The Evening Star. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 1871.

Auckland Star, Volume II, Issue 439, 7 June 1871, Page 2

The Evening Star. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 1871.

On it evening contemporary in yester- ; day's issue was " laughing" and "blushing" all over; the occasion being the deliverance of Mr. Cherry out of all his troubles. It is so seldom that our contemporary is in a hilarious mood, and we had thought him so unsusceptible to those amiable impulses that mantle the cheek in modesty, that we are almost loth to call in question the grounds of this unusual exuberance of his emotional nature. But really there is so much in the case, Euller v. Cherry, for which our contemporary should be thoroughly ashamed of himself, that we think he might have selected a more fitting, occasion for his cachinnation,. In the case in question, as will be remembered, Mr. Cherry published in the Evening Afews a letter reflecting, as was alleged, on Mr. Fuller in his capacity of a hotel keeper. The libel was of the mildest possible kind, and Mr. Euller, as foolish people are accustomed to do, must needs rush to law for satisfaction. He first applied to our contemporary for the name of the writer, and, instead of being shown the way to the door, with a certain physical application to expedite his going, as would have occurred in the office of the Evening Stae, he Was apparently implored to have mercy, and the writer was basely surrendered. Our contemporary, who is wholly void of pluck in the presence of danger, has a habit of giving up his correspondents, and from having given up so many of them and appeared so often in the Court to aid in hunting down his own writers, his moral sense has apparently been blunted, and he does not see how discreditable to journalism it is to thus betray the anonymity of the press, and the confidence of those who put their trust in him. Our contemporary opens with a word for Mr. Beckham, to whom he administers a mild rebuke for the forcible manner in which that gentleman had stated his opinion of the publication in question. It will be remembered that Mr. Beckham not only characterised the letter itself as " utter rubbish," but spoke in the forcible lan<rua<re characteristic of our respected Resident Magistrate respecting the paper that published it. W*e verily believe that what provokod the ire of Mr. Beckham was not the worthlessneas of the letter but the unmanliness in journalism that first entrapped a correspondent and then aided in involving him in the meshes of the law.

But our contemporary endeavours to " improve the occasion," and makes the case point a moral, or rather two morals, and adorn two tales. He finds in the first instance that this attempted prosecution has been caused by the prosecution of the late editor of the Otago Daily Times at the hands of the Government. It would be strange indeed if it should not feather a dart to shoot at the Government; and we are confident that in his heart our contemporary thinks that it was Mr. Vogel or his agents that incited Fuller to prosecute Cherry. At any rate, the." bad example set by the Government in prosecuting Mr. Barton" has induced this prosecution of Mr. Cherry, and we would commend to the consideration of all Governments the moral drawn by our contemporary, which for .aptness and sagacity surpasses anything we have ever read. " This," says the Evening News, " shows how cautious Governments should be neither to set a bad* example to those they govern, nor to rush into court, except with, clean hands."

But there is a second moral drawn, and this time not for the Government but the Press, and it is so funny that it makes our contemporary laugh. "We can afford to laugh ourselves," he says, " at what has been said from time to time by other portions of the Auckland press about our deserving to be criminally prosecuted by the Government for our alleged libels upon them." Upon the honour of the Etening Star we declare that these ai*e our sentiments, and when our contemporary departs from legitimate criticism of political opponents, and charges them with personal dishonesty, we decidedly think that he deserves such prosecution, and what is more, we believe he will get it. He has directly charged Mr. Vogel over and oyer again as a " swindler," and in the venom of his soul has broadly insinuated offences .against integrity that would be Sufficient' to damn the character of anyone7whoseTname and iame were riot'public property. This

has been clone in Mr. Vogel's absence, and when distance seemed to give impunity; for our contemporary would not dare to make such statements if Mr. Vogel were present, and the receipt of a lawyer's letter would bring our contempory to his knees, and make him lick the dust of Mr. Vogel's feet and clothe himself, in sackcloth and ashes for a month. Our contemporary has not a spark of manliness, and only stabs when he fancies he can do so with impunity. He says he can " afford to laugh" at criminal prosecutions ; we venture to say that ere many months have gone (vernacularly speaking) he will find himself " laughing with the wrong side of his " mouth." At tho enunciation of such doctrines respecting the wholesome effects of criminal prosecutions by the " conductors of the Government organs "in the South," the .Evening News " never ceases to blush at the thought " of the admission of such men into " the same craft with ourselves." .But if the Evening Star could blush at all —and we did not regard it as one of those obsolete weaknesses that belong not to " the age we live in"—we should blush in Vermillion to see a contemporary making high 'professions of a bold policy, and calling on the people "to stand up for the freedom of the " press," when every week shows that the merest menace, the veriest appearance of danger, brings him to the most abject submission, and when it is known that he will surrender everything and everybody for the sake of "safety.