LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 270, 23 April 1875, Page 3

LOAFER IN THE STREET.

(From the Press.) • At one of the recent annual church meetings I read of a gentleman advocating the whole church being free without seat rents. He was of opinion that if everyone who came paid 2Jd per service the revenue of the church would be even larger than at present. He further thought that they should give this system a trial and go out in the highways and byways and compel all to come in. This suggestion has two drawbacks. First there would probably be a difficulty in the < l running-in” system. Would the ecclesiastical special constables search the pressedin devotees to see if they had twopence halfpenny about them, and would cash be insisted on in advance? The second drawback is that the voluntary twopenny-halfpenny system would starve out any clergyman in the province. We are a real liberal lot when we cannot help it; but otherwise we cannot be said to be very strong on parting. I should scarcely say parting was our forte. We prefer reading about it, and confining our charity to praying for those in sickness or need, “ Seats free. No collection” is a good drawing advertisement for most of our Christians, but it can’t be a good arrangement for the preacher—l mean not in a pecuniary point of view. A wedding is not a cheerful mode of putting in a day. You buy store garments which you don’t want, you attend a ceremony at which the feminine portion of the congregation all weep copiously. You go away to a heavy repast, called, for some inscrutable reason, a breakfast. Every one makes speeches of a generally moi*nful nature. Happy pair depart, so do you about three o’clock in the afternoon, and that depressed that you go and drink heavily and sadly somewhere. The Maoris do the thing

properly. Your Auckland correspondent wires down an account of a Maori wedding which he says was celebrated according to European rites —whatever they may be. There was no sadness about them anyhow. They went for refreshment and went for it properly. Besides bullocks, pigs, puddings, and things, a children’s feast was spread upon a mat forty feet long, the cake being piled on it four inches high. There is a luscious aroma about the whole account of the repast which reminds me of Sundayschool treats, or tea meetings. From what little I have seen of these entertainments they are very Maori in their character. There is the same lavish profusion on the tables, and the same firm resolve to eat more than enough in honor of the occasion. Here is a case in point. Little Benji Bungles is a really good boy. He is regular at Sundayschool. He is loved by his teachers, and the boys don’t punch him, because he “ tells” when they do. He reads aloud from the “ Sunday at Horae,” when not otherwise engaged on Sunday evenings, and when fourpence was given him to put in the box for the Melanesian Mission, he only did the poor heathen out of a penny, and that was a mistake, because he happened to have a threepenny bit in his pocket. He is a good pattern little boy is Benji. His mother says so. He went to the school treat. He ate very properly to a large extent. Subsequently he felt a little crowded and uneasy. Then he left. He looked pale and worn. Soon he returned. He said, “ Oh, I’ve beea so sick.” It was suggested that he had better return home. “ Please,” said Benji in a gentle voice, “ I think I’ll ask a blessing and begin again.” The City didn’t get endowed the other night. I’m sorry for this, because I know the City wants money, and—so do many people in it. The Mayor made a good effort He did so. Perhaps you think the city has played its last card. But it hasn’t. As the Professor observed when he had been drinking too much chlorofornr—- “ Don’ you b’lieve the’s no more fat; Lota in the kitchen’s good’s that. Know I’ll try V guess I’ll win, Here sh’ goes for hit’m ag’in!’ Worn out with a struggle which has displaced a Ministry and deprived of what she considers her dues, and disgusted with the mercenary feeling of the country members, the city has determined on a policy which Mr Weller long ago recommended to disappointed people. She (1 suppose a city is a she) has determined, I understand, to keep a pike. Not one pike, but several. At all entrances to the city, at every conceivable spot where the country people are likely to approach, there will be pikes. In fact the town will bristle with pikes. And it is easy to imagine the satisfaction with which the Municipal Council and the city members will take their places at the gates, the delight with which they will levy toll on the wains and buggies of those country members who would not do justice to the metropolis. The city coffers will now be filled to overflowing, and we shall indeed be happy and prosperous. “ Wanted a daily nurse for two children. Music required.” The above appears curious, but it’s only what I’ve been expecting for a long time. Hitherto I have been under the impression that nurses where a class of people who’s call in life was to block up the streets with perambulators, dress the kids, pinch them when required, and sometimes when not. But our educational system has now arrived at such a pitch that mammas will henceforward expect all those accomplishments in a nurse for which they have had to engage the services of a governess. It is only a slight change after all. Up to the present the governesses have been more or less nurses. Now the nurses will become governesses. Considering that it will now be understood that the lady in charge of the nursery is expected to wash and perambulate, as well as educate the children in French, Italian, music, singing, dancing, fancy work, and all the ’ologies, it might be reasonable to raise her wages (say) on a level with those of the cook.

In opening the criminal sessions in Dunedin, his Honor Judge Prendergast is reported in your telegrams, to have said that he failed to see that the number of homicides resulting from drink, denoted any particular state of morality or want of morality, or called for particular observation. Of course if his Honor did make jthe fabove remarks I suppose its all right, but up to the present I have always supposed that homicides, whether resulting from drink or any other cause, denoted a want of morality. Killing is no murder sometimes, but one scarcely expects to hear the doctrine from a judge. A leading man of business in this town does a big trade in all kinds of things; l He goes in for selling almost anything, from soft goods to panoramas. He got a telegram the other day from his traveller as follows—- “ Don’t send ables. Send one 4d chaffcutter complete, with pulley.” He got ramping round the warehouse on receipt of this. And then he wired back to say he was out of ables, so far as he knew, and he couldn’t stand chaffcutters at fourpence. Then came another telegram from the traveller explaining—“ Don’t send axles; send one 4 D chaffcutter complete, with pulley.” Then that man went home more happy in his mind, but he he says the wires want to learn more how to read.

His Excellency the Governor has arrived. I hope he will have a good time. Se does everybody. I like Governors. If I were a Governor coming to Canterbury for the first time, this is the course I should pursue. I should say the place was more like England than England itself. I should join a musical society and give the schools a holiday. I should send a stuffed contribution to the museum, and buy a racehorse and some Lincoln sheep. I should write a letter to the paper about education, and get two trout presented to me by the Acclimatisation Society. Last but not least, I should found a society for the benefit of distressed loafers, and appoint the present writer treasurer. I’m a bit shook over Major Palmer’s report on the surveys. I don’t own any land myself. I don’t mean to. I think borrowing money from friends is a better investment. I should like to be a surveyor though. I should go into partnership with a lawyer, and go round making business. I should make things lively for some of them, north of the Rangitata, and ,the way that lawyer partner of mine would increase his business would surprise a good many. You will probably remember Mr Wegg who “ professionally Declined and Fell but as a friend dropped into Poetry.” There is a Weggy sort of man living at an Accommodation House not very many miles from Christchurch. He occupies an important position in the household. He cooks. That is his profession. He is an amateur musician. The pianoforte is not his forte x but he has

selected that instrument to amateur on. I’ve known lots of other people in the same line, especially young ladies. When the dinner is dished up, he leaves his stewpans, and taking advantage of the absence of all hands at their mealing, he plays. It’s rough on the guests, because you know a man can’t swallow down much tough chicken with any amount of pleasure when a man’s playing “ I would I were a bird” in the next room. “The Dead March in Saul,” which is his usual accompaniment to the pudding, is more appropriate, but still not pleasant. There are only two men I know who are not going to the races. One has been into seventeen Calcutta sweeps, and drawn seventeen blanks. He seems to have lost confidence in racing matters. He takes no interest in winners. The other is a friend of mine who has only got ninepence, and can’t rise another threepence. I expect I shan’t be able to lend it to him.