, the Doctor proceeded to criticise the report of Messrs Macandrew and Co. re direct steam service,he unflinchingly maintained

that there was not the most remote connection between the committee's report, and the evidence on which it professed to be based. The facts, conclusions, and recommendations of the report he declared to have been "evolved by Mr Macandrew from his inner consckmsness." This seems like blowing hot and cold in a breath ! We all know that " Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade— A breath unmakes them as a breath has made," but Scotchmen, in particular, are supposed to believe that, while " A king can nmk' a belted knight, A marquis, duke, and a' that. An honest man's aboon his might, — Gude faith ! he mamma fa' that !" The evolution of facts from one's inner consciousness is a process usually considered slightly incompatible with honesty ; bxit perhaps it is an amiable and praiseworthy characteristic of " fine, noble, honest" Scotchmen ! Yorkshire must look to her laurels as the best coloniser of New Zealand !