THE LIBERAL ASS

Observer, Volume XVIII, Issue 1023, 6 August 1898, Page 3

THE LIBERAL ASS

It is Made to Bat Dirt.

One cannot help admiring the clever way in which the public are being bamboozled by the promoters of this Private Electric Lighting Bill. Anyone with half an eye can see through their little game. They are intent upon making a pot of money, and if they can get the electric lighting rightß of Auckland on their own terms, without paying anything for them, the pot of money is assured to them. But unfortunately the public are not keeping even half an eye on them. The result is that they are posing as philanthropists with no other purpose in their mind than the public good, and the unthinking few who stop and listen to their plausible tale believe them. It is very funny.

But the funniest part of the whole business was the way in which the Liberal Association was nobbled and induced to pass a resolution in favour of this contemplated private electric lighting monopoly. There were thirty-four men and seven women present at the meeting, including an interested lawyer or two and sundry reporters. And the meeting consisted largely of auch well-known and thoronghly consistent Liberals as Graves Aickin, Hugh Campbell and his partner Russell, John Chambers, junr., Peter Oliphant, Johnny McLachlan, J. S. Kidd, and Thomas Prosser. Surely theße be great Liberals.

And cheek by jowl with Graves. Aickin and Oliphant and McLachlan and the other dignitaries of the National Ass sat the redoubtable James Regan, the independent Beehan, and tho irrepressible Shera. It was an odd spectacle, truly — the Liberal Abb, with a woe-begone and dejected air — the Liberal Ass, wearing the halter of the National Ass around its neck. Hugh Campbell told his tale. The Liberal Ass brayed an obedient echo, with little Shera and Rosser leading off. Shame on the people who subjected the Liberal Association to such an ignoble use. Liberalism is the sworn and uncompromising foe of monopolies.

Here was the Liberal Association, under the direct, tutelage of the National Ass, assisting to fasten a gross monopoly around the necks of the people of Auckland.

Shame on the people who were responsible for this degrading thing, we say. Let the National Asb and the people connected with it work their own monopoliesWhat sympathy have they with the Liberal Association and ita work ? What aid did the National Asa ever lend the Liberal cause in Anckland that the Liberal Association should be employed to aid a movement so opposed to the interests of the people of Auckland as this one ? It was funny. The Liberal Association of Auckland under the patronage of Hugh Campbell, Graves Aickin, Peter Oliphant, and Johnny McLachlan ! The Liberal Association eating dirt to please the' National Ass, after Mr Reid, its secretary, had written to Mr O'Regan, M.H.R., in Wellington, condemning this scheme. Liberals of Auckland, are ye listening ?

Witness (to counsel in Sunday observance case) : Yes, Bir, the hotel is very quiet on Sundays — just like a church. Pbohibitionist Isitt: Yes, that's it, just like a church— alwaya crowded on Sundays.

— That champagne flowed freely on the Rotomahana when the newß of those twins arrived. — That in the present railway controversy Mr Shera is great on ' ear-mark^ ing.' Has he ever tried ' dagging ?' — That persistency is the road to success. The only known excep iion to this rule is the case of a hen sitting' on a china egg. — That Captain Duder has . won golden opinions from the All Saints' girls since he put in a good word for them at the parishioners' meeting. — That of 612 young ladies who fainted last year, more than one half fell into the arms of gentlemen. Only three had the misfortune to fall on the floor. — That the ringing of the curfew bell in Auckland might do a lot of good in keeping the little ' chits of things ' at home instead of being ont these wintry nights. They have got this law in Hobart. —That the covert attempt to put up opposition to Mr W. Philson as the Chamber of Commerce's representative on the Harbour Board was frustrated. But who was the other candidate, anyhow ?

— That it was an odd coincidence that Tonson Garlick and James Dickey, for many years carrying on business in adjoining shops in Queen-street, Bhould die within a week of each other. —That the political dead-beats from all over the country are hastening to Wellington on the prospect of being made insurance company managers by Dick Seddon when he takes over the business of the insurance companies. — That a civil case in which a member of the House figured as defendant was called in the Wellington Magistrate's Court last week, and was adjourned — ' for certain reasons,' as the counsel put it — till the end of September. — That - the Auckland artists have turned their Exhibition pictures to the wall to await the decision of the Exhibition people as to whether the pictures are for an art exhibition or merely to decorate the Choral Hall for concert purposes. — That the Auckland- Wellington match last Saturday was mighty different to the blood-thirsty wrangle which took place at Wellington in 1883. Those were evil dayß, sorely, between the cities.! and players. J