The Globe. FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1877.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 880, 20 April 1877, Page 2

The Globe. FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1877.

Once more the subject of drainage has cropped up, and yet another public meeting is to he added to the list. To judge from the effect of those which have preceded it, we should say that the one to be held on Monday evening might as well not take place. To place another scheme before the public at this time is premature and injudicious. Until the public have had an opportunity of studying Mr Carruthers’ scheme, no one can say that it is not the best one that could be devised. All that the Monday night meeting will do is to afford to a certain class of theorists an opportunity of ventilating their pet schemes —many of them, no doubt, being thoroughly impracticable and unsuited to our wants. Denied, at last, by long-suffering editors, columns of space to explain the emanations of their genius, they project a public meeting. It is well known with what facility signatures can be obtained in Christchurch to a request for a meeting, more especially if a cheap —and, therefore, more enjoyable —evening’s amusement, in the shape of badgering some unfortunate speaker is expected. It was, therefore, easy for our friends —who are all persuaded that each and every one of them are heaven-born engineers—to get a requisition numerously signed, and the result is that his Worship has called a public meeting. Under present circumstances, it can do no good whatever. Had the projectors waited until the lithographed plans had been in the hands of the public sufficiently long to enable them to master the details, we should be with them. A meeting, such as the one now to be held, is scarcely the place to enter into an elaborate disquision on levels, nor will the greater part of the attendants understand it, but how much less will they be able to come to a decision between the rival plans, when they are absolutely and entirely in the dark as regards the one favoured by the Drainage Board. If patriotic and self-sacrificing citizens who are striving to do good to their adopted country, wish to herald forth to an expectant world the schemes which are to revolutionise drainage engineering let them take the proper time to do so, when a fair comparison between the rival schemes can be instituted. This is not the case now, and, therefore, we consider Monday’s meeting uncalled for and premature. * Who are the Ratepayers’ Association ? From time to time paragraphs tell us of their deliberations and decisions upon gigantic and important subjects, but we know nothing of their personality. Like Mrs. Betsey Prig, we are fast coming to the conclusion that there is no such thing; in fact that the whole deliberative power centres in one or two. We are induced to make this inquiry into the composition of this erratic, and exceedingly modest body, from the last manifesto emanating therefrom. In their wisdom, the Ratepayers’ Association consider that the time has arrived when a canal and dock shall be constructed. Plans, designs, and estimates of these small works, and a trifle of some hundred miles of concrete channelling, are the modest requirements of these imitators of the celebrated tailors of Toolcy street. We wonder they stopped there. Why not have asked for plans, designs, and estimates of, say, a railway to S ew Brighton, with a submarine tunnel to connect that populous and flourishing suburb with Sumner? AFe commend these works, also, to the consideration of the trio ol gentlemen who, popular rumour says, form the liatepayers’ Association. It is a well-known and recognised fact that, with regard to the generation of

gas, steam, &c., it is necessary that an escape should he provided, in case of an over-supply. It is therefore, perhaps, a wise dispensation that the super-abundant talking power, so prominent in this Association, should have a safety-valve in the shape of these meetings. They must do a great deal of good to the overburdened brain of the members of the Association, and no evil results to the public follow. Indeed, on the contrary, if this safety valve was to be by any means removed, we should have such a flood of eloquence poured in as would have a most detrimental effect upon the general health of the public. We hope the Drainage Board will treat the requests of this important body with the respect and attention they deserve. To do otherwise would add the last straw. Public meetings ere this have complained of indifference on the part of the Board to their requests, but they were as minnows to this Triton of I public opinion. This represents the concentrated opinion Jof «.h well, we were going to put the number, but our readers can supply the blank for themselves. Therefore let the Drainage Board beware. The suggestions of so influential a body must he received by them with deferential attention, or they may write over the door of their office the one but expressive word “ Ichabod.”