THE Inangahua Times. PUBLISHED TRI- WEEKLY FRIDAY, OCTOBER 12,1877.

Inangahua Times, Volume IV, Issue 80, 12 October 1877, Page 2

THE Inangahua Times. PUBLISHED TRI- WEEKLY FRIDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1877.

The case of young;- Ghees, recently committP.l for trial liere for embezzls in« f«o^ 8 ?™ m t** osfe Offic ' c o H" !afc tint,' we tbmk, to be passed over without a word of warniy£ t» parents, and of Hdmnnition to the Head ad the Post Office Department. .Tlie ease ia one whii'li possesses muh to single it out from the ordinary run o.f bucl» ca»ea, for it is hnpd to ace why the m;ij'ir sha^e of bfame for the- boy's defeult should not be laid directly afc the door of the Department. Green was, we beUeve, in reefipt of a salnry of some-. thiog like J6?70» per annum. Being away from his parents, fee had of course to live at an hotel, and) with this scaoit income feed and cloth himuelf. "We all know tbat the surpousMiings of hotel 1 life are oat at all ti-tnes of the tno&fc elevating character- even to adults.— what they am I'ikelyto be to a youth, and particularly to a precocious you.tli, when removed from thc-coatrolling in' Silences of his parents ifc is not hard to imagine- Yeang Geeen happened to be ol" a particularly precocious disposition—the Department appears to e«pe«* dolly favor the precocious element— find he appears to have done what probably ten ouit of every twelve of such boys would have done under siwlar- c : rcamstancies — glided prematurely mi to the full fuatnesss of town life. In his official r«la« tion to the public he stood upon the same footing as the Postmaster ; that w fio say, it was his duty to rpceive and despatch mails, soat and deliver letfcew, to receive money for remittance by telegraph and post office order, and in fact, make himself "gpuern'ly useful."' Tkiw of course |>laced ,him in poai-tiow <tf gr^afc reaposibility and tempt abion — a responsibility and temptation quite disproportionate either to his pay or hia years — the later particularly* with regard to his freedom outside the office.. Had the boy been under- the- eye of his parents the case would have been diflivreufc,. a« they woul 1 have- been in- a jjreafc measure responsible for his private conduct j and ibis is precisely the position in which many boys now in, the service of the public- departments of the colony are placed,. A boy w taken away from school, placed: as a cadet in thu public service, uta salary nliumt RumV.ieut to keep lwm. decently dressed ; vn the course of a f&w months be is removed from Ilia parents ; placed nominally ns an assistant in some disfcaab brunch of i be service,, has temptation and respoD'sibility pitchforked at hiitß, and then driven into the nllurements of hotel life c Can any one reasonably wonder at the, sequel of such a st.ifce of affiiirß ? We do aofc wish in. any way to attach blame to the Postmaster here, for we b«Heve, that had the office been undier th* cbavge of any one less attentive and aH&kluouH in the discharue of his duties matters n>i^bb have assumed a more serious turn,. As it is, however, a promising you-u"; career has been nipped' in the bu<i through nothing else than the premium which the Department bolrlg out for dishonesty. If it is necessary to train boys up fo» the public service, they should be trained in the proper sphere v and theiic remuneration be proportionate alike lo- their circumstances of life and ! ihe responsibility they weild ; but to overwhelm a mere juvenile with tetn« tatioa,ns iv young Green's case, and , this ia the position he was placed pji> vately,is.to-Bay th& least of it, dangerous in the highest degree. There have been so many cases of defection of this class in the I'nst Uffice Depavtracnt of the ; Colony that it is evident there is great ' need for reform somewhere, and it is demanded, in the interest of the public, uo less than in the inter^t of pureuts whose children sire in the serviwe that the matter should bt» inquired iuto without delay.