Pars About People.

Observer, Volume XXIX, Issue 42, 3 July 1909, Page 4

Pars About People.

THE presentation that was recently made to Henry Martin by the mem.

bers of the local Bar and officials of the Court was a graceful and welldeserved compliment. For 26 years Mr Martin has worthily discharged the frequently onerous duties of custodian and crier of the Supreme Court, and the sonorous tones of his deep bass voice were sufficient to oveiawe any irreverent disturber of the hallowed hush that usually permeates the atmosphere of the Court. What an excellent toastmaster he would make ! But to return to our muttons. The presentation, which took the form of an illuminated address and a cheque for £125, was made by Mr Justice Edwards on behalf of the subscribers, who were present in force. His Honor's speech contained many eulogistic references to the efficient manner in which Mr Martin had always carried out his duty, references which received cordial and unqualified endorsement from everybody present.

Mr Martin, in returning thanks, made some interesting references to his past career. "My acquaintance with this court," he said, " goes back to the year 1873. In October of that year I was, by the order of Sir George Arney (then the presiding Judge) locked up all night in this very room, in charge of a jury that was hearing a case of manslaughter. I little thought then that I should now be standing here, listening to the kind and flattering words that the Judge now occupying that honourable position has been pleased to address to me to-day. Ten years later I was transferred to the office that I have continued to hold up to the present ; and I have during that time been brought into close contact with the legal profession.' In the course of his further remarks, Mr Martin recalled the fact that, when he first took office as Court crier, Mr Justice Gillies was on the Bench, and Mr Edwin Hesketh was at the head of the Bar. Both of these gentlemen have long since joined the Great Majority.

Mr Martin's history has already been told in the Observer. But a brief synopsis may not be out of place at this juncture. For ten years from 1873 onwards, Mr Martin, then Sergeant Martin, was in charge of the Water Police Station at the head of the Queen-street wharf, the late Constable Luke Macdonnell being one of his colleagues, who, among others, included Ex-Sergeant Carrigan, still a resident of this city. In 18S3 Mr Martin was appointed to the position of Court crier, from which, owing to the age limit, he has just retired. Prior to his arrival in Auckland he had been for three years in the Armed Constabulary.

Dr Findlay, Attorney-General, made an excuse at Feilding the other day for the dilatoriness of the Government in providing new court houses — that -.there are demands for court accommodation from all parts of Mew Zealand, and in 42 places justice has to be administered in private buildings. This is all very well as an answer to the claims of towns that are already reasonably well provided for. But no one, not even the Justice Department itself, has the hardihood to assert that the antiquated building with which the Auckland magistrates have to make shift is at all adequate to the reasonable requirements of the city. The shortcomings of that building have been admitted time and again, and there are Ministerial promises galore. Nevertheless, in spite of visits from officials and experts, that were expected to expedite its replacement, ' the scheme fOl a new hall of justice shows no signs of hurrying towards , fruition.

F. W. Lang, M.P., ib Bhifting his habitation. For many years past Mr Lang has fixed his bachelor establishment on his farm at Tuhikaramea, west of the railway line, between Frankton and Ohaupo. Lately, however, he has disposed of the Tubikaramea farm to Mr Macartney, from the Wanganui district, and purchased a property in his present electorate of Manukau. But, despite the kindly suggestions which he occasionally receives from interested friends as to the advisableness of a further change of state, Mr Lang seems immovable from his present condition of single blessedness. A bachelor he is, and a bachelor he is likely to remain. But who knows what closer association with the electresses of Manukau may effect ?

If the individual who was recently arrested at Home on a charge of burglary is really John Francis Usher, then the English police have got hold of one of the Hon. James McGowan's Waiotapu lambs. In March, 1908, two prisoners surreptitiously levanted from the Waiotapu prison camp. One was a person answering to the extremely uncommon name of John Johnson, and the other was Usher. The former was subsequently recaptured, but of Usher the police have found no trace from that day to this. Usher was one of those men who should never have been sent to Waiotapu at all, and at the time of his escape, we commented strongly upon the action of the authorities in allowing criminals of such a type to be turned loose there. The Hon. James McGowan, who was then Minister for Justice, sought to

show that proper discrimination was exercised in the selection, but, such a contention, under the circumstances, was absurd.

Usher, who is a Canadian, was sentenced in February, 1906, to live years' imprisonment for a series of lonsebreaking convictions, and was looked upon by the police as ja dangerous criminal. At the time of his tritl, he caused considerable sensation by snamming lunacy. His acting, however, was not convincing enough to imp ess the jury, and he was packed oil to durance vile. Usher is 31 years of age, and at the time of his escape h»d completed about two years of his fi^e years' sentence. Consequently, aboit three years are still owing. If the man arrested in England turns out U be Usher, it stand* to reason that 1 ; besides having to s-erve the balance oi the five years, he will be called upon to stand his trial on a charge of breaking prison One thing, at least, may be taken for granted ; and that is that the lost lamb will not be re-admitted into the Waiotapu fold.

