The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit TUESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1884. The Claimant’s Exit.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1412, 23 December 1884, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit TUESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1884. The Claimant’s Exit.

_ The release of the Tichborni 1 claimant from gaol is a sufficient!; notable event to awaken more than i passing interest even in these distan colonies. So remarkable an imposter a worthy follower of those masters Messrs Lambert, Simnel and Perkii -i War beck, could not retire trom th< eye of the world without exciting somi comment. It is the last act of th< n Tichborne drama of which the mora has been “ Honesty is the bes policy.” Public attention having beei thus directed to the subject, the grea i 0 trial has become again a matter of tasl n and argument. Sundry, new orator have been unearthed in Australia ant elsewhere. A man possessed of im portant evidence, which he has hithertt suppressed for mysterious reasons, ha been discovered. We in New Zealant have not escaped the contagion. Wi are at present recovering from at attack of Osprey fever. Old se: " captains of retentive memory, bu defective perception, have beet able to vouch for the fact that the; have met with or heard of a vesse called the Osprey in the course of thei experience. The public must not bt kept in ignorance of this astounding information. Accordingly the papers particularly those published in th< Northern part of this colony, have teemed with letters. And as each writer maintained that his Osprey was the Osprey, a very elastic type of vessei she appears to have been. The facilitj with which she changed her rig was less remarkable than her capacity to shrink from a ship of over one thousand tons to a craft of two hundred. But to return to the claimant. It must be admitted that he quits his prison with some dignity. He implores his friends to start no agitation in his favor. He will be no party to any immediate and ill-advised attempt to restore to him the possessions of his ancestors. They will not forget him, he trusts; but they must respect his retirement. This is carrying the thing off well, quite as it should be. But many of his supporters who would doubtless have been much moved by his pathetic injunctions are no more. Among these must be numbered Lord Rivers and Mr Guildford Onslow. These gentlemen in the early days of the imprisonment would frequently pall on their stout friend and induce him, as we may suppose, to lay aside his oakum and listen to their consolations. The voluble Kenealy is gone, too. So, perhaps, after all, his determination to lie perdu is a wise one. With his future career we need not trouble ourselves. Some sirpple people will stilj regard him as the injured Sir Roqer ; and 50 Iqng as there are simple people he will do his best to support the role of the persecuted baronet. His most striking characteristics in the past have been an unmatched impudence, and, to borrow Lord Macaulay’s term, a forehead of brass. How far these have suffered Ijj’minution from his prolonged confinement reraai”? to be seen, and so we tafee our leave of hiu? a >» his reduced, bfit still huge, person disappears the obscurity of quiet priyate life, from which it is to be hoped he wjll never again emerge.