VICE-ROYALTY RUFFLED.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 549, 31 August 1869, Page 3

VICE-ROYALTY RUFFLED.

As an illustration of the easily injured vanity of the present Governor, Sir George Bowen, the Wairarapa Mercury supplies the following narrative: —The No.l Company ofWellington Volunteer Bifles have in their ranks a number of dramatic amateurs who perform occasionally. Recently they announced a performance for the benefit of the Benevolent Society, which the Governor and the Commodore were requested to patronize. The Commodore not wishing to attend, having recently suffered a severe domestic affliction, took a number of tickets and encouraged his officers to be present. The Governor, however, wrote to say that he was unable to attend, but, the company were at liberty to use his illustrious name. Xot anticipating any great benefit from doing so, they headed their bills, " under the patronage of the Commodore." It came to their knowledge that Sir George considered himself slighted by this, and the secretary (who was a gentleman in the civil service), was directed to inform His Excellency that being aware that he was not going to attend, they did not wish to deceive the public by saying that he was. The letter was not couched in language sufficiently submissive to be agreeable, but, nothing was said until there appeared in the Evening Post, a local giving the particulars of the affair, and commenting on the value of His Excellency's name. Sir George's wrath was aroused and, setting the civil and military machinery of the Government in motion, the delinquent was attacked on both sides at once. He was accused of "lese majesty" in writing impertinent letters to the Governor, and of being the author of a vile local which appeared in the columns of an evening periodical, unworthy to be named. Colonel Reader attacked him, as his commanding officer, for breach of discipline as a volunteer ; the head of his department suspended him for breach of civil service regulations, and the unfortunate individual found himself between " the devil and the deep sea." The Post exonerated him from all complicity in the " local" yet he still remains in a precarious position, daily expecting dismissal. It cannot be denied that Sir George Bowen's conduct in this instance has been the very reverse of gentlemanly; its justice, people can form their own opinion of. If ho considered himself aggrieved by any statements in a newspaper, he should have vented his indignation against it, and vindicated himself, which he had abundant means of doing, and not have wreaked his wrath on an unfortunate clerk, whose position left him opon to be crushed under the Yiee-Regal foot.