DUNEDIN LETTER.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XLI, Issue 5634, 24 April 1909, Page 3

DUNEDIN LETTER.

(Own Correspondent^

' " Jarrah Sleepers "" — These are what • are worrying us just now. Not polir tics or Dreadnoughts or LawrenceRoxbugh railways or mayoral elee3 tions. but just " jarrah sleepers." If 3 you ask me what are " jarrah sleepers " I must honestly confess that I do not know. I have never seen 'em, j'ever met 'em and never been intcpl duced to 'em. But I have come very i near it. I have met a man who s knows all about 'em, knows where they "come from, where they growed, where they went to ' sleep and why they are called " jarrah peepers." That is just where all the trouble comes in. Every thine was going along nicely until my informant popped in— like Paul Pry. He was tall and big and Taft-Jike and he had a v oico in keeping. " Hullo ' Where do you came from ? " I asked. *'. Westralia ! " he roared. "Where the dickens is that?" I I asked. I "What," he shouted, "don't know where Wesitralia is ? " " No," I answered brazenly (I only came up to his waistband and I was determined to take him down a pe~\ " My goodness," he snorted, "Shark at this now " (he looked* up at the plaster cracks in the ceiling). "Here's a miatn (stoort number two) who .doesn't know where Westra'lia is— God's own country and don't you forget it." " I_ don't," I piped, " but where is it ? He glared savagely, like' a Brobdignagian farm hand misrht at Gulliver. ' then sneered " Why where the jarrah j sleepers come from." "Oh is that all," I chirped, " I ' thought it must have been from some place like that." Then ho jjave me up and tried to ' talk quietly— it was a striking illus- 1 tration of ihe triumph of mind over 3 matter. , " Now look here young man," he < began (m.y youthful and ingenuous " countenance again ! — I was five years 1 older than he was though I didn't look it) " you want to know about ' jarrah sleepers ' ?*' " Not at all," said I, " I know all ) about 'em ; what I want to know is what are they ? Are they alive ? ! (he groaned). Do they live of the , banks of the Yarra ? (he squirmed) j " way down the Swanee River," I t quoted irrevelantly. " Are they always asleep and when did they wake c up ? Nothing to ■do I suppose with j Virginia Creepers, the potato bus?, the California thistle or the dry ; rot." v ' I "All, now you have ifc," he inter- t rupted me ; " dry rot, that's what it is and there has been rot in more i places that one," he added with a i mysterious wink and jerk of the arm). '■' But just you listen. I know all ab- x out those " jarrah sleepers ' of yours'; > know where they t»-rew, wlio cut J em, who shipped 'em. and wKai they ,ars worth. They aint worth a tinker's £ anathema ; its a disgrace to Westra- {. lia to have sent 'em here, and I'm v croing to kick up a row when I get .to the only country worth living in south of the line." i | ' " Have you told the Council ?" I j queried. , ' " Told 'em ? " he fulminated ; \ " told em ? Well I guess I have, j Why, I went over 'em with 'em. I pointed out their defects, weaknesses £ and absolutely shocking* want of „ primitive vigour. Jarrah sleepers ! k says I, why they are no more the v genuine tumor that Thomson's ginger a ale is Dunvil'le's whisky." j " And what did they say ? " v " I'm not going to tell you," he. answered, " but just you put that in ,- the paper to-night (he produced a , bundle of manuscript), and that will r about fix matters up." • It did. The Mayor that is and 1 the j. Mayor that wants to be, the Council- . a lors tthat are and tjhe Councillors that may be. the correspondents and the candidates are talking nothing but jarrah. Nor do I wonder ; the business is decidedly unsatisfactory. Put in plain prose it comes to titie. The Council bought 5800 jarrah • sleepers h at 2s lid each and after it. had 1 bought them, it discovered that they c were no good. Not that this was much »\ Dunedin is used to it ; a trifle of £850 doesn't count anyway. The only thing that mattered was to hush it up. \But jarrah sleepers, like murder, " will out " ; somebody gave