THE GLOBE. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1881. LOST!

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2168, 5 February 1881, Page 2

THE GLOBE. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1881. LOST!

" Lost, a Liberal Reform Association. When last heard of the Association had on a checked suit, very threadbare, consisting of a President, several Vicepresidents, a Secretary, a Treasurer, and an uncertain number of members. Person emaciated, its clothes hanging loosely on it. Voice husky, with a strong accent. Hands generally deep in trousers' pockets, as if hunting for a chance sixpence. Has trick of singing snatches of an old song, beginning—Oh, my poor Georgy Grey, they have taken you away. Any one giving reliable information which will lead to the discovery of the above party will be rewarded." This somewhat flippant notice has, we imagino, reference to the existing or defunct Liberal Reform Association of Ohristchurch, about which body there are anxious enquiries from several interested parties. We are not alluding to those patriots and high toned gentlemen who nsed to be summoned periodically by the Association to rally by the old flag, and do or die im the cause of oppressed nationalities. Par from it. Those high toned individuals, bear the mysterious disappearance of their Head Centre with the calmest philosophy. No —the anxious inquiries are solely from low-toned persons who are base enough to interest themselves in mere mundane pounds, shillings and pence. In point of fact the Association owes monies—what Mr. Mantalini would call " demnition coin of the realm"—and for the life of them the gentlemen to whom the money is due are nonplussed as to how they are to obtain payment. For the Association is constructed on most accommodating principles. In one point it resembles other associations. It has a patron, a president, a number of vice-presi-dents, a secretary, and a treasurer; but there the resemblance seems to cease. None of these lofty officials appear in any way to interest themselves in the financial aspect of their undertaking. They were not elected for any such purpose, and they act accordingly. The sight of a creditor endeavoring to grasp the Association for interested purposes puts one in mind very much of the fine old [English sport of catching a pig with a greasy tail, with this exception, that in the game the caudal appendage of the animal finally has the grease worn off it, and then the pig falls an easy prey, whereas the slipperiness of the Association has, up to the present date, remained totally unimpaired. The lowtoned individuals in search of coin are referred from one high official to another, and abandon the undertaking in despair, with a general impression that upholders of the oppressed nationalities, like similarly employed gentlemen always to be found in the vicinity of Leicester Square, London, are not altogether a " good mark" —we mean, of course, in their character of universal patriots. We confess to being not altogether able to understand the present situation. The programme of the Association, when first it was galvanised into life, claimed to be so extensive and philanthropic that the public were led to believe that gigantic resources existed somewhere in the background. The affair was vouched for by the Knight of Kawau, a leading politicomedical light, a perfervid though somewhat blatant evening journal, and a number of eminent citizens. It was thought that, at worst, the crushed masses whose critical and down-trodden state was, for the first time, clearly revealed through the sole agency of the Association, would, possibly by subscriptions limited to a penny each, raise the wind if necessary. But the knight, the doctor, the journal and the masses have, one and all, left the Association stranded. The hungry searcher after truth may perhaps still, by a process unknown to us, be able to gather inspiration from the Association as a whole, but the hungry searcher after coin is completely baffled by the present complexion of affairs. However, there is just one possible solution of the difficulty. It may be that the originators of the Association may have looked upon it as a body to be used only in electioneering times. The call on members made last August to canvass for subscriptions to wipe out their debts may have been a mere blind, those behind the scenes considering that, after all, the affair was only wanted at particular crises. It may have been their deliberate intention to" retire into winter quarters" between election contests. Hybernating animals, we know, lie hidden for many months in the year, during which period they are popularly supposed to live on their own fat. It can hardly be supposed that the Liberal Reform Association took the method pursued by these animals as a strict example, because it does not appear to have any financial fat to live on, but at least it may have thought that the idea of lying perdu until the next time of excitement was a good one. The thought that its creditors might not look upon the project with the same favor may not have been over-troublesome. As the bear emerges from its hollow tree, lean but vigorous, so who knows but what we are not to expect the Association, when the next election comes on, emerging from its secret habitation, impecunious but invigorated ? Where that habitation may be, but few are likely to know, because the Association has, for obvious reasons, parted with its offices some time back. But perchance in some secluded spot (say the "Lyttelton Times" offiee) the officers of the Association are at the present moment comfortably rolled up in a prolonged slumber, regardless of duns, and but awaiting the summons of a general election. But to the oppressed nationalities there must be something very trying in the present position of the Association. Whether it be hybernating, or defunct, or what is technically called " in hiding," or whether its constitution was always so gelatinous that it never had any solid existence, matters not. The contrast between the past and present is excessive. An " oppressed unit " might handle the reputation of the Association much as Hamlet handled the skull of the jester:—

' Let me see. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred my imagination is 1 My gorge rises at it."