NOTES FROM LYTTELTON.

Globe, Volume VII, Issue 765, 2 December 1876, Page 2

NOTES FROM LYTTELTON.

Saturn, who represented time in those early days before Olympus was peopled by the gods, swallowed, or in other words, took in his sons as soon as they were born. Our town clock is like its ancient relative in this, that it takes in the Lytteltonians. Like many another resident in port the clock has several faces, and these are not always the same. The other day one of our leading citizens set his watch by one of the faces, aud turning round the corner entered into conversation with a friend. Time was mentioned, and a controversy took place as to the precise period of the day it then was ; there were three minutes difference in the watches, and yet both gentlemen declared they had only just settheir respective timepieces byfthe town clock. On referring to the dial oppisite them the second getleman was found to be correct, much to the astonishment of our first friend, but proceeding to look at another dial, lo aud behold ! the first was right, and the second wrong. The diflerence was in the clock. Norwich Quay was three minutes faster than Oxford street! I am afraid the poor clock must have caught cold through its sou’ west face being so much injured. Hospitality is always a good thing, but there are positive, comparative, and super lative hospitalities, and certainly it was the latter that was exercised by our kind friend, Mr Disher, on the occasion of the cricket match at the Valley on Saturday last. All of us had hurried away from port that day by the 1 p.m. train (without our usual luncheons in many cases), aud when after three hours’ hard work, we were told by our genial friend that a good feed was waiting for us, many a face that had never lighted up during the noble sport, “sprang into genuine smiles.” The benedicts showed to greater advantage at the table than in the field ; somehow they seemed more accustomed to handling the

knife and fork than the bat, but then they deserved more consideration, having provided far more provision in the shape of ducks’ eggs than their opponents. I thought of the immortal “Jingle” when the speechifying began, and I made the discovery that he is not the only gentleman of my acquaintance that speaks in disjointed sentences at cricketing dinners. Well it was a jolly, happy afternoon, and I believe we all really enjoyed it. May Jwe spend many more such this season, gaining health and spirits through the exercise. I hear that we are to be challenged both by Sunnyside and Rangiora, and that the Married v Single match is to be completed to-day. It must be a matter of sincere regret to all who really wish to see our town prosper that drunkenness should be so very common on Sunday as it is. lam the last person to ■wish to “ rob a poor of his beer,” either on Sunday or any other day ; but Sunday is a holiday—a day of rest—when many a poor fellow, who has been stuffed up in some workshop or office in Christchurch all the week, comes down to port with his family for a few whiffs of fresh sea air, and it is hard that he should be annoyed, as he too often is, by a set of drunken men rolling about the streets. Really the people who supply the liquor are most to be blamed. Why do they go on serving customers when they see they are the worse for liquor, and without doubt they must do so, or how do the men get into such a state 1 A large proportion of the Sunday drunkards are, I am glad to say, not Portonions, but sailors from vessels, or else visitors. Two of our leading publicans have adopted the admirable plan of shutting up their houses on Sunday altogether, but the others keep open, as it is very necessary they should, for the convenience of visitors; and if one of their regular week day customers, who resides within the three miles, does come in and ask for a drink, why they serve him if there are no policemen around, and there is such a halo of enjoyment about that drink, because the man knows that he ought not to have it, that ten to one he has another, and another. We all remember how Mr Graham, in “ Our Boys,” describes how they put pigs aboard a ship, by dragging them back, and pretending they don’t want them to go there, and says, “I’m like a pig too.” Yes, and we are all like pigs in that respect. Tell any man he shall not do a thing, and he immediately itches to do it, and I firmly believe thousands of drinks are sold every Sunday simply because the recipients fancy they are evading the law and getting the better of the police. The difficulty of getting in the house, the mystery, the whispering, the slinking out by back ways, are all so many delicious flavours added te the forbidden draught, which is never so sweet as on Sunday or after eleven at night. As wisdom and folly, exemplified by the B.M. and myself, were sitting in the Court the other morning, after the cases were over, a certain drowsiness seized me and I became aware of a violent throbbing in my temples. What was going to happen; was I ill, had something given way in my brain, and was I going to Sunnyside—not as a cricketer bnt in another capacity 1 Well, there was one comfort, there was a doctor not far off, at any rate. I felt my head but could not feel it throbbing ; was it there at all ? No, it was out of my head, out of the Court, in the next house—a horrible monotonous sound. When I enquired of an intelligent member of the force what it was, he replied that it was the cradle next door, and that evidently that baby had numerous attendants, as the rocking never seemed to cease day or night. He remarked that he and his chums did not care much about it, when it kept them awake, hour after hour, when they returned from their beat. I hope the proprietors of the baby will take this hint, and cease to rob the guardians of the public peace of their well-earned repose. It seems that the Lyttelton larrikins are in the habit of climbing the lamp posts and turning on the gas during the clay time, besides breaking the glass and doing other injuries. So serious has the nuisance become that the Gas Company refuse to provide the gas for the same price they have hitherto charged, and the consequence is a waste of the ratepayers money. Not only the police, but the burgesses also, should endeavor to bring some of these young scamps to justice. Were an example made I believe this abominable practice would cease. I have heard it argued that three people constitute a crowd. Now, in Lyttelton, a newly arrived skipper, never mind how large or how small lie or his vessel may be, always constitutes a crowd, for it has become the habit for rival tradesmen to watch for signals as anxiously as the shipping reporters, and immediately a vessel arrives, to board her in a frantic state to solicit custom. It is not a bad thing for the boatman, whom they employ, and many of them are becoming nearly equal to Monsieur Airec. and quite fit for a show, through the extraordinary feats of agility they are continually practising in endeavoring to board a vessel first ; but the amusing thing is the effect it has had upon the small craft skippers that visit our port. These gentlemen used to be comparatively humble, and hail fellow well met, but “lor bless you !” that time is now but a memory of the past. You see the skipper of a ten-tonner laud and proceed along the quay, with head erect, and “an eye like Jove to threaten and command,” humbly followed by seven or eight supplicants for his custom. The brows of two or three of these followers are generally “wreathed with smiles,” they having been the lucky ones on this occasion, while the others wear a gloomy and distressed appearance, and a'-e usually occupied in furtively endeavoring to thrust their cards into the skipper’s hand. Citizens of Lyttelton, the greater number of you are about to lose your privilege of voting for the election of Borough Councillors. In the new Act, which is speedily to be enforced, it is stated that no person shall be called on to pay rates who is not a six-monthly tenant. All the weekly, all the monthly, all the quarterly tenants—the great majority of the people of Lyttelton—wit I thus have their names erased from the next year’s rate roll, and that of the owners of the property (who will have to pay the rates) will be inserted in their stead. lam very sorry that this clause of t he Act has been passed, as I think it will deprive many sensible burgesses of a privilege they have long and worthily enjoyed, Good-bye till next Saturday, PCRIONIAN,