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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume X, Issue 163, 5 July 1875, Page 2

On a bleak, dreary, desolate hill a. the Manukau Heads there is a telegraph station, not an intermediate one, but a terminus. It could not have been erected for the convenience of the residents in the neighborhood, because they are exceedingly limited in number, consisting solely of the signalman and lighthouse-keepers and their families, if they have any. There is also the telegraphist, and, subject to the same proviso, his wife and family. But, including all these, the population can sparceiy be called sufficiently numerous or important to justify the establish- j nrenfc of communication between them I and the rest of the colony. For what i purpose was the line extended from Onehunga to this out-of-the-way place? Tbe answer to this, we presume, would be that the Manukau bar is being constantly crossed by steamers, in the movements of which the whole of the southern portion of the colony are in a greater or less degree interested, and consequently that the state of theweather in the district, and of the sea on the bar ought to be telegraphed daily. But, strangely enough, although telegraphic reports are .forwarded from all other stations, that at the Manukau ia not deemed worthy of being placed on the list that is posted every morning at the various offices. The extension of the line from Onehunga must have cost the colony something, and the telegraphist is probably in receipt of a salary from the public funds— at least, from the description we have received on very good authority of the locality, we feel justified in saying that none but a hopeless lunatic would choose to live there merely for the love of the thing— and what does the public receive in the way of an equivalent ? So far as we can learn, nothing. It is not, then, too much to ask of the Government that the daily weather report should include information from the Manukau station, nor do we think that -the puhjic' would lay themselves open to a charge of being too exacting if they were to express a wish ihat that lonely telegraphist, perched upon that barren peak, with nothing to do all the day long but to wish that somebody would send a telegram requirinn- an answer, were ordered to inform his brother officers in more lively situations whenever a stealer that had been carefully reported as having left Onehunga had beep ablpQe uqabje to cross the bar., Manukau is solely j*qd psspfttjajly a weathe.r and bar station, and will continue to be such until, to use a phrase much in vogue, its resources are developed, but Manukau is the one exception to the list of offices which supply information under this % head. Could not Mr Lemon be prevailed upo£ to take some steps to prove that 1 'thb line between Onehunga and Manuka^ need not always be, as at present, a* 1 thoroughly useless, but by no mean*. ] inexpensive toy? j