THE WEEK.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VI, Issue 77, 1 April 1871, Page 2

THE WEEK.

Tnkino; i!i|r» cons;*] t-sr.t. ion the dale on wliieU ibis is written, I think I cannot do better than commence with a quota I ion from the genial Elia who thus discourses on All Fouls' Day : — "Tho compliments of the season to my worthy masters, and a merry first of April to us all ! Many happy returns of tho day io you — and you — airl you Sir — nay, never frown mun, or put n long fane on tho matter. Do not we know one another ? what need of ceremony among friends ? we have all a touch of ill at same. — you understand irif — a speck of the motley. Bfeshrew a man who on such a day as this, the general festival, should affect to stand aloof. I oin uoae of those sie.-ikers. 1 am free of the corpora (ion, and care not who knows it. He that meets mo in the forest to-day shall meet with no wiseacre, I can tell him. Stultus sum. Translate me that, and take the meaning of it to yourself for your pains. What I man, wo have four quarters of the globes on our side, at ihe least computation." The view taken of human nature by the writer of the foregoing lines is not perhaps a very flattering, but, nevertheless, it is an exceedingly true one. Some of you demur to it, aad object to being told that } r ou are fools, do you ? Now I, on the contrary, believe that there is neither mau, woman, nor child, on the face of this earth, who has not, at some time or another, been a fool — many of them are fools at the present moment, and nearly all will, in all probability do exceedingly foolish things again before they bid adieu to this world. You, Mr. Newcome Jason, who arrived in the colonies with a thousand or two in your pocket, and were induced to purchase a .share in a magnificent sheep run, which was to make your fortune in five years, have you not often since then sorrowfully confessed what a fool you were to so easily believe in the flattering picture that was held out io yon ? Then there was your friend Mr. Wildoats, whose father thought lie would do excelleutly well in the colonies, and so sent him out with a few hundred pounils and his blessing. Mr. TV\ never saw a plough in England, and very likely did not know a sheep from a pig without looking twice, nevertheless he thought farming was his vocation, and so he bought land and stock, and fancied himself a veritable farmer, but where is he now? Is he, think you, perfectly satisfied in his own mind that he never did an unwise thing ? He does not like to be told what a fool he was, but for all that he knows it perfectly well, and, what is more, ho knew it at the time, nnd now bitterly regrets that ho did not attend to tho VJuispevings of the inward moniior ih'M vena constantly intruding tha fact before his eyes. But all the lools in the world are not of the masculine ponder. There ia pretty little Angelina Gu?hingloi?, who listened once and ;;gaiu to all the soft nothings that that wicked Augustus poured info her ear at tho last ball, until slie actually believed tlieiu, and, what was worse, suo let him see that she believed them ; hasn't she, many a .time since then, thought what a precious little fool she was for her pains, and yet won't she do exactly the same thing again at the ncct ball she- goes to. And you Madam Juliet, with your half dozcu sturdy little brats around you, wasn't there a time when you thought that to be united to your adoring Romeo was to ensure your happiness for ever and without a break? Has everything since the wedding day been couleur tie ?'ose as you expected, or have you not often and often thought what a fool you were to believe that your future was to be so widely different from that of others ? And we can stiJl go upwards in the scale in framing a category of fools, for it is not only the young and inexperienced who have qualified themselves for the title. — Elia tells us, and tells us rightly, that All Fools' Day is a general festival. You, my lord judge, vrho, when you held a prisoner at your mercy, wished to mark your horror of the offence of which he was convicted, and so passed such a sentence upon him that you raised the whole country in one loud outcry against you, and excited a strong feeling in favor of him whom you persecuted — do you not see now how utterly you failed in your intended purpose, aud what an immensity of harm you have done to the cause you wished to serve, and can you conceal from yourself the unpleasant fact that you have been guilty of a most tremendous act of folly ? We will take oue more step — this time a very long one — iv the social ladder, in our search for fools and then close our list. In the German fortress of Wilhelmshoe there sits a man who not many months ago ruled over millions of subjects; now he is a prisoner in the power of his greatest enemy. I wonder what be is thinking about this first of April. Whatever they may be, I do not envy him his thoughts,

for I fancy he must look baok upon the linys {rone by with a bitter pang, as he reflects that, if lie hail not been such an egregious fool ho might, still have been the proud Emperor of the French, to whose lightest word all Europe listened with attenfciou, instead of being the helpless I captive, whoso sayings and doings possess not the slightest interest for anybody. Yes, we must all I fear acknowledge that, while All Fools' Day is doubtless a "general festival," our individual acts of folly not confined to the Ist of April , but, thai; they pervade every day of the year. However, lam rather an admirer of Mark Tapir's creed, and I firmly beliove in making the best of everything, and being as jolly as is possible under all circumstances, no matter how adverse they may be, so we will once more refer to our good friend Elia, and take comfort from what he says on the subject. Here iit is : — " Take my word for this, reader, and say a fool told it you if you please, j that he who hath not a dram of folly in his mixture hath pounds of much \vorse matter in his composition." I had not the slightest intention, when I sat down 1.0 write, of devoting so much space to fools and their folly, but as there is but one driy in the whole year on which every member of the human race can unite in keeping high festival, I may be pardoned for taking advantage of it to say a few words on a subject in which we &re all so much interested. "Uprouse ye then my merry merry men, for 'tis our opening day." Such, I presume, was the burden of the song of the, oysters on the Waimea mud banks this morning, which ushered in the oyster season. No fear of police-sergeants now, no occasion to be alarmed lest you should l>e called upon to " interview" His Worship on the bench because you happen to have in your possession & few shell fish which you were anxious to preserve from being drowned by the floods ; for the next six months !yve may eat and be filled with oysters without being called upon to contribute to the revenue in any shape whatever, uuless we should elect to turn fishermen, in which case, I believe, the Government expects to have the pleasure of giving us a receipt for half-a-crown. Poor Stringer! his, not unnatural, desire to be a week ahead of his confreres in the oyster market has cost him £5 and "fixings," as the Yankees would say, and that is no trifle in these hard times. Well, bis money will not have been entirely thrown away, for it will at least furnish him with plenty of food for reflection on this first day of April. The time for our annual races is drawing near, when, thanks to the exertions made by some of our leading sportsmen, there is every probability of there being excellent sporr, ono entry having already being received from Of ago, and another being expected from Wan^anui. There is also some talk of another from Otago, so that if we have not, as in the days of yore, the best, horses in New Zealand on our course, we shall at least have the satisfaction of seeing some well contested races, and the opportunity of enjoying a thoroughly pleasant holida}'. F.