TUAPEKA.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2475, 21 January 1871, Page 2

TUAPEKA.

[from our own correspondent.]

A till kettle tied to a dog’s tail, a few dried peas in an empty bladder, and a woman’s tongue are all trifling matters capable of making considerable noise in the world, yet these sink into insignificance compared with the stir caused by a few equally contemptible political adventurers. Of course. 1 allude to our local branch of the Great Southern League, a body formed as far as I con gather for the purpose of deluding electors into tbo belief that Mr Reid’s candidature involves some political principles, and is not the resuit of our intrigue for securing the loaves and fishes to a few hungry expectants. Of course, the almighty Brown is at the head of this movement, allied with the no less pursuant Bastings. How on earth the former gentleman continues to gain the smallest support, appears to me an insoluble problem. Hisname is associated with no wise measure, he has never—perhaps more from want of ability than of will- enunciated any policy, he is in short a man who carries into politics all the dodging little tricks of a smart commission agent. He is the laughing stock of one house, and button-holer in ordinary to the other. He has no ideas beyond securing trifling local advantages—such as impassable bridle tracks —being utterly guiltless of any attempt to comprehend the wide r interests a legislator is expected to consider, A cargo of onions and a bundle of old hooks are the only things resembling a stake in the country 1 ever knew him to possess. A jumble of figures, amid which the statistics of the Tuapeka commonage figure prominently, is the backbone of all his speeches (?) if confused and rambling utterances devoid of g- aramer ; connection or argument can be dignified with such a name. These same statistics I have heard repeated a dozen times, and recently came across them figuring in the pages of Jla'inanL Jl expect to hear them again and again in his electioneering addressa . In short, thi < creature, who dares to arrogate to himself aufch rity to advise or dictate to his fellow-citizens, is no less ignorant than he i presumptuous—is one of the class of professional politicians whose continued existence is a whole community. Mr lu id’s supporters here are, in truth, a strange lot. A friend of mine compared them to the denizens of Noah’s ark; but | corrected him. They rather resemble an entomologist’s cabinet, so predominant are the creeping things. Not a single man of character or position in the district is associated with them ; and yet, to hear them talk, one would imagine them the mouthpieces of the whole district. The three tailors of Tooley street are, however, a precedent for this kind of assumption. Of course, the great Bastings is a leader among them. Not content with dosing our physical corporation with “black draught,” he also insists on prescribing for our minds, too diseased to be imposed upon by a plausible manner, and a bol I head that might he mistaken for an ample forehead. It were better for him to remain ■ ontent with his civic honors than attempt to cobble tjie affairs of the country under the supervision of such a guide, philosopher, and friend as the honorable member for Bruce.

I have left no room in this epistle to dilate upon local matters : in sooth, it so stirs my bile to see these orang-outans presuming to dictate to better men than themselves that I am hardly capable of writing on any other topic. Perhaps my just indignation may have cooled down sufficiently to enable me in my next to give you the news of the day.