THE SUNDOWNER'S SWAG.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 2, Issue 108, 31 July 1877, Page 3

THE SUNDOWNER'S SWAG.

"Let it out." • " Wirein's; speech on BorrLED Froth." I am not a reticent individual more especially over enumerating my many faults and failings. I find that my ; amiable kind of weaknesses are not singular ; many are touched with the same complaints that I have, and, like me, take to inflicting themselves, and their chimeras, upon a much enduring public, time and place never being considered. If it had not been someone else, I should certainly thought it was me, Jack Sundowner, who recently figured at a Road" Board .Conference in Christchurch. When I read the account of the proceedings at that conference, I had serious doubts of my own identity; doubts which were not removed until a friend had floored me, and then lent hie a looking glass to show me lioav neat a hand he was at making a wreck. It was nic to a T.Y., was that diffidently modest unassuming stylo of good breeding, which . showed itself by calling strange gentlemen "my friend;" again, I thought, no one beside me would have the delicacy to inform any conference " that I had come one hundred miles," —how powerful is imagination, glorious Tom Pepper !—" and had little to say for it;" that" the Peninsula did notwish to be mixed up with those on the plains ;" that "they should leave the Peninsula alone, and let it fight for itself;" that " I Avas a member of a County Council, but did not believe in it;" that "I worked as hard as I could ;" " carried my point," and saved my district from being "short of funds ;" that—l got'laughed at, and with unabashed humility, left that conference enlightened considerably as regards myself, but with foggy notions as to my representative capacity. Pope wrote' that needless conceit was— "An assumption, which is to nature what paint is to beauty, not only needless, but a detriment to that which it is meant to improve." I have no objection to others occasionally doing what I am in the habit of doing, perhaps too often, and that is, indulging in burlesque. There are times, however, when burlesque is out of place and uncalled for, such, for instance, as the occasion of the late meeting held, to consider the necessity for the establishment of a fire brigade in Akaroa. I cannot do the admiration business, nor gush over the part which Mr. W. Adams took at that meeting, as it seems to me that to burlesque such a muchneeded movement is simply to throw cold water upon a very good thing to throw. is'nt it Councillor Cubing ? Do you remember doing the same to the baths, and would-be bathers ?—and condemn it. One of the articles of equipment, suggested by Mr. Adams, reminds me of my school-days —viz.—paper hats. Mounted on a stool, with elongated visage, woe-begone wretchedness depicted upon every lineament, an outward semblance of crawling servility, but an inward determination, to leather, or be leathered by, my jeering surrounders; with the " paper cap," that emblem of the antipodes of acquired knowledge, surmounting my empty cranium, have I stood "the observed of all observers" in the school. I am not.for a moment insinu- ~ Ating that Mr. Adams took thatposition at the meeting, but, you. know,, one cannot help one's thoughts ;' we are all of us impulsive creatures and playfully think we should like to see things, we fancy come *to pass which we should be sorry to know, would be likely to happen. I do think that Mr. Adams means well to_ the fire brigade movement, so assist it along -committeemen, for is he not one of you. Now is your time, brother Morey, to prance around them with your practical ideas and sound common sense notions. " Who shall judge a man from hismanners ? Who shall know him by his dress ? Paupers may be fit for princes, Princes fit for something less." I think I have told the readers of this

journal, on more than a solitary occasion, that I have an old lady friend who clothes some of her remarks in very peculiar English. As is my wont. I went a few days since to see, and have a yarn with, the lady in question. After talking for some time upon indifferent subjects, our conversation turned upon our reminiscences of the passage out, from England to the colonies, together with our thoughts upon the same and the experiences we acquired during that time. " Ah, John," said the old lady, when we had thoroughly warmed J up on the subject, " I liked the passage very well except the time when we were in the ' saw-pits,' then the heat was very disagreeable indeed." " Saw-pits !" said I, " why what the—a-hera—what are you driving at ? Whoever heard of " sawpits" in connection with a passenger ship?" **John," quietly remarked the venerable dame, " either your education':was shamesully neglected or you are jeering; I mean the time about when we crossed the. line." For a time I collapsed, but it gradually dawned upon me that" the tropics" was what was meant to be implied, and with a jaunty " oh yes, I know," I got out of that difficulty. " Mis(s) Take was a kind-looking lass, But her errors were grievous, indeed, So I in despair left her side, To seek a true friend in my need." "Hooray! three cheers and a double tiger 1! We won't go home 'til the morning, 'til the orient day is dawning, we •won't" "be ay now. ye disgracefully dhrunken howling devishes, or its Aylmer's bCreen yell be investigating."- This was the salute that greeted the ears of as choice a trio as ever drank whiskey, and confusion, to themselves and others. Of course, Ljvas in it. • We had the/music flowing in beautiful • numbers, the shakes, and demieemi grace we. introduced, was not written for the '■ composition, but, to our thinking, they enhanced its melodious beauty. We had beeri making a night of it, celebrating • the great and glorious genius of him who invented the Little River petition ;when our loudly vented admiration, find cat-disturbing serenade, was rudely broken by that Italian peace pre- — server. "Bad cess to bini." This little episode, made us, if possible, greater admirers of the petition and its trio of enthusiastic signers. We felt sure that the _ "three tailors of Tooley-street" had not livlsd in vain ; that the nobility of their conduct was worthy of all emulation ; that they—Pho3nix;.like-i-had risen-at the antipodes to, as we hoped, sweep away lockups Tipperary Italians, and other unconsidered trifles of that' nature. What a *" paradise for us sundowners, Little River will become when this beatifaction takes

place. Gloriously glorious !•• • •-;-'■- " Resolve to be merry, _•" • ~ All worry to ferry . Across the famed waters that bid us forget. And no longer fearful. But happy and cheerful; We feel life has much that's worth living for yet." Adieu.'