According to Chief Inspector Fleming, of the Wellington Board of Education, the younger children are supplied with books of fairy tales. Rather cruel to expect children, at that tender age, to assimilate the contents of " Hansard," and the speeches of Parliamentary candidates. However, Mr Fleming says that the Board selects only the best books, and the works mentioned are the best books in the fairy tale line that it is possible to get.

Thomas Lawless, once sh well known at Te Aroha and the Thames as the Big Pump with which he was formerly associated, and now a Boniface at Stratford, struck weird evidence the other day that his present hostelry was at an earlier period conducted by somebody who was lawless by nature, if not, in name. In the course of reconstruction operations, a pipe was discovered leading from the cellar up through the bar into an upstairs chimney, and cunningly boarded over so as to escape detection. There are legends that private whisky stills and their products ran free in the district in the wild and woolly early days of settlement, and that this same cellar was connected by secret passages with ttie Patea river, and Thomas .reckons that he has hit upon an important bit i.i corrobroatiou. $ i

Interviewed in the South, the Hon. George Fowlds made light of the Webster claims, aad stated his opinion that the present case was not likely to have very serious results to the Dominion, But, if the position is not serious, why has it been considered necessary tosend the Solicitor-General to London "to rebut the claims? Other people are suggesting thaftthe real purpose of Dr Fitchett's trip fa to assist the Prime Minister in preparing the speeches with which he is to electrify the Imperial Defence Conference. At anjw rate, the ordinary coincidence ot tl/ je simultaneous departure of the PreniijjJ er and his principal legal adviser is apt *;° give rise to speculation. \ • (< • \ Sir William Jukes Steward thinks itft would be possible ho secure for Ne\v\ Zealand, by arranging some kind of \ barter or exchange, the Grey collee- \ tion of books and manuscripts now ai Capetown, which do not seem to be ' very highly valued by their present custodians. Here is a chance for the New Zealanders who brought back valuable loot from South Africa to distinguish themselves. There are said to be large quantities of private property from Boerland in the possession of New Zealand Tommies who went to the Transvaal and helped in sacking Boer farms. As the Boers are now tellow-citizens with their Cape neighbours, it should suit them to get these trophies returned, and here would be something, at any rate, to ■ offer towards the exchange th&t Sir ■■ William has in his mind's eye. .: ' • m. .• s r,- : '"I Ex-Minister Hogg, in his tjnbhu- . siastic self-admiration over what be-: - terms the " sacrificial act " of resign- p ing his portfolio, declares, in a' para-" ■ phrase of Othello, that he would rather be a toad living in a dungeon , than be a Minister "tongue-tied, gagged and muzzled, even at £1000 a year." It is a picturesque heaping up of epithets, but who ever heard, o f >? tongue-tied Minister ? Isn't the'lp , ( %. of Ministers — Mr Hogg himseji, rpt example— rather that they have too much glibness of tongue? Anyhow, if by some freak an unlucky Mitiieter were tongue-tied, wouldn't it be.ftijp^r--fluous to gag and muzzle him ? - '"'

The question as to whether Karangahape Road should be lit by gas or by electricity has, in more senses than one, been the burning topic with the City Council recently. Orator after orator put forth his valuable opinion for or against. The argument of H. M. Smeeton was, however, probably the most original of the lot. According to the reasoning of the intellectual Herbert Mayne, it was undesirable that Karangahape Road should be lit by electric light, because such an illumination would only serve to show up the general dinginess and shabbiness of the various shops in that thoroughfare. In fact, according to the Smeetonian reasoning, the installation of electric light would put the Karangahape Road shopkeepers to considerable expense in renovating and beautifying their premises. If H. M. Smeeton had said that the electric light would serve as a beacon to show the muddy gulfs and gullies in the centre of the road, he would have been nearer the mark.

And, apropos of this matter, the attitude of Councillor C. J. Parr appears to be worthy of some attention. On the occasion of the Mayoral installation, Mr Parr publicly plumed himself on the fact that, since he became a member of the Council, be had been instrumental in getting £60,000 spent upon various works in Ponaonby. Yet, when it was proposed that £400 per annum should be spent in lighting Karangahape Road in an adequate and up-to-date manner, Christopher James stood aghast at the proposal. But, since Karangahape Road is only second in importance, as a thoroughfare, to Queen-street, the proposal doesn't seem so very outrageous as the parabolic Parr would make it out to be. At all events, the Council doesn't think so, as is shown by the fact that, in spite of the Parrian arguments and the Smeetonian alleged logic, it carried the proposal to instal electric light among the fastnesses of Karangahape Road.

A legal luminary of the Auckland of twenty and odd years ago has returned to his old love, in the person of J. P. Campbell. For sixteen years (says the Wellington " Free Lance "), Mr Campbell has been quietly and busily practising his profession as a

lawyer in Wellington, as a member of the firm of Travers, Russell, and Campbell, winning the esteem of his fellow citizens, and building up a safe and solid business. Latterly his nephew (John Campbell Peacock) ■ has come down from Auckland to enter into partnership and take up the running here, while Mr Campbell has left to set up his shingle in the Queen City, and make his home there. It is merely a case of au revoir, and not good-bye, for Mr Campbell will still keep in touch with Wellington, and pop up serenely there from time to time.

