OUR CHRISTCHURCH LETTER.

Observer, Volume 7, Issue 160, 6 October 1883, Page 11

OUR CHRISTCHURCH LETTER.

Pjedlihg-ton politics, female physicians, bankruptcies and the new law anent such piccadilloes, and monster dioramas, have given the Christ- ■■. church public plenty to gossip about lately, to say nothing of football, and the chances of the coining races. Of the former I need say little, as you have your local' municipal elections for Councillors and Mayors passed and pending, arid; can imagine easily from them what we are suffer- . ing here. The Councillors have been chosen by ' the free and independent l'atepayei's, who for once hero have done ri^ht. They have relegated to his proper obscurity an aspiring tailor rejoicing in the high-sounding name of Hobbs, who proclaimed himself as the apostle (I'm not exaggerating) that was to set Cliristchurch going ahead again, and, through^ Christcburch, the colony. He was Mayer here once, and everyone asked, why no man of standing could be got to come forward and contest for the honour. Since him we have had sundry, all more or less objectionable. The present occupant of the chair is a retired publican. The sight of him always recalls to my mind my first introduction to him. It waft twenty years ago. I had ridden over, from Lytfcelton one Saturday, and, being detained late, it was midnight when I started on my return >; home. Before getting clear of Christchurch I discovered that my horse had cast a shoe. To proceed to Lyttelton was out of the question, aft : at that late hour I had to find a lodging — no easy matter in those days, at such a time of the night. The one thing about the result which I have never forgotten was the filthy hairbrush I discovered in the morning ia my bedroom. It, sickened me, and was breakfast enough. I never attempted again to sleep in that house, and never . see the little owner of it — now our Mayor — without remembering that brush. One candidate for honours at the . coming election is an a»tctioneer, who has been a Councillor for many years, and has a good chance, besides deserving the position. He has fought for it once or twicß^ unsuccessfully, and I wish him luck this time. Curiously enough, ho is connected in the miri&» of many here with hairbrushes, having been for years a prominent barber before he resigned the comb and scissors for the hammer. Mrs Anna Potts, Philadelphia M.D ., has been en- , lightening the public here, and the ladies particularly, on surgery. Her lectures, which were well attended, did not attract the opposition and condemnation which they did in Dunedhv There some purists wrote to the papers saying" • that her addresses were unfitted for the ears of decent women, and that she kept all the speciallyhasty bits for her lectures "to ladies only." 1 The rest can be imagined. The fair sex crowded to hear what it was that was so bad. The halfcrowns rolled into the lecturer's lap, but you couldn't get a single one of her audience to talk about what she had heard. The agent, Mr Waugh — an old American journalist, and most entertaining fellow — will be with you in a few days. I promise you that an evening spent ia his company will not be wasted. He reminds me of genial Josh Pickersgill, now in Christchurch. Josh has a panorama, the biggest tiling of the kind in every way yefc seen in the colonies. It represents scenes in Mark Twain's incomparable " Innocents Abroad.'* There are ninety pictures, each of them three feet wider and longer than the pictures of the Zulu "War. The lecture is said to be written by Dr Neild, the well-known theatrical critic of tha . Melbourne Argus, and the lecturer will be Joah^. It opened here on Tuesday. I have seen some of it, and can tell you Aucklanders will have a treat when it is shown in your city. By-the-bye, when J.P. calls on you, ask him to rehearse . you his drawing-room lecture, with its musical accompaniment with his hands over a glass tumbler. He'll know what I mean. I waa one of a roomful whom he kept in roars of laughter & few nights ago for hours with it. Rent collectors' experiences are occasionally pecnliir. A certain commission agent here owed several months' rent for his office. In spite of impecuniosity, he has a curious mixture of pomposity and bonhommie. The collector — a mild, timid man — having repeatedly asked in vain for the arrears of rent, called one day and suggested that if the agent would, give him a promissory note at three months for half the amount* h» would give a receipt in full, to save further trouble " Sir !" said the agent, swelling up into the personification of. outraged dignity, "Sir l who authorised you to come into my office and insult me by suggesting that I should compound with mj creditors ! How dare you have the impudence to make me such an offer ! Tell your master I shall pay you in full when I chose.* And in this strain he went on at the poor collector till the meek little man did not know whether h« was standing on his Head or his heela, and heartily wished himself^ safe out in the street. At length, after stammering out most humblaapologies, he asked when he might expect pajTment. With an instanteous change of voice and manner, the agent, casting his .eyea .upward, andextending his hands, said, .in the most devout manner, "The Lor-i-r-d knows,!"' 3&iit the collector hurriedly and horrified. ( Preparations for the Industrial Exhibition* ;s<>*, s bo held here in December, are going oil merrily,' Applications for space are coming in rabidly from all parts of the colony. It will be r the most com^g plete thing that has been accomplished yet'm the^ way of a collection of New Zealand manufacture^, and" productions. •''^': K ip-:'^