CORRESPONDENCE.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 209, 28 February 1873, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE.

We do not hold ourselves in any way sible for the views and sentiments expressed by correspondents. All communications must be accompanied by the correct name and address of the writer not necessarily for publication, but as a guarantee of good faith.

THE MID-WEEKLY MAIL SERVICE. (To the Editor of the Mount Ida Chronicle.) Sib,—Will you allow me, through the medium of your columns, to call the attention of the public to what I consider an unjustifiable piece of favoritism that has lately been accorded to Messrs. Cobb and Co.,'greatly to my loss. Last year, the inhabitants of Naseby, Hyde, and Macraes petitioned for a mid-weekly mail service from Dunedin, via Hyde and Macraes. That petition was granted; and Messrs. Cobb and Co. were asked to name a sum that they would do the service for. £4OO was named by them as the lowest figure. This was considered by the authorities as much too large a sum; and the matter would have fallen through, but that Mr. James Duncan and myself agreed to run the mail for £2OO per annum. This was also considered too much. The Postmaster then offered £l5O, but only on the express condition that the mail should leave Dunedin and Naseby on Wednesday mornings, thereby compelling us to run a double line of coaches. Now, sir, Mr. Barr told me repeatedly that this line, to be of any service at all to the beforementioned places, must be run as above, and on no other conditions would the money be granted. In tendering for the mail this year, that fact caused me and others to increase the amount of our tenders—mine from £l5O to £245. But had I been aware that four days—instead of two, as formerly—was the time given, a very different price would have been the result. In common justice to me, as the previous contractor, and one who did, through one of the most severe winters Naseby has ever witnessed, deliver my mails with as much or more regularity than the firm who now do the service—(see ' Mount Ida Chronicle')—and at a great loss, I should have been allowed to compete for the service as now performed, the loss of which caused me to give up the road and the connection I lad formed to the more favored firm. lam not aware who the firm of Cobb and Co. consists of; but if our worthy Chief Postmaster is connected with the firm, the sooner the public are made aware of the fact the better. It seems to me that the Post Office authorities are assisting to create a monopoly of the coaching business to Mount Ida and the Dunstan; but I hope the public will look to their own interest, and not allow themselves to be done out of their "rights to suit any parties. —I am, &c, R. W. Daniel. Naseby, Feb. 22, 1873. «. (To the JEditor of the Mottnt'lda Chronicle.) Sir—Having seen a book on Spermatorhoea, "by a person named Hargrave, in which appears a paragraph stating that Dr. Beany had ■examined his remedies, and had recommended them as being the best, safest, and most innocent he had ever seen; and being the only medical man in the colonies of the same name I conclude I am the Dr. Beany referred to. In connexion with the paragraph in question I feel it due to myself to say that I know nothing of the man Hargrave or his remedies, and that I certainly never recommended him nor them—having never before heard of either. I am, &c, James G-eo. Beany, F.R.C.S. Collins St. East, Melbourne, Feb. Bth, 1873. i