THE LAKES.

Dunstan Times, Issue 361, 26 March 1869, Page 2

THE LAKES.

(from our own correspondent.) Arr-'wtown, March 23 St. Patrick was a gentleman, and came from dacent people so, at least, the song says —and in honor of Ireland’s patron saint almost every body kept high holiday on Wednesday last. We drank, as a matter of course, to St. Patrick, we eat to St. Patrick, we sung to St. Patrick, we danced to St. Patrick, and we chartered the steamer “Antrim” for a trip up Lake Wakatip in honor of St. Patrick, and if we failed to thoroughly enjoy ourselves, why, the fault did not lay with St. Patrick, but we did no such thing, and St. Patrick’s day will long’oe remembered as one of the most agreable and pleasant ever spent by the several pic nic a ud gipsy parties, who set aside the occasion as one for healthful out-door enjoyment. There is something very | jolly in a pic-nic party. Dinner and j tea, and dancingupon the green sward i in some cool shady glen, the daughters | of Hebe all smiling and light-hearted, I is a thing not to be despised, anyhow, j and, I question very much, the existence of anything else so sociable or : agreeable in this mundane oxi.sence 1 of ours. One large party from Arrow- j town, sought the banks of the Kawarau river, near the mouth of the Shotover. : whi'-e a second repaired to Mr. Marshall’s W 'Olshed, on the margin of Lake Hayes. A considerable number of persons patronized Mr. Tally’s excursion by the “Antrim” steamer up the Wakatip to “Bob’s Cove” and, I am told, enjoyed themselves amazingly amidst the wondrously romantic aud picturesque scenery of thatlittle hollow in the mountains. In the evening there was a Ball at Powell’s Family Hotel, Queenstown, and also at the Library Hall, Arrowtown, and it is almost unnecessary for me to observe that, at both places, the votaries of Terpsichore “danced all night till broad day-light” and further followed up the dictum of thesongby “seeing the girls home in the morning.” Talking about dancing, what will your readers, Mr Editor, think wh n I tell them (mind I do not reqire a straight jacket) that there is to be a Ball, a Grand Ball, so the bills say, on Monday night next, in the new ward of the Wakatip District Hospital, atFrankton. Only think of the maimed, the halt, and the sick making a bonfire of their crutches, throwing their physic to the dogs, and gaily tripping it “on the light fantastic toe” to the strains of merry music, why, it is positively more wonderfuf than the “ cold water cure.” As a secret, a new quadrille entitled Les Miserables will be danced for the first time. The House Surgeon as M.C., assisted ' y the Cook, the .Matron, the Washerwoman, and the Wurdsman, the outside public only being admitted upon payment of one guinea each. A ball at a Hospital is a new idea entirely, and its originators deserve great credit for their invention. I have heard of a “jig” being got up at a Lunatic Asylum ora Workhouse now and then, but I never heard tall of one at a Hospital before. In the case of the two former institution, the inmates are generally in a state of convalescence, or, when otherwise, not within hearing distance of any disturbing influences. 1 presume, however, that, the Wakatip Hospital Committee have made ample arrangements to meet any unforseon difficulty. My humble opinion of the matter is, that a difficulty in respect to the payment of the government subsidy might arise by the Provincial Trcasurerwithhnldiug payment, urging as an excuse, that if the nerves of the patients are sufficiently strong enough to permit of the as-emlving of a lot of noisy persons in an adjoining apartment to the one occupied by them (the Provincial Treasurer is sure (o have a plan of the IT otf)it»l)w ifheut [orient ten: rqi.o i ct s

they must all be quite well enough to bo sent about their business. As tho Ball is in aid of the funds of tho Hospital, the exchequer’ of which is at rather a low ebb just now, it is to be hoped that it will be largely patronized. This concludes my budget for this week. I know of no party of mineis having found a “welcome stranger," nor have there been any serious accidents or anything approaching the horrible to chronicle Ido not however despair of a subjectfor my next