The Daily Telegraph. TUESDAY FEBRUARY 6, 1883.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3610, 6 February 1883, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. TUESDAY FEBRUARY 6, 1883.

~M.il. Lakxach, in returning thanks to the electors for placing him at the head of the poll in the recent contest for the vacant seat for the Peninsula, is reported to have said, " Yαeta alra rut. The die has been east by you, and I am the first impress of it —an impress that lias met with your favor." Mr Larnach made a mistake in the quotation, and he was utterly wrong in its translation. Yarta cut okn—t\iQ die is cast—has no reference to the die for an impression. It refer* to the hazard of the dice,_ as familiar a. mode amongst the ancient Romans of settling- a dispute, or of determining nu action,'as it is at the present day. A more inapt quotation could hardly have been selected by a successful candidate for a seat in Parliament. It was as muchas to say that the electors had exercised no judgment, but had left the result of the election to a process not one whit more discriminating than the happy-go-lucky hazard of the dice-box. That, of course, is not what Mr Larnach intended to imply; but when persons "show off" by dragging in a cheap Latin quotation, the meaning of which they do not understand, they are apt to make mistakes. Had he contented himself with a line from Shakespeare—" I have set my life upon a cast, and I will stand the hazard of the die " —Mr Larnach would not have stumbled. The electors might have thought that the hazard of the die was a poetical allusion to the chances of the ballotbox. But Mr Lavnach i.s not poetical; he appears to have a remarkably commonplace way of expressing himself, and, if ho was reported correctly, lie very soon loses his temper and uses coarse language. A short specimen of a portion of his speech will suffice to show what we mean: —" Notwithstanding all the factious opposition that has been exercised to pursnade ,you from doing what was right, here is the best evidence of a man who'has dime well for the people meeting with that gratitude and that re- (' Ayah !') —that such a man deserves. I have no ordinary opposition here. —(A voice: 'Who paid for the cabs?') Kennel up, you curs ! kennel up ! I have too much regard for the intelligent, honest, and real working man and mechanic— (cheers) —to care one jot for the miserable ejaculations—(interruption) —and the hootings of a most damnable lot of curs. lam not afraid to meet men, but it is those wretched individuals who demoralise a great nation by their "\ lie acts.—(Cries of 'Donnelly.') 1 have been opposed by a miserable faction." After the above the delicacy of Bishop Koran's sarcasim can be appreciated —" Gentlemen, I have only one more sentence, and it will be the only one. I say it because I think I ought to say it, because there arc certain things I ought to rebuke, and that .sentence is this : That in the knowledge of business, and the affairs of the world, in the management of its affairs, and the choice of select language and epithets, and in eloquence, the representative you have elected, stands, facile primrps, head mcl .shoulders above all other men, and I have no doubt, whatever, gentlemen, that in the House he will represent you truly to your hearts' content."