The Westport Times AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 25, 1868.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 438, 25 December 1868, Page 2

The Westport Times AND CHARLESTON ARGUS. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 25, 1868.

If at any time a Briton, or the son of a Briton, can truly be said to attain the sentimental, it is within the short season commencing on Christmas Eve and ending with the advent of a New Year. Of all seasons, that of Christmas is, both in Britain and hercolonies, essentially the season of sentiment. Far above mere sentiment are, of course, the feelings which inspired men to the first observance of the day, and which, it is to be hoped, do still inspire many to maintain its observance as the one great holyday of the year. But it is the inferior and more mundane features of its national observance —the secular and sentimental, rather than the sacred —which most prominently present themselves. Especially in "Westport. And it is these features which, thus presented, suggest themselves as subjects for reference in the columns of a newspaper published—in Westport—at the dawn of a Christmas Day. It is a misfortune for him who would venture to write at such a moment' that there is so much of unusual sentiment, and so little of ordinary sense, prevailing. There is a danger of his imagining himself inspired toaim at the sublime, and of awaking to wish that he had expired rather than that he should have realised the ridiculous. The atmosphere is absolutely pervaded with sentiment. Men are shaking each other hardly and heartily by the hand, wishing each other, with sentiment, "A "Merry Christmas," or adding, with a sentimental smile, " And many returns of the season."' Some are loitering where they should not loiter, and excusing themselves by an excuse which would scarcely be received by the Resident Magistrate—sentiment. Printers are printing supplementary sheets (containing lines by some gushing poet or poetess overflowing with—sentiment:; :and containing a story which is all a fltory except its sentiment. Soft-goods men, with a reoommeadable appreciation of advertising, utter -sweet sentiments, sud aolieit attention to their stack-in-

trade. Even butchers appeal to the heart, and speak of sheep and awine with sentiment. Under such circumstances sense must be subdued, and we must claim also to be allowed to have our swing and sentiment. Our sentiment for the season is:— Faith, Hope, and Charity—three -cardinal Christian virtues.

Faith, it is said, will remove mountains. If it has not literally done so in the particular district in which we live, it is a virtue which, when wisely exercised, has done much towards the same end. By its moral assistance, many hill-sides have been penetrated during the year that is past, and much of what is prized by man has been removed. 'lt requires no great stretch of faith to believe, or to predict, that much more can be done in the same direction. In no district more than in this immediate neighborhood is there verge and room for the exercise of faith and of its practical application in the " prospecting " or working of auriferous ground ; and, judging by the past, there is much reason for faith as to the future. By faith, and in the face of false reports, men have been induced to seek for. and to work, when found, ground which has amply repaid their fidelity of belief and their labor ; and if faith, safely grounded on past experience, do not receive its reward before another Christmas comes, we shall have to confess ourselves deluded believers in " outward and visible signs," and sanguine sentimentalists whose sensibilities have been affected by Christmas and its surroundings. We have faith, notwithstanding, that there are, in the Westport district, resources as to the development of which we can, at least, exercise the second of our cardinal virtues—hope. Hope is commonly compared to an anchor, but the comparison is odious when there is such an article as a ninety-ounce nugget with which it may be associated. And that there is such an article in existence is proved by the fact of a party of miners havingbrought it down yesterday from the upper waters of the Buller, and by more than one reliable witness having seen it, and " felt its weight." We imagine that, even with such a solitary but singular proof of the resources ofacountry comparatively yet untried, hope has not altogether departed from the minds of those who are aiding iu the enterprise of prospecting Manuka Flat, or who have s.ioken of the Upper Buller as a»distiict destined to dhulgeits resources when the Nelson Government fulfilled its duty by making it accessible to those who are competent and willing to undertake its development. If we imagined less, we should be doing injustice to the discoverers of the nugget, and to the virtue of those who have been detained in the district by no Government encouragement, but by the simple exercise of hope. Charity,we are told,covers manysins, and it would truly require to be expansive if, even at such a charitable season as the present, it could cover the many sins of mere omission on the part of that same Nelson Government. Faith in it has ceased long ago ; hope is even waning ; and there remains but charity. But if charity should begin at home, as it proverbially should do, it is in Westport, not Nelson, that it should find a field for exercise ; and, if the Progress Committee mean anything, they me.m that for their programme before next Christmas. Writing in the temper < f the time, these are our sentiments for the season. Finally, we have faith enough to hope that our readers are charitable enough to wish us, as we wish them, " A Merry Christmas a?td a Happy New Year."