J. P. Campbell once had ambitions to enter ihe political arena, but that is a story of thirty years ago. At that time he was chairman of the Piako County Council, and also of the Cambridge Town Board, and under public pressure he came out and contested the Waikato seat against the bland and portly J. B. Whyte, who xv as the sitting member. It was a very willing light, and J. P. Campbell only lost it by 32 votes.

According to the Rev. H. Mason, the water diviner, when he enters the sphere of water his body becomes violently agitated, and his arms begin to shake. We have noticed the same symptoms in other people, but water certainly wasn't the cause of them.

His Excellency Lord Plunket is evidently well aware that in order to get the best of everything, it is necessary to go to Auckland. Anyway, it is recorded that the vegetables used in the Gubernatorial residence at Palmerston North were sent thither from the queen city. This, of course, is another bitter blow to wild and woolly Wellington. Sad to think that even in the matter of the classical cabbage, the luscious lettuce, the trenchant turnip, the cantankerous carrot, and the boisterous beetroot, Wellington is beaten by her northern rival. Perhaps the secret is that in Wellington the retail vegetable irade is pretty well a Chinese monopoly, and that Lord Plunket is patriotic enough to object to fostering the trade of aliens. If so, we raise our hat to him. His example is worth following by the New Zealand public generally.

Henry A. Gordon, who is just retiring on superannuation from the post of consulting engineer to the State Coal Mines Department, was once considered to hold the future of mining in New Zealand in the hollow of his hand. Prior to the boom of ten or twelve years ago he was inspecting engineer to the Mines Department, but he resigned that office to share with Professor Park, then Director of the Thames School of Mines, the representation in the colony of the AngloContinental Financial Corporation of London, which was putting money into New Zealand mining investments. This institution was the "AngloGerman syndicate " with which the late Premier Seddon was for a time associated, and which was the cause of many bitter things being said about him in Parliament by his political opponents. At the period in question it looked as though the " AngloGerman " was likely to mop up most of the good things, that were going, and to become one of the most potent dispensers of mining patronage.

For this reason, Messrs Gordon and Park, in their pilgrimages on the goldfields, found themselves sought out, wherever they went, by people who had mining propositions to dispose of. Communities seemed to hang upon their lightest words, while their signatures were valued at thousands of pounds. It 'was principally their reports that led to the flotation of the Thames - Eauraki Company, which erected with Government assistance the huge pumping plant that now drains the Thames deep levels. But the period of glory did not last. By-and-bye the boom burst, and the " Anglo-German " dropped out of sight. For some time Mr Gordon carried on private practice in Auckland as a mining engineer, but the advent of the Coal Mines Department found him another niche in the Government service, which he has tilled ever since, and is now vacating. But, if ever a man was in a position to be an authority on New Zealand mining, that man was Henry Andrew Gordon.

It is a venturesome person that undertakes to carry out a practical joke within the sacred precincts of the Police Court, and that person is Lawyer W. £. Hackett. When the solicitors and police officials were assembled the other morning to await the arrival of the Magistrate, Mr

Hackett produced a mysterious-look-ing package which he declared to be an opium tin, and submitted to Chief Detective Marsack, to obtain his ex. pert opinion as to whether or not its contents were in a form suitable for smoking. The Chief Detective scrutiuised the packet, smelt it, looked knowing, and proceeded to take off the lid. As he did so, the said lid came away with a rush, and a fearsomelooking snake issued from it, sprang, over his shoulder, and twisted itself round the classic shoulders of Detective Fahey. With a yell of horror that might have been heaid ia Queenstreet, Fahey rushed out of court, and sought refuge in one of the corridors. Exactly what might have happened next it is hard to say, it the orderly's cry of " Silence !" had not ushered in the Bench. tut both Marsack and Fahey are now exceedingly suspicious of any exhibits of Uackettian origin.

With bated breath, the Press Ass. recently recorded the momentous fact ; that while the Hon James Carroll was entering a railway carriage,' he stumbled over a bag and received a shaking. It he doesn't take care, this fearful propensity for haste and hustle will be the death of the Hon. James one of these days. He should try to curb his enthusiasm for bustling things through. ' :

W. Farmer Whyte, who has been acting-editor of the "Herald" since liiditor Sholto went Home to shed the light of his intellect upon the Press Conference, has struck out in quite-/ a new line — two new lines in iaot, and the Lakes District is the start-ing-point of both. He has relinquished his journalistic post, to undertake the management of the team, of Maori dancers which is going to America, and this week he bows his ' neck to the matrimonial yoke,, with a , fair Rotoruan for his bride. Mr Whyte' s secession from the "Herald" office necessitates a recasting of tne staff. R,. M. Haoket is ' transfer- •. red from the "Weekly News" to become aoting-editor, with reversion, to,. , senior sub-editor when his chief returns ; E. D. D'Esterre gives up the chief reportership to edit the weekly ; and John Ypulin Birch is elevated to the giddy rank of chief reporter. And everybody is .pleased * v because for once the proprietary have filled senior positions without fresh J< importation. . „ , ■