The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News. FRIDAY. NOVEMBER 25, 1873.

Auckland Star, Volume IV, Issue 1201, 28 November 1873, Page 2

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News.

FRIDAY. NOVEMBER 25, 1873.

For tho cause that lacks assistance, For tho wrong that needs resistance, Kor the future in the distance,

And the good that wo can do

Although not in all respects satisfactory the result of yesterday's contest in City West was pretty near to what was generally

expected. This perhaps ig the more noteworthy from the fact now known that there

was an extraordinary amount of party treason indulged, and the quantity of plumping which the scruitiny revealed may teach a lesson that ought to be well laid to heart. Mutual help was the bond and watchword in the bunch of five. But if all in tho bunch and their supporters expected that this bond would bo sacred, and that it would be aught other than a delusive rallying-cry, to be used or abused according to the exigencies of tho hour, they are gifted with an amount of verdancy for which we had not given them credit. Thab some of the candidates were " sold" is not now questioned ; but did any one believe it would be otherwise ? We do not intend to criticise either the victors or the vanquished, but to one or two features in the result we desire to refer. That Mr William Swanson is returned will be a gratification to nine - tenths of our people. In the province —in New Zealand—there is not another that can and does view questions from the same stand point, that can see them so stripped of conventional drapery, and can bring to their solution so clear honest common sense. r Swanson's absence from Council would

have been a public loss, and we sincerely congratulate City West on placing him at tho top of the poll. In Mr Goldie tho Good Templars have achieved another victory ; and we do not hesitate to say that by prudence and caution the thin edge of the Templar wedge now inserted may be driven home and effect a separation between tho people and their tipple. For the defeated we cannot but admit that there are among them those whom we regret to see out in the cold; but if there is one lesson more than another that popular election shoiild impart it is how little disgrace should attach to an election defeat. The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, and certainly popular honours aro not always to those who most deserve them at the people's hands.