THE WAIMAKARIRI.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XI, Issue 657, 23 February 1859, Page 5

THE WAIMAKARIRI.

To the Editor of the LyHelton Times. 1 Sie,—ln your issue of the 12th, under the head of local intelligence, in your concluding remarks on designs for the Wahnakariri Bridge, you convey an impression which I think is not general and not correct ;' you say " Colonel Mould will find a fact recently sprung into existence, which causes a deficiency in all the designs, &c." I believe Colonel Mould has too great a knowledge of the shifting character of the New Zealand ; rivers to receive any such fact as a new idea, and knows perfectly well that the man that builds a bridge in ust protect it the best way he can; so must the Government. You say, ".though each competitor provides that his bridge shall-maintain a traffic across the river, he has not thought it necessary to keep his river, &c," under the bridge. .Of course he has not; he was not invited to do so; it was not one of the six points; and, if it had been, there would have been no competition at all. Doubtless every competitor has made some provision for preserving the banks near the bridge—some five feet, some one hundred feet; the spot was fixed, and doubtless the best; but, to guarantee that the river should run to that spot for seven years is not what ordinary men would compete for. It might, for ought I know, require tea miles of, piling instead of five feet. We were invited to provide against the "scurry," but not required to find water for it. ' . ■ "A man that contracts to build a bridge over a river," will have completed his contract when he has erected the bridge where he is ordered, although the river may run seven miles off at the time of completion. • I am, sir, &c, WILLIAM DARTNALL.'; _ Market-square, Christchurch, :