WELLINGTON.

Evening Star, Issue 3571, 3 August 1874, Page 2

WELLINGTON.

(From, a Coirespondmt.) Wellington, July 30. The weather here has been something scandalous. We may perhaps have had two fine days —or days without rain—since the opening of Parliament. They tell me here that 1 see Wellington at its worst. Well, a more evil climate than it has been since I have arrived cannot well bei magined. Bain, snow, and sleet, and sleet, snow, and rain alternating diurnally. When it blows a fowl cannot cross the road without fear of being blown into the bay ; when a fine day occurs people say “Thank God,” I shall stand a chance to get comfortable boots and dry clothes”—when they have only one suit, like your correspondent—before the evening sets in. That mythical personage, the Rip Van Winkle of the Province, says the weather was never so bad during any other winter as it has been during this one, but this somnolent inhabitant repeats, I hear, the same story every year, and only advancing years and senility perpetuate this opmion. It rains and hails at times at the iiluit and Riverton, but only in a modified form as compared with the rain and hail of this embryonic “ Empire City.” The political atmosphere is very different frem the meteorological Everything in political life is as quiet as can be conceived. The genius, tact, and hard work of the Premier distance all competitors. If any man ever attained a prominent position in politics or any

other mode of influencing mankind by sheer hard work and unfailing courage, the present Premier of New Zealand is a living and illustrious example. You look at the man’s head m a phrenological aspect, and wonder i J llß bfaia power is situated, and only learn after experience and comparison how he dwarfs other men with whom he is brought into contact He does not speak as gracefully as Header Wood—the most polished speaker in the House of Representatives—does not look a thoroughbred like Stafford ; nor does he gabble nor “aunder after the manner of 1 itzherbert; neither is he querulous like Gillies, of Auckland ; captious or self-sufficient like Kollejton, who presumes on the wealth of his Province and his reputed or actual “ double first; but, to use a cricketing term, Mr Yogel is good allround,” whether to bat or bowl to long-stop or keep a wicket Many wonder with me how his brains were compressed into their present shape; but it is an indisputable fact that he has distanced, and will as long as he has health distance all other competing politicians of the Colony. I don’t know who the Wellington correspondent of the ‘ Guardian’ may bo, but he has contrived to put the company in for a good thing. The Hon. Henry Russell—better known as “Lord Harry”—is more than irate on the subject. At the time I write ho has not entered an action against the company, but with the assistance of Mr George Cook and Mr James Smith will most probably do so. The paragraph of which he complains is a perversion of the truth—whether designed or not this deponent sayeth not. There is not a particle of truth in the whole statement. I don’t oare for a mild libel at times; but stating that Mr Russell has been excluded from Government House and His Excellency’s levies on account of misconduct, which has not got beyond the mere allegation of it, is a very different thing to ridiculing the feces of our political representatives.

Another paragraph in the * Guardian ’ has exercised not a little the member for the Duns tan. It was read carefully by him, and it is even said he remarked to a friend—l wonder whether it would be the member for 1 uapeka—that the cup was nearly full; that the last feather had almost broken the camel’s back ; that another malicious statement would almost induce him to enter an action for bbel against any transgressor of the fourth and mulct the offender very severely, either in coin or liberty, “Penny-a-liners,” as he terms them, must now beware. There is a rumor of the hon. gentleman geing into holy orders, adopting a clerical life. After the rumor got current, the following was found in Bellamy’s:—

“ In vain to Mininsters Shepherd beseeching TrieS'kard and fast for a snug little place; Returning to Dunstan men say hell try preaching, ■ Turning children of tinkers to vessels of grace.

He thinks it will pay, and be better than hanging To skirts of a party who hate him like smoke; But to me the brave T, L. S., in pulpit exhorting, A wolf in sheep’s clothing to him were a joke.

