THE SUNDOWNER'S SWAG

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 2, Issue 122, 18 September 1877, Page 2

THE SUNDOWNER'S SWAG

"Out and In ! In and Out!" , Senatorial vicissitudes."

The day! That day, " big with the fate of Caesar and of Rome," has come and gone, and (un) " like the baseless fabric of a vision," left five disappointed " wracks behind," sighing over washed-up dreams of Municipal honors unattained, and broken promises of votes and support." The feelings of a defeated candidate are beyond my ken. I can, however, sympathise with those who are now suffering, so severely, from " blighted- hopes," and ambition " nipped i'the bud." I am told that one of the last elect, hut not of the re-elect, felt the. ignominy of defeat so much that he kicked the buc—l mean box—of his affections, aud scowled savagely at that unoffending, but much used article of utility. Now for a plentiful crop of criticisms on the ins from the sad at heart outs. I have no doubt that, until the keen edge of the " back seat" is somewhat worn, things, in a critical, satirical, and other ways, will be made hot and lively for the-*iew Borough Councillors. Take a '' Sundowner's " advice. You " new chum " borough legislators, be careful how you act, doubly careful what you say, trebly careful in conducting Municipal business ; cultivate a thick hide and an impervious imperturbable callousness as to the sayings, doings, and writings, of your disparagers—for you are sure to have them—and then, with the aid of good digestion, sound appetite, stolid stupidity, powerful drinking and sound sleep, you may worry trirough your terms of office.

" Than wild anarchy There is greater ill ; beneath its rage Cities are sunk, and houses are o'erturn'd, And, in the contests of the spear, it breaks The battles bleeding ranks."

Strange, but true! Your romantic borough has suffered an almost irreparable ] oss —l do not allude to you. dear Doctor H. Your loss is the Council's loss —a loss that brought tears into the eyes of the much-suffering and meekly-enduring Town Clerk, whilst it had such a staggering effect upon his Worship that pen cannot explain, or words express, what must have been the agony to his "expansive buzzum." Tell it not in Gath." Yet it must be told that Professor, that is, and Councillor, that was, Chad wick, has managed to lose himself, his election the book of Municipal laws, and, horror of horrors, a key of the sacred chest, which holds the Vishnu of the Akaroa brahmins, that idolised and glorified production, the borough seal. One of the newly fledged ohicks, of Councillors, will have to go keyless and bookless. I say, " Venus," don't let the urbane Town Clerk try that " twist" upon you. Inspect him as a nuisance if he does Stay, should he, turn him over to fair Italia's son, that gloriously beautiful emerald gem, whose oratory and facial expression is—oh, carry me out " its kilt I am."

" Let wealth and commerce, laws and learning die. But leave us still our old nobility."

How few among us ares'*'5 '*' moderate in all things," and how seldom is moderation exercised when the acquisition of money is the end in view. I have been thinking what peculiar notions some of us have af to what is meant by the word moderate, and how differently we estimate it in the actions of buying and selling. As bearing somewhat on my remarks, and showing how opinions differ in the estimate of what is moderate, I read in the Akaroa Mail, that a gentleman offered the Akaroa and Wainui Road Board some hill-side land, for the purpose of a road, at the moderate price of £30 per acre, with a moderate request for a trifle more on account of fencing, winding up with the moderate assurance that they would, he hoped, "consider his offer moderate." Strange perversity-, the road-boarders did not swallow the moderate, bait, they did not see where the jmoderate part of the offer came in, and they were immoderate enough to defer, instead of jumping at the purchase of the moderately-valued piece of freehold. Now, I have an idea that that gentleman of moderate offers must have been confabulating with our tried friends the Oddfellows' valuators, for I have a vivid rememembrance of those gentlemen hitting out moderately in away remarkably similar to his. . Am I right, Brother 0 let's Tryon'? If so, lam grieved for you. Have you not suffered moderately? Was not eight colonial roberts per day, moderately considered, and said to be enough, for you and your wheelbarrow? It was!. Pascal wrote that

" To go beyond the bounds of Moderation^.to outrage humanity." And Bishop Hall defined moderation as' "The silken string running through the pearl chain of all virtues." The man who first discoveied that " what belongs to everyone belongs to no one," tumbled across a great truth, which is strikingly exemplified in the case of the Akaroa Town Hall. Some months since I blessed, my good fortune that I was not a shareholder in 1 that dismally neglected building. I. then endeavoured, by means of ridicule,--tr> shame, those connected with it into painting, cleaning, and, in other ways, touching: up its exterior and interior; no go, however. Whoever may be on the committee .appointed to look after the shareholders' interests, they seem to me to wilfully, wrongfully, and shamefully a"ree not to do what they were elected for. A building which should be an orna- ; ment to your borough is, through the miscohducj;: l of those who should do their utmost to preserve it, allowed to become a bye-word for all that re dilapidated; un-cared-for, filthy, and dry-rotten. If ever a clean sweep'was required it "is*-in this case. ' What are the shareholders dream-

ing of? Have they lost the use of their eyes and reasoning powers? Whose pockets will have to be dipped into to repair the caused by systematic neglect? Sundowner, pariah, aud ne'er do well as I am, even I would he ashamed to acknowledge that I am in any way oonnected with the mismanagement of theAkaroa Town Hall building. "■Had I an arm to reach the skies, Or grasp the ocean in a span, I'd not be measured by my size, The mind's the standard of the man." Adieu.