News of the Dominion.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 18, 3 May 1911, Page 4

News of the Dominion.

OUR WELLINGTON LETTER.

WELLINGTON, April 29. The Municipal Elections. THE City Council elections left things pretty much “as-yon-were.” Nearly all the old councillors who offered themselves for re-election were returned; in faet, only one was defeated, and the city fathers are naturally congratulating themselves upon this expression of public confidence. There is a slight infusion of new blood. The novices elected are Mr. John Fuller, junior, of the wellknown theatrical firm, Mr. Len. McKenzie, a popular young chemist, of Manners-street, and son of the late T. W. McKenzie, the “father of Wellington,’’ and Dr. R. W. Cameron, a local medical practitioner, who has evinced a great interest in municipal affairs. The three new members are live and energetic men, and ought to prove useful councillors. The chief honours of the election go to Mr, Robert Fletcher, who headed the poll, with over ten thousand votes, besides topping the list of the Harbour Board election. Mr. Fletcher has been chairman of the Wellington Harbour Board for the last year, and he has won the confidence of the citizens by his business-like management of the Board’s affairs. He is an excellent type of the solid and yet progressive citizen, and the affairs of the Boa’rd are safe in his hands. There is a possibility that he will be Mayor of Wellington before many years, too. The half-holiday vote resulted in the retention of Wednesday, to the particular satisfaction of the small shopkeepers, and also of the housewives, who would feel lost if they were deprived of their Saturday afternoon’s shopping. The voting was remarkably heavy; in fact. I do.not remember having seen so much interest in any previous municipal election in New Zealand. There were approximately’ seventeen thousand votes recorded, out of a total of twenty-nine thousand on the roll. The city returning officer. Mr.. Ames, says he considers it was the biggest municipal poll recorded in New’ Zealand. He does not remember the franchise being exercised by women to such an extent as it was this week. This increase of public interest in matters municipal is certainly a healthy sign. Our South Sea Possessions. I hear that the Hon. James Carroll, Acting-Premier, has definitely decided to make his promised visit to New Zealand’s “Knots of Paradise” in the South Paerfie in May of next year. He was to have made the cruise in the Tutanekai next month, but the absence of the Premier and the approach of the general elections, prevent him leaving New Zea’and’s shores. The idea is to make a comprehensive inspection of the islands and atolls under New Zealand’s jurisdiction —the half-dozen islands of tne Cook Group, tire north-lying lagoon islands ot Penrhyn, Manihikd and Rakahanga, lonely Danger Island and Pukapuka, and, finally, Savage Island, or Niue, the largest island in New Zealand’s South Sea possessions. It is very probable that Tonga will also be visited in the cruise. In the meantime, the affairs of Raratonga call for investigation, and it is a pity Mr Carroll could not have gone down there this year. The dissatisfaction of a section of the residents with Mr. '-m b. the new Commissioner, finds vent in frequent complaint's in the Wellingt m news apers, ami it is obvious that things are not going as they should. Mr. Smith is an excellent Civil Ferviee official. I t the Government made a huge mist .ke in sending him to replace Col. Gudge n. The Colonel was a splendid man for the position. and no one had a word to say against his administration. He knew the natives, their ways, and their language. and he was not so old bus that he could have carried on there for another ten or fifteen years with erfe t satisfaction to the Government, and the people. To send a Civil Service official down there fresh from such an office as the < ’ld Age Pensions, and expect him to fill the offices of a Governor, a Chief Ju-tie, a Judge of the Native Land Court, and chief ruler of a particularly “touchy” native population—to say nothing of the whites—is simply to invite

trouble. Mr. Smith was a first-class departmental officer, but he should not have been expected to taekle such a strange task. New Zealand and the Friendly Islands. I hear, too, a whisper that next year will very likely see Tonga—the Friendly Islands—added to New Zealand’s South Sea dependencies. This is a highly important item of news, but no inkling of it has as yet appeared in the dailies. When the Hon. Mr. Carroll was in Auckland recently he had an interview with King George Tubou, the native monarch of the Friendly Islands, on the question of the destiny of his Coral-and Coeoanut Kingdom. George Tubou’s crowned head has been an uneasy one for some time past. The fact of his islands having been placed under a British protectorate saves them from foreign annexation—• the Germans have always had an envious eye on Tonga —but the arbitrary methods of the High Commissioner tor the Western Pacific, whose representative is the power behind the throne, irritate the Tongans extremely. They pride themselves on their independence, but if they must knuckle to some white Government, then they would prefer that Government to be New Zealand’s. In any ease, the present unsatisfactory state of things eannot -continue long in Tongst, and I am very" strongly inelined to the belief that next year will see the New Zealand ensign flying over the Government buildings at Nukualofa. The Group is a very rich one, there is a big trade—most of it with New Zealand —- and there is no troublesome problem of a big Indian Coolie populatii*!, such as exists in Fiji. Tonga would be a distinct acquisition to New Zealand’s territory, and would involve us In no expense for it is more than self-supporting. It would go a long way to make up to us for not getting Samoa, which would have been under New Zealand’s flag twenty years ago had not narrow and ignorant British officialism blocked the way.

