CENTRAL BULLER NEWS NOTES.

Lyell Times and Central Buller Gazette, Volume VI, Issue 275, 29 May 1886, Page 2

CENTRAL BULLER NEWS NOTES.

(from our own correspondent.) Fern Flat, May 25.

No apology would be required were T to take somewhat extended notice of the weather prevailing in these parts, since the appearance of my last communication in the Lyell Times. But now that things have resumed their wonted aspect, perhaps the less said the better. 1 formerly spoke of Johnnie Frost in this connection; but I am of opinion that General Uproar was in chief command during the recent severe spell. The elements are once again on their good behaviour, be the boss MiFrost or Mr Uproar; and while that continues let us be as thankful as we may, lest a worse thiug befal us. Steady, solid, good weather cannot reasonably be expected at mid-winter, and " Blessed is he that expecteth little, for verily he shall not be disappointed."

It the recent flood has brought one thing more tLan another under general attention, it is the lamentable, if not positively dangerous—and certainly discreditable —state of the main coach-road passing through this district between Lyell and Nelson. It is the subject of complaint by everyone who requires to traverse it, and must be a special terror to heavily laden waggons, and to the mail coaches which meet and rest overnight at this point three times a-week. The roadway is done; and, instead of being macadamised anew, the holes are merely mended here and there in the discretion of the contractor, and apparently almost without supervision on the part of the County Council. The road also is peppered over with small stones, which lie loose in all directions, and afford a certain stumbling-block to man and beast alike. It is impossible, from the nature of the country, to avoid sidelings; but who shall say that the lower or river side (heretofore entirely unfenced and unprotected) does not afford a high premium to serious, if not fatal, accidents. In the first place, as you know, Mr Editor, the road is an absurdly narrow one ; and so it happens that if two vehicles are to pass each other at any of those sidelings, the nonoccurrence of accidents would be almost

a miracle. And one shudders to contemplate the consequences of an upset (as of a loaded coach, carriage or wagon) down a sheer precipice of, in many cases, hundreds of feet. The present state of the road implies unquestioning confidence in the perfect steadiness of horses under all circumstances ; steadiness only to be obtained, as I believe, by first of all shooting the poor animals dead. And what of the very likely fall of earth, stones or trees, while saddle horses or vehicles are passing ? Are they not very likely to be projected incontinently down the yawning abyss, and to be picked up in pieces, if at all? Sidney Smith once remarked that preventible railway accidents would continue to take place till the railway magnates killed a bishop. By parity of reasoning, one may be pardoned for saying that this unseemly state of things, amounting to a public scandal, is not likely to cease till a County chairman, or engineer, falls a victim to the gross and continued neglect of an obvious duty on the part of the legal custodians of the road. Surely in this district, where timber is to be procured on the spot for the simple felling, a stout three-barred fence ought to be erected all along the road, and thus an end be put, once and for ever, to the man-and-horse trap now laid all along the road. It would be worth the Council's while too, to call tenders in future for all their works in the Canterbury Times and Otago Witness. Hundreds of pounds would thus be annually saved.

While on this snbjest, I would mention the bridge at Mr Russell's place, a little beyond Mr Alfred Smith's Hotel here. I visited it on last Thursday afternoon (it is on the coach road) 'and saw the water within a few inches of the top of the hand-rails, its normal height being some 10 or 12 feet under the road-way. Any one possessing even the most superficial knowledge of road engineering must observe at a glance, that by merely carrying the road-line a few yards up the hill on both sides of the creek, and throwing a new bridge over it there, all danger and inconvenience from floods would be at an end. This also wants immediate attention.

The Queen's birthday passed here with little or no notice, although of course we are all loyal citizens and cordially unite in wishing Her Royal and Imperial Majesty " long to reign over us; happy and glorious." A ball at Hampden (Murchison) attracted a few of the Fern Flat youth of both sexes; and young people, we all know, never fail to enjoy themselves with each others society and the mazy dance.