The Globe. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1878.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1484, 18 November 1878, Page 2

The Globe. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1878.

The explanation, which appears in this morning's Li/tteUoti Times of what Col. Whitnioro ought, might, could, would, or should have said respecting local defonco is taken on the whole not more contemptible than the late sui,i„ v utterances of the lion, and gallant WGn tleman himself. Does he, does anyboc v think that wo can bo bamboozled by bio .., 1( i 0 im d crude dicta into tho same idea of which the goose of the fable found ih \ wv OWII stupidity. Colonel Whitmore tttllrs to us, and has been speechifying in the samo stylo throughout the country as if wo wore destitute of common—very common sense. He is wrong altogether, we do not hesitate to say, in his remarks on nearly every particular of this subject. Tho popguns, to begin with, provided for our safety by a beneficent Government may make a noise and that is about all they will do. As to their location; a vertical or a horizontal fire into a fog bank or a passing cruiser will not much matter, and really

in choosing the place wo are inclined to imitate the flippant style of the Defence Minister and say " heads you win and tails wo lose." One place, to the gallant colonel is perhaps as good as another, and no doubt, when these fortyton guns are imported, some of us may bo consulted about mounting them. Privateers, wo are told, would not dare to assault our unarmed seaport towns for fear of the vengeance they would speedily bring down upon themselves. Would they not ? And, where is the vengeance to come from ? Ten thousand miles is a longer range than even the guns spoken of by Colonel Whitmore could cover and from about that distance we fear if the necessity should arise we should have to look for succour. The statement that to bombard Christchurch it would be necessary for a squadron "or two" to enter Lyttelton Harbor must be an oversight. It would require considerable vertical or perpendicular shooting to get over the Port hills. Novices might think that a position off Sumner or New Brighton would give better target practice for an enemy's guns, but that is as it may be. What we want to impress upon our readers is that the Government in the person of Colonel Whitmore by the careless or ignorant manner of their treatment of a matter of the first importance has deliberately insulted the community who, in the event, must be the corpus vile upon which the experiments and theories of Colonel Whitmore and his coadjutors is tested.

Hebe is a story of the sea, extracted from the log of the Rangitiki just arrived. The naturalness of the tale compensates for the the crudity of the language in which it is told, Defoe, himself, or that joy of our youngsters, Jules Verne, neverjhappened on such materials for their novels as is here put in the way of the|readers a penny newspaper, vide " Press "of this morning:— On September sth, in 9 N. 23 W., rescued two Portuguese sailors from a swamped boat, who had been in the water fifty hours. They stated they belonged to the Portuguese ship Amerique. One of the two survivors had fallen overboard from the ship, and a boat containing five men was sent from the vessel to his rescue. They succeeded in picking' him up, but on their return towards the ship the boat capsized, and filled with water, afterwards righting. Two of the unfortunate men were immediately swallowed by sharks, but the remaining four got into the boat, when the sharks still attacked them, and two others were washed away into the sea by the waves, and shared the same fate as their unfortunate companions, being instantly torn to pieces and devoured. The other two succeeded in keeping the sharks off by tearing off the bottom boards of the boat, and fighting the sharks with them; they were perfectly nude when rescued, after fifty hours' immersion. The boat in which they were picked up was hoisted aboard, and is still to be seen. So persevering were the sharks, that even after the castaways were aboard the sharks followed the ship in numbers for a long distance. The Portuguese have since quite recovered, but suffered severely for some time, the whole of the outer skin peeling off. What more in the sensational line can be desired than we have here ? To a seaman, indeed, the yarn savours somewhat of those occasionally told to the marines, but we will not let any insinuated doubt spoil the roundness of the statement. It would perhaps occur to the hypercritical to enquire what became of the Portuguese ship Amerique after she had launched a boat containing five hands, and it is difficult, knowing the nature and habits of the creature, to swallow the story of two whole sailors being swallowed by sharks, they must have been whales or very like whales. In short, the tale in its incidents is probably true, but these are quite ghastly enough to render unnecessary the touching up that seems to us to hare been resoried fea.

A. fracas occurred this morniug at one of the hotels in the city, in which two distinguished members of a minstrel company recently performing here took a hand. A dispute arose on some subject, and one of the gentlemen whose vocal requests to be " taken home" nightly drew forth loud plaudits during the season, not only "bent" but almost "broke" up the countenance of the facetious corner man. So seriously is the latter injured about the face that it is highly improbable he will be enabled to give forth any of his "gags" to-night at Southbridge. He has unfortunately realised practically the effect of not having a " ticket" or the " 'sqivalents" so frequently and graphically pourtrayed by him. Great sympathy is felt for the sufferer on this occasion, as he has always made himself most popular here, and his secession from the company, which is now assured, will leave the rest stranded on a foreign shore, as he waß without doubt the mainstay of it.