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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 19, Issue 1516, 24 December 1872, Page 2

The shipwrights of Hobart Town have been holding meetings with the ol»ject of obtaining the eight hoars system of labor. A series of resolutions have been parsed, and they are unanimous in their purpose. There is also a movement among the plasterers for the same object.

The Auckland Evening Star writes as follows on the subject of the Auckland Grammar School : —That the principle on which the Grammar School is based is wrong there is not a shade of doubt. As hitherto conducted, and in accordance with its very nature, it is simply a highly endowed Government Select School, intended to choke off all other schools for advanced classes—a huge monopoly strongly supported by the public, and not conferring one special benefit in return. The Grammar School is nothing more or less than a school for the boys of what are known as the "better classes;" that is, of those that have more money than their neighbors, and do not wish their children to associate with dirty little boys. Far be it from irs to question the righi of any parent to keep his children from dirty little boys, but what we do question, and not only question but indignautly protest against, is that public fund*, which are the property of the whole people, should be appropi iated for the benefit of one class. This is done in the management of the Grammar School trust The fees are fixed at a rate which absolutely precludes the children of those in straitened circumstances from deiiving anv advantage whatever from the existence of the Grammar School. We earnestly hope that this gross abuse has come near its close. If primary education is to be free, so also ought the high class education of the Grammar School to be free too. Admission to its forms should not be dependent on the sovereigns in the parental purse, but on the brains in the boy's head. Highly educated men such as its teachers should be, and we believe are, should not fritter away their time in teaching children to master the information from the horn-book tkat " Jack is a good boy," and " The cat is fat;" and never will the proper graduation from the primary to the secondary schools be carried out until not only both are under the same control, but the very same principles are carried out in their constitution and management. Qualifications proved by examination should show what pupils have finished their elementary education in the primary schools, and are fitted for entering on study in the higher forms—to wit, the Grammar School; and not the son of Sir George F. Bowen, nor of Sir James Fergusson should be allowed admission to the upper public school on any other condition than those on which admission is given to the dirty little boys that call

Bill Jones father. We know that this is excessively heterodox, and provoke a defiant smile ou the face of those whose personal interests raise a hedge around the Grammar School, but this state of things is coming and silly tneei-s will not prevent ic. The Grammar School as well as the primary school is the property of the people, and the spirit of colonial life demands that its doors must be open to the public as freely as to those who purchase its privileges with their gold. In all this we speak not a word against either the Principal or any of the teachers. Wo believe that both he and ihey are in the highest degree qualified for the position, and that their teaching has produced most satisfactory results in the boys who have been privileged to enjoy it. But this in no way affects the question. The principle on which the Grammar School is based is bad, and the report of a select committee on the mailer of carrying out that principle can hardly be expected to better the case. The sole remedy will be in the Grammar School being placed under the same control as the primary schools, and their being all welded together with a firm hand as component parts of the system. One of the most hopeful features in the new Bill h that it contemplates this com se. All kinds of dodgery and intrigue will bar the wav to reform, but we would strongly recommend those who feel an interest in the Grammar School as ic exists, to yield with good grace in time to prevent all being swept awav before the irresistible tide of popular indignation.

The Southern Cross, December 14, says :—We are sorry, although not surprised, to hear that a large portion of the wages of the " navvies " employed on some portions of the Wakato railway is *pent in drink. No .sooner, wo are informed on credible authority, are the wages paid than they are spent, or a large portion of them, in beer and spirits. Saturday night some places on the line is described to us as presenting a picture which those who wish well to the men cannot look upon without 1 egret. What can this wilful waste of means end in 1 Instead of saviug week by week a portion of their wages, as almost all ot them might do, and obtaining pieces o* land along the line on which they might erect comfortable cottages, aud li\e in a state of comfort with their wives and families which few working men can attain at home, they will at the close of the work be no better off than when they began, and with probably enfeebled bodies from such inordinate indulgence in drink and riotous living. Among the good stories told at the expense of Mr Greeley's chirograpby is this : Years ago, when a young man, he received a poem from a young lady in Vermont. He strongly suspected that all poetry was nonsense, especially if the lines do not square at both ends, and as this paiticular poem did not come up to his particular mechanical standard for such literature, he threw it in the waste basket, and wrote to the author that he thought she would do better to marry the first honest men that offered her his hand, and mend his hose and tend his babies, than to rack her brain in trying to write rhymes that nobody would read. The poor girl received the cruel letter, and could decipher only the writer's name. She .•mowed it to her mother, and she too was A council of inquiry was held over the strange document, which was (mall} interpreted as a proposal to marry the gifted author of «ho rejected rhymes. After some inquiry into the character ot Mr Greeley the proposal was accepted, greatly to the surprise of the young editor, who was so much pleased with the prize he had won that he bought the white hat and overcoat that he he lias worn ever since, and was married forthwith.

Black and Grey : A grey hair was espied among the raven lock* of a fair friend of ours a lew days ago. " Oh, pray pull it out," ?he exclaimed. (i If I pull it out leu will come to the funeral," replied the lady who made the unwelcome discovery. "Pluck it out, nevertheless," paid the dark haired damsel \ " it's of no consequence how many come to the funeral, provided they all come in black."