But perhaps, after all, if the thing really happens, It could hardly be easily bettered : T’were worth a ‘Jew’s eye ’ to hear him expound The Gospel according to Shepherd.” Whether this be true or ttbt—whether another Parliament will see him in his accustomed place is a question that will doubtless be answered according to the *’ predeliotions ” of each of your readers. But should he not again be able to write M.H.R. after bis name, there is another man ready to take his place-quite as tall, but lean like Cassius, and almost equally objectionable. I allude to the individual popularly termed the “ Buller Lion,” but whom the * divinity that do hedge ” a member of Parliament style an “ esquire,” who dwells where the sleepy hollow can be found. I expect your readers will all be pleased with the goldfields report. It is more compact, contains fuller information, has in its appendix more complete tabulated statistics than in either of the reports preceding. The earnings of miners in the different localities of the goldbearing districts of the Colony, and the yields from the various parcels of quartz crushed during the year are especially interesting and instructive. It is to be regretted that the mine owners in our Province—especially in the Gromwell district—should hayejbeen so relucta t to furnish returns of the qqartz crushed andttthe yield obtained from the stone put through t heir mills. It will be seen that nearly all the valuable information that has been obtained from this locality is due to the courtesy of Mr Charles Cololough, which MrHougtou fails not to acknowledge. A comparison of the results of our quartz workings with those in Australia mil show clearly how much greater an amount of gold per ton we obtain from the stone we crush than our neighbors. This fact, if it obtains due publicity, will probably induce an influx of extraneous capital to develop the resources of our quartz lodes. The returns from the 1 names goldfield are almost perfect.

in the Upper House the Hon. Colonel Brett has been both amusing and instructing the public. He has Lit on a mode hy which advertising can be performed in the halls of legislation. The public domain in Canterbury contains some 500 acres, fire acres of which are wanted to form a site for a college to impart a education to the boys and young'men Colony. He stated among other things that the majority of the young people who would be educated would be from ten to fourteen years of age, and were some of the most unhcked cubs m creation. . . For 'himself he would say that, as the father of four handsome daughters, he would not allow them to live near the proposed college. They would be in danger of receiving missives that would be calculated to be offensive to their dignity and sense of propriety from these very uncouth +i?- r l6 *■ i , men > as a rule, possess this delicate kind of clay, they do not proclaim publicly its beauty, unless they happen to be Circassian slave-merchants ; and although Belgravian mothers trot out their budding offspring at times in a meretricious manner, it has not yet, I think, been considered necessary for the father of a family in the Houses of Lords or Commons to announce the fact that he possesses handsome unappropriated daughters. It possibly may have been this oause that prompted him two years ago, in the Provincial Council of Canterbury, to say that “ahundred Yankee fihbusters would sack and destroy Christchurch, and their ferocious leader sir * (addressing the Speaker) “would be sitting in the chair you now occupy.” * ■ • l fr 1 ?° U r. ay ha ? B° ne North. He increases m bulk and importance in every Province he passes through. Both Mr Rolfeston And MiMacandrew have heavy sins to answer for in puffing up this Chartist advocate for trade! union untii he has become the inflated mass that he now is. I saw the man daily while? hj! was here: saw him grow palpably'before mV very gaze; but whether it was from the good cheer he ate or the wine of self-laudation he daily drank, I could not divine. At times he got oonfidential: vert yo/UTtUr Home, or passages from his diary; and to sum him up, he is worse than Grant on of r tlle °9 t^ ou > fnd Graham on the other, standing on tubs and employing their eloquent vituperative powers against each other and against all things and men in 'Otago It is infra dig, for “Citizen andfDelegat* Holloway, to carry even a carpet bag. He will stand m a bar and order grog—which he sticks up and the Government has to pay f»r_ RPo 7* poured out and then order it to'be sent to his room Bed, board, whisky washing, clothing, free : twenty shillings a day salary from the Government, fourteen shillings a day from the Union to w uch he belongs (some people affirm he has another twenty shillings per day travelling expenses from this latter source), bud twenty-five shillings a week for the maintePWUnH v T'i? f. Urin * Ub absence from England. A enly hxs lines may be considered to have fallen m pleasant places, and considering the money he receives, and that he has no!SS to spend any of it-nay more ho tak£ not to soend—his children ought to have a CniVn ltaSe * 1 su PP° 8e he costs our open* p !r^ pursue the theme a little further, j endeavor

t the Maori population ih the North Island is increasing. Their number at the Census in February last was 43,408: their estimated number three or fovlr years ago was 36,000. Those who were conversant with the North Island knew this increase to be a fact. The sexes are almost equal—23, 639 males and 19,769 feinales. These figures, viewed in any light, are very suggestive. The Ngapuhi tribe, who live north of Auckland, and to which Wi Katene belongs, is the most numerous, numbering 5,568 souls. The return is both interesting and instructive.