The Maori and His Tangi. There is a soul wandering around somewhere in the Maori spiritland just now chuckling over the way in which it diddled its pakeha creditors. It inhabited the substantial frame of a brown gentleman whose ancestral whare was up on the banks of the Wanganui river. Brown gentleman, it was known, had f2OO or so in the bank, and his numerous creditors had their eyes on this. He died, and when the claims came in it was found that the bank money had been withdrawn. John Maori, it seems, anticipated his own decease, and wrote out a cheque for tangi expenses. Anyhow, he had a real good wake, and that was the main thing. Never mind the pakeha creditor. A Maori’s spirit couldn’t rest for evermore unless there was a decent tangi over its late fleshy casket. In the Auckland Museum now’ there is a big carved house that the owner, old Major Fox. passed over to the pakeha, in order that the funds aceruing therefrom would give him a decent send-off into brown brother’s Ghostland. Frank Courtenay Seymour, Kis Shovel. When I read yesterday that Auckland par recording the sudden death on the Rotorua-Te Teko road of Frank Courtenay Seymour, old soldier and old colonial hand. I remembered a few things.- I knew Seymour, and I wasn’t surprised to read that he died at his work, with his long-handled shovel in his hand. He used to say he wanted to “peg out” at work, when his time came. Seymour was an unusual man, and had led an unusual life. That he had come down in the world so far as to be a roadman, shovelling dirt for a few shillings a day. didn’t worry him. He was as happy" as that other “Ro■-•dmender” of a famous little book. Yet Frank Courtenay Seymour came of an old aristocratic English family i blue blood has n lot to answer for,, and was cousin of a high-placed British naval officer. Admiral Seymour. He was one of the innumerable “younger sons” who have drifted into all sorts of queer occupations in all sorts of strange corners, the “wholly unauthorised horde” of Kipling's “Lost Legion”:— "The ends of the earth were our portion; The ocean at large was our shore.” Seymour was a big fellow physically,

tall and straight and athletic, with a fearless poise of head, and with features that would have won Guida’s heart. He came to New Zealand in the sixties, fought in the Maori war, won the wadmedal, and a reputation for dare-devil behaviour in the face of the enemy; and in the early seventies he wore the blue uniform of the Armed Constabulary. He was one of the men who helped to construct the telegraph lines in the Bay of Plenty district, and in this rough and hard work he delighted just as much as in bush-whacking and soldiering. He would tackle anything, and though he couldn't swim he would always take the lead in dangerous river-fording. Later he was track-cutting in the Motu district, back of Gisborne. In those days, in the old A.C. Force, Seymour—he had dropped his family name in the Force and called himself Frank Courtenay — was the life of the camp and the head and front of any wild piece of devilment that was afoot. He was one of the reckless irresponsible types that are now a disappearing factor in the life of this country. For instance, a yarn. It was in the early seventies, and Frank and his best-beloved mate, an Irishman, whose front name was Joe, had come down to Gisborne for their semi-annual spree. In the course of their rejoicings one of them—but which of them neither could ever definitely tell—married a new chum English girl whom they found at one of the hotels. The marriage was pretty quick work —the trio had only been acquainted one. day—but as far as could be made out afterwards front Frank’s account, the girl had fallen desperately in love with his fine roving eye and his beautiful silky beard. She was married to Frank, presumably, but Joe swore that she married him, and next day there was a picturesque row between the two partners,” over the business. Said Frank: "Damn cheek you had last night, getting away with my wife!” Quoth Joe: "Your wife be hanged! She is my wife, and I'll fight you for her too.” Sobriety brought about reconciliation, and then mutual flight, when the pair realised that one. or probably both of them, had fallen into the matrimonial pit. They bolted up country for the Motu as far as they could go, quite omitting to inquire whether the wife would come for a honeymoon. The English girl was on the tracks for a while, but at last gave up the pursuit of those aristocratic silky whiskers in despair. But for months, even years after this, Frank’s acquaintances used to put the fear of the Lord into him, as they expressed it, by telling him that his wife was at the next station looking for him. The veteran would give a heartrending groan, and pack his swag straightway for the depths of the bush. Not a very creditable story, but alas, often true of ths early days. What became of the unfortunate girl is not known. His neat little camp in the bush, close to the shores of Lake Rotoma—some twenty-seven miles beyond Rotorua—reflected the old-soldier training; it was as orderly as a barrack-room; and his books betokened a certain cultivated taste. Seymour was an honest fellow, even if his duty to society was not fulfilled—a type of the fearless men who fought the Maoris or pioneered the bush bi the wild frontier days. But it was a wild life, and the cousin of an Admiral of the Fleet passed out with his shovel in his fist, and just as the traditional Admiral of the Fleet wou’d like to die, facing the foe with his sword in his hand.