NASEBY ATHENÆUM.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 232, 15 August 1873, Page 6

NASEBY ATHENÆUM.

(To the'JEditor of the Mount-IniCfiBOKiCLTi.) Sib,—-I was very much pleased at seeing in ypur last week's paper a letter commenting upon the flagrant mismar nagement of the Athenaeum. I can corroborate what " Boanerges " says concerning the disgust felt by a number of the subscribers with the manner in which the institution is at present conducted, and now that it is made public, I am sure that it will disgust the community at large. . The total number of subscribers is fifty-two, but only thirty-five out of that number are annual subscribers; yet notwithstanding the small income:.derived from members, the can see their way to pay a Librarian a salary..of £6O out of an income of perhaps less than £so an arithmetical process altogether incomprehensible' to persons less gifted than themselves.

If it. was found necessary to appoint a paid Secretary and -Librarian, common justice demanded" that .the "billet-" should hare been advertised by the Committee, instead of giving it to one of their own number, who has still continued to be a member of Committee since his appointment. The circumstances under which the present Committee were elected; or rather elected themselves, will probably be in the recollection of,many :, meeting night wet and stormy, very few being.present besides* themselves, resulting in the election .of too many of a particular- set. There are several,members of the Committee who are very -rarely seen: in. the reading room at anytime—butthis-is.only what might be expected, fudging from the mismanagement of the institution.' As to closing the place at 9.30, this is only a preliminary step to closing it altogether, when once the money is all spent. If the Committee possessed any common sense at all; au.d had the welfare of. the'.institution sincerely, at heart, they would never have sanctioned the place being closed at the time it has hitherto been,, just about the hour when many of the business places close, thus preventing storekeepers and others from availing themselves of the reading room.The" future prosperity of the Athenaum urgently demands the resignation of : the present Committee.—l am, &c, An Annual Subscbibbb. MR. MERYYN IN SELF-DEFENCE. (To the Editor of the Cromwell Argus.) attention has been directed to a paragraph in your issue of the Ist inst., in which", referring to my rejection by the Mount Ida constituency as a candidate for'the representation of that disr trict in the "Provincial Council, you states "That nice -trio—Shepherd, Mervyn, Hickey—Where are they? All three have, giv.eh place, to'.better men, and their constituencies'need no longer blush under the shame of so.misjerable a representation'' I do not know; what I have done that I should be classed in the same category aa Messrs Shephei'd and Hickey. lam conscious that I have incurred the enmity ot the Dunedin Press, inasmuch as during the time I was a member of the Provincial Council I took an active part in opposing the centralising action of the D.unedin members, and endeavored to have justice meted out to the inhabitants of the outlying districts. , But I respectfully that that is no reason why the country papers should join in an outcry against me. It has been conceded by my bitterest opponents that during the two years Mr. Armstrong and myself represented the Mount Ida district, we .hare had more done for that district in the way of the-expenditure-of public moneys than was ever done previously since the- district was first inhabited. Therefore our rejection was not owing to what you call "miserable representation," or' to-our having failed ■to attend to the monetary interests of the district, but' was . owing solely to our having conscientiously'refused to be a party'to the the administration of .the Province to' Mr, Macandrew, and any creatures of his whom he might be pleased to associate with him. I may state that I considered I was in honor bound to contest the Mount Ida district, in -the interests of the party with whom I associated ; otherwise I could-easily have, procured a seat in the Provincial Council. I hope in future, if you should be pleased to criticise' my'-conduct unfavorably, you will state wherein you differ from me,' and not be guilty of vulgar and indiscriminate abuse.—l am, &'c," ' ' D. HuNTEJR MeBVTN. Wellington, July 24 1871.' [We insert this letter at the, request of Mr. Mervyn.—Ed, M.I.C.] ' " ~