them a kick and they awakened with a yell. The sleepers were valueless. Dunedin had bought a pig in a poke and then found that there was more poke than pig. Anyway a big row resulted, and at this hour of writing it is being fought out at the Council table. Whatever the end may be does not matter a great deal. The main interest centres around the query : '' Who ordered the purchase ? That is the point on which opinions differ; around it the battle rages, and over it Cr. Walker and his Worship are exchanging blows and challenges and compliments. The Councillor says mt the Mayor is responsible for the purchase ; the Mayor answers back " You are another." Both appeal to the record and boih claim that it proves their case. Let us look at the facts — we will ledve their interpretation to the contestants. On February 10th the Council decMed'to offer 2s 6d a sleeper for 4000 sleepers. The owners wrote back declining and offered the whole lot of 5800 at 2s lid each net. The Mayor thereupon wrote on the back of this offer his instructions to the Chairman of the Tramway Committee : " Cr. Cole to act." Cr. Cole and his Committee approved. The puzzle now raised is, by what authority did the Mayor give instructions to Cr. Cole to act after the owners of the jarrah sleepers had refused the Council's offer ? Cr. Walker, as. a rival candidate, naturally charges the Mayor with the responsibility of a costly and ghastly muddle. The Mayor shelters himself behind the Tramways Committee's resolution and cries " Fair play, if you please," and I say that the Mayor had no right to, give instructions to Cr. Cole to act, that Cr. Cole had no right to act and that the Tramways Committee had no power to authorise so wide a d«parture from the terms of the • ri Final resolution of the Coun«il. We have, in fact, a repetition of past scandals, andi like all scandals it has resulted disastrously for the ratepayers. Councillors Braitlrwalte and i London once assumed the right .to pay away nnotaiey they had no authority to pay to Noyes Bros., and the city lost heavily, and norw Cr.' Cole, unheeding, the lessons of the past, lends his position as a Councillor to a similar usurpation of power witlh almost equally financially serious results to the citizens. . Did you read Tuesday's ?i.ir &nd Wednesday's Times ? I am a/raid r<.t, else would there have beni weeping and mourning in Tuapeia. Whn* 1 hinted would happen, has happen- 1 '! • Willie Thomson, the hotel .r«*fi»rm r. like Mrs Carrie Nation, the saloon smasher, has gone away, lie l.as retit ed into the bosom of moth :r n i ture, to the beautitude and comfort of farm life in the North Island Re had a long and a meuy innin-s while it lasted. He possibly did more harm send cosrt. '" tbe trade " more in hard cash than Mr Isitt and Mr Mchblls mjiiltiplied by ten. And he v didn't refeoro a single hotel. The r leopard has not changed his spots 11 ' nor the rhinocerous his skin. He is s the sajme Old Bung as he always was > and always will be. i- On Tuesday night Mr J. B. Nicholls kindly summed tip tag Js&tfts of bis

rival's work and, generally, they were fairly stated, though perhaps it would have been more generous to have said nothing. Willie was a beaten man and the " trade," too, were badly beaten. So, why bury the dead twice over. The Licensed Victuallers' Association gave Willie a .nice little send off (see Otago 's Daily Crimes) and a purse of sovereigns. They were really sorry to lose him. They didn't want him to go ; they wanted him to stay another two years. He had done his work so well (Willie nearly burst into tearsat this stage, he knew they meant it I and it really sounded almost like the actual thing); but, alas, Willie had decided to get back to the land, beer no longer satisfied him, and Mr Nichols so upset him that he could not stay, so to the land he has gone. Goodbye, Willie," good-bye ; Oar hearts are sore for tliee ; and we'll not forget .you gave us lots of fun. Willie Thomson's gone awa' Will he no come back again ? Better loved he canna be And NichoH's hairt is sore wi' pain. I don't think he will— will you, Willie ?