RANDOM REMARKS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 291, 3 September 1910, Page 2

RANDOM REMARKS.

(By "Onlooker.") Mr F. Lawry, the well-known Auckland M.P., occasionally indulges in the fascinating pursuit of throwing flowers at his friends. Not the ordinary garden variety of flower, nor the artificial article beloved of wornenkind for personal adornment, but choice flowers of rhetoric which scintillate. Occasionally the flowers thus cast possess thorns, and Mr Lawry's allusion to the Hon. R. McKenzie's mind as possessing an adamantine base must have been a barbed shaft. Ohura settlers will be inclined to agree with the genial member for Parnell in estimating the calibre of the Minister's mind. However, it is understood the residents of the favoured valley are preparing a charge which is calculated to penetrate even an adamantine base, and we may confidently look for an early start of the Ongarue-Stratford railway at the Ongarue end. It is well known that in politics, as in football and other games the best method ef defence is attack. Acting on this estimable and orthodox theory the settlers have resolved to send a wellknown local politician to Motueka to contest the seat against the Minister. It is estimated that when the name of the prospective candidate is revealed even the inflexible mind of the Minister for Public Works will be shaken to its base. The story seems rather vague, but it is as the writer heard it. Moreover, desperate situations are proverbial for creating heroic reme dies and the hour and the man may fit the occasion. ***** According to the calendar winter is well on the wane and we shall shortly bid adieu to mud for a brief period. Thanks to a fairly good season our district roads have been rather better than usual this winter. No doubt the Public Works Department will claim most of the credit, and the County Councils may even have sufficient presumption to "hug the flattering unction." Being a devout individual with a desire to judge justly my vote goes to an all-wise Providence. The sense of justice referred to impels me to state that the vote is given on the strong recommendation of a well-known coach-driver. He should certainly be in the best position to form an accurate opinion. However, speaking impartially, and as a matter of fact, if we get much more rain within the next few weeks I consider the coach-driver will be justified in revising his judgment. ***** Te Kuiti is fulfilling its destiny, and it is verifying the many flattering predictions of its optimistic citizens in the matter of growth and prosperity, and other things. In the olden days when borough status was regarded with an eye focussed on the distant future; when county government was only aspired to, and when sly-grog was supposed to flow unashamed and unrestrained, the casual drunk was unknown, arid the "first offender" flourished not in the precincts of the Magistrate's Court. But times have changed; progress has taken one of its giant strides, and Te Kuiti must pay the inevitable penalty of greatness. The "first offender" has arrived; the prohibition order has long been with us. Remains only for the irresponsible "habitual" to complete the little list, and make us feel that we are in the very forefront of modern life and thought—and other things. ***** Otorohanga, which is held by some misguiied persons to be a suburb of Te Kuiti and by all intelligent people to be the natural capital city of the Rohe Potae, continues its severe and steady course in the march of progress. It has not yet attained striking distinction in certain ways like unto its sister city, Te Kuiti, but its citizens are well satisfied with its rate of advancement, and look with calm and unruffled gaze upon that which they know the future will bring. Still, let me whisper it gently, "there is a rumour of a branch railway to Kawhia, and a State coal mine and certain other unconsidered trifles that make for prosperity when linked with the natural resources of a district." * * * * * A reckless disregard for consequences seems to possess the inhabi tants of Waitomo County in the matter of finance. Loans which have been in the air for quite indefinite periods are at length descending to solid ground and the metalling policy so long and ardently advocated by the "Chronicle" seems to be winning popularity. On second thoughts modesty compels the admission that metalling may have had other champions. In fact, every out-back settler yearned with such an exceeding yearning for metal that he would imperil his chance of marble in the next world in order to obtain a sufficiency of common coarse stone in the right place on this planet. But as all men know stone in the wilderness is only obtained after much travail and mighty murmurings. It has to be exchanged for good red gold or the equivalent thereof, and the supply of gold in this country has recently been as limited as feathers on frogs. However, the basic adamant of the Minister's mind must have cracked sufficiuntly to allow an idea to filter through, and the magic word "subsidy" took j shape. Little it recked that the word had long been forbidden and banished from the Ministerial vocabulary, and that the law against its use was neld to be as immutable as the edicts of the Medes and Persians. Adamant rarely cracks, but when it does something has got to happen. The imme- j diate and apparent results in this in- \ stance are county loans for metalling. J If the results embrace the emancipation of our back-block settlers from mud the price will be cheerfully paid, and minor results will have little interest.