NOTES FROM LYTTELTON.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 852, 17 March 1877, Page 3

NOTES FROM LYTTELTON.

We all retire to our virtuous couches early in Lyttelton. About 10 p.m. all married men, if they are playing billiards or euchre, or anything else, at once drop cards or cue, as the case may be, so anxious are they not to keep their wives waiting, and rush frantically towards their various domi ciles. At least this is what the majority do, but there are a few —a very few —naughty people amongst ns who sometimes exceed this limit, and (“ whisper it not in Gath”) do not return to their homes until those hours in recording which the town clock makes least noise. It is only latqly I have been aware of this, as thanks to my early training and epnpbliug career, I have of course no experience in these matters, and therefore speak diffidently what I advance, being of couise simply from hearsay. I hear that some of these gentlemen state when they reach Home various reasons for their long detention, but that in no case do they ever acknowledge having been at a public house. As a rule, the excuse is detention aboard a ship—sometimes they are supposedto have visited 9, vessel on business, and a joyial skipper has barred the door of the saloon, and forced them to remain and drink against their will; whilst all the time —or at lea-t so they tell their wives on their return—they were so anxious to get away, so longing for the moment when that obstinate captain would open the door, and let them fly to embrace their dear one. Why, I heard of one man who was buying bullocks till three o’clock in the morning, four nights in a week ! Just think ! There’s application to business for you ; now that chap deserves to get on. But I hear that the old excuses are failing, and that the wives are becoming obdurate; so for the benefit of these gentlemen, who are not bad chaps after all, I will tell them the latest husband dodge at Greymouth, as recorded in the Argus, at the same time hoping none of the ladies will see this paper, or else of course it will be impossible to take thpm in that way: “Blodger is a convivial soul, and as convivial souls usually do, he can never contrive to get home until the small hours, but he had hit upon a plan for conciliating the wife of his bosom which would have been efficacious to this date, had he kept the secret to himself. His plan was this—Arriving home, say at 1 a.m,., he would pretend to think that his wife was asleep, and as he divested himself of his garments, would talk to his reflection in the lookingglass after the following fashion ; ‘John, you ought to be ashamed of yourself, keeping such ungodly hours, and there’s your dear little wife, the finest woman in the world, been sitting up for you until she had to go to bed, and there she is, the darling, tired out and fast asleep, and you spending your time and your money outside. If you wore anyone else, I would punch your head —I would, you brute!’ And John slips under the blankets to find a nice warm arm round his neck, and not a word of reproach.” Now, you convivial gentlemen, you see this Greymouth dodge answered. The one I am going to relate from another part of New Zealand was not so happy in its results, but I think with some slight modifications it might do for port, so I commend it to your earnest attention. “An erring husband, who had exhausted all explanations for late hours, and had no apology ready, recently slipped into the house about one o’clock very softly, denuded himself gently, and began rocking tho cradle by the bed side, a ; if he had been awakened out of a sound sleep by the infantile cries. He had rocked away for five minutes, when Mary Jane, who had silently observed the whole manoeuvre, said, “Come to bed, you fool,

you! the baby ain’t there,’” Now there are two dodges to work on, that ought to last you a mouth anyhow, when I hope to be ready with some more ; though I don’t know after all that there is anything better than joining the Masons. You can always make it lodge night, and of course you are bound by your oath not to reveal to your wife what passes on these occasions, while the use of incense at the more mystic ceremonies may well account for any slight unsteadiness of gait or dizziness of the head.

I hear that the new police barracks are to be on Norwich Quay. Messrs Hargreaves and Go’s stores, used as a Custom-house lately, are to be pulled down, and rebuilt on i the same site for this purpose, Of course the lock-up will be there. Now I expect a present from the inebriates, for being the first to convey to them this good news. No more cart hire to pay ! think of that boys. Why a chap can get comfortably tight in any of the pubs on the beach, and only have to travel just across the road to bed. Even supposing he is partial to London street, what a comfort it will be to know the road is downhill instead of up. T wonder, if the station had been there, if those gentlemen who created a disturbance in the street without speaking, on Wednesday night, would have been locked up ?

most expensive beds in Lyttelton just now appear to be the tanks on the reclaimed land. One gentleman, for sleeping there in a slightly inebriated state on Wednesday night, got nine days’ hard labour, and his chum and bedfellow forty-eight hours, so that, calculating their labour at 6s a day, one paid £2 14s for his bed and the other 12s ; they did not have the whole night either—only a part of it. Now, after that, don’t you tell me the Mitre is the most expensive hotel in Lyttelton.

From earliest youth I have been informed that Justice is blind. Now this lady is always represented as weighing something, and with a bandage covering her face, so in my youth I always imagined the eyes were there, although hidden : this crude opinion became confirmed at a riper age, for when I first became a resident in this town I found Justice had eyes, and that they were very useful. Justice had to leave Lyttelton a few days ago, and, what was worse, carried her eyes with her. Now people have grumbled considerably at this, and I think, not without cause. Government took away our statue of justice for a time, without erecting another, on which time and money had been laid out, and the consequence was that one Lytteltonian at least suffered loss It is true that a number of roughly sculptured figures were erected on the Bench in its stead, but no money was spent on them, so of course they were only partial successes. Had any one of these figures been taken, had a little money spent on it, and the robe of power thrown round it, for the time, no doubt it would have answered quite sufficiently well, till the real image was replaced, but this was neglected, and Lyttelton suffers. The sculptures don’t like it either, for it its not pleasant to be exposed to the public gaze and criticism for an hour or two every day without reward, and the work is very heavy on those who have not been accustomed to the machineiy, and do not clearly know how to balance the scales.

If I were a sheep I should prefer being killed in Canterbury to becoming a traveller, more especially if I had to, travel by the Canterbury Railways, I saw fifty-seven sheep in a narrow guage truck the other day, none of thqm were running about, not one I I don’t know who put them in, but he ought to have been a wool dumper, that’s his profession. PORTONIAN.