Meetings.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4905, 21 March 1894, Page 3

Meetings.

lUOCIIUgOI Some five or six thousand persons assembled in Cathedral Square last evening I to hear the final addresses of the prohibitionist leaders before the licensing elec--1 tions. During the early part of the ; meeting the proceedings were very orderly, . but towards the close the large crowd showed signs of impatience, and at the conclusion there was some rather I rough "horse play," which resulted in I Constable Fitzgerald arresting a young man on a charge of acting with intent to provoke a breach of the peace. The speakers were Messrs G. J. Smith, member of the House of Bepreaentatives, and T. E. Taylor, Captain Osborne, of the Salvation Army, and the Bey P. B. Monro. The speeches were mostly replies to' the addresses of the Bey A. Chodowski, Mr M. Davie and Mr W. W. Collins, the lastnamed gentleman being designated as the mouthpiece of the liquor party. Mr Taylor read extracts from a book published by the Bey Dr Elmslie in 1876, in which the suppression of the drink traffic was advocated. Mr Taylor said that this bad been published by the reverend gentleman when he was in his full Christian manhcod, but be had now changad hia ideas, and ho (Mr Taylor) prophesied that in five years Dr E ; mslie's name would be a by-word iv everyone's mouth on the liquor question. The Rev P. B. Monro in concluding his address accueod the morning papers of having suppressed a Piers Association telegram p.a to matters connected with the agitation in Timam and witb. having substituted a misleading message.