THE COUNTRY.

Evening Star, Issue 3232, 30 June 1873, Page 3

THE COUNTRY.

Correspondent mites Active preparation* are being made for the labors of the Beal-hunting season. . Two boats* crews, consisting of ten men, have been landed on the Snares, where they propose remaining during the next three months. This expedition has been fitted Out by Mr Hatch, of Invercargill, wfip has devoted considerable attention to the development of the trade. Last season is understood to have been the first occasion on whiph the Snares trere resorted to as a sealing station. During a few months’ residence sk good many seals .were caught, and it is to he helped tip? pease's operations will prove no less successful At Riverton four boats have bepn fitted out, .pud will be despatched to the West ■ Coast sounds without 1 delay. These four boats are to be manned by twenty men, chiefly Maoris.—Now that election matters are over, a word may be said regarding results. Astonishment has been expressed at the fact that not a single “ Macandrew man ” has been returned to the Council Two ressons have been assigned, both of which are erroneous. - Mr J. L. Gillies’s eloquent persuasions are said to have changed the current of events in favor of the Reid cause. That is not the case; at all events it is, not the ruling cause. Others allege that Bishop Moran used his influence against MrMacandrew. That is still further away from; the truth. The real facts of the case are these. The Invercargill branch-of the Macandrew committee has succeeded in completely disgusting the public wind, -At tbs general election in 18/1, it managed to carry matters all its own way 2 and it must he. admitted that it exercised its influence to good advantage. The success of its members on that occasion, however, appears to have completely unhinged their minds. For example, they have been heard to boast that they could ‘‘put in the black doctor if they chose to take him in hand,” It will be enough to say that the black doctor is, or rather was, a half-witted creature who brought his credentials from the Tasmanian side of the wqrld. In pursuance of that extreme idea of their own importance they put forward men of the worst possibly stamp. Let me give you an instance. Some six or eight months ago an Invercargill clergyman wrote in the public prints of a certain individual who need not be named—“ He is afflicted with an irrepressible penchant for writing upon any tync[ every sub iect, > he has only tq sign his name to these writings to ensure them to be totally disregarded.” That opinion, publicly expressed by a minister of the gospel, was readily acquiesced in by every thinking man in the place, and yet that is the man who was put forward to oppose Mi* William Wood, Mayor of Invercargill It was in deed and in truth an attempt on the Sart of the Macandrew committee to “ put in a lack doctor,” and it is to the credit of the electors that they manfully resisted such a flagrant attempt to outrage their electoral privileges. Two really good men have been made to suffer in this wholesale slaughter of the Macandrew committee projects, viz., Messrs Basstian and Maoarthur. Had these gehtleman not been identified with this obnoxious organisation, it is generally believed they would have been returned. Had Mr Macandrew’s cause rested on its own,merits, it would have fared much better in Southland.