THE WEEK.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 111, 12 May 1877, Page 2

THE WEEK.

What is to be its designation, what its probable cost, or under^vhat guise the amount required is to be smuggled through the Estimates are questions with which I am not called upon to deal, but it is quite clear to me, if Governmental matters are to be carried on with that smoothness and absence of friction which should characterise their movements, that a new department will have to be constituted for the purpose either of absorbing or getting rid of officials who, under unpleasant circumstances, may have cut the painter that connected them with the Civil Service. If something of this kind is not done the authorities are not likely to hare any peace, as the departing officers are sure to state facts or express opinions likely to engender a very disagreeable if not a hostile feeling towards the Government of the country. A case in point has just occurred to which I would direct attention, summaris-

ing the facts as briefly as is. possible. One Mr Wright was Postmaster at Chriatchurcii; but, as he states in a letter to the Post, wasr: induced by Mr Gisborne to transfer his ser- 1 vices from the Post-office to the Insurance : Department. For a time he appears to < : have got on comfortably and well wheY there 'appeared on" the scene a Mr C. v G. Knight, a young gentleman who, it is stated, had been sent home by a paternal Government to make himself acquainted with acturial matters, and on his return was placed in control of the Insurance business. I Then Mr Wright's troubles commenced, ami he ♦' was subjected to a system of annoyance* and petty persecution." In consequence of this he begged to be reinstated in the Postal Department, a request that was at first,refused, but eventually, under pressure, complied with, and he was appointed Postmaster : at Port Chalmers, his re-appointment to the department being on reduced terms. Hia description of the sweets of this particular office is to the following effect:— "lt is situated over a cesspool, and the health of the former postmaster was ruined by the foul stench therefrom, while the telegraphists are in wretched health from the' same cause." His health giving way under the influence of the chronic stink, he was compelled to re-?? sign, and asked to accept the compensation^ he considered due to him for hia loss of office. This appears to have been refused, and so he details his grievances to the public through the medium of the Press, ahd thus does he put his case:—." During, the whole' fifteen years I was Chief Postmaster of Canterbury, I never received a letter from the Government calling in question any; one of my acts; there was never an error in my accounts; and, through careful supervision, and arrangement, there was not a single caae of letter stealing or defalcation by any of" the officers of the Christchurch office. ;Tbe reward of this good service is that lam broken faith with, and in consequance of reaisting which, I have either to submit to take a subordinate Postmastership. in a foul and: loathsome office, and perform diitiea to which ■ I am quite unused, or, in the forty-eighth year of my age, commenceJife again, with a few hmndred pounds of compensation. I prefer «he latter course, and hope to find that I have sufficient life and energy left to enable me to do so as well as in a service in which the sole conception of organisation and discipline consists in. petty tyranny and the unremitting endeavor, to stifle every spark of independence of character." Not content with a statement of his particular grievances he proceeds to give his opinion of the young gentleman to whom all his troubles are directly or indirectly owing, thi3 being the manner in which he sums him up: "In conclusion, allow me to express a matter of opinion, ,not mine alone, but that of everyone with whom I have conversed who has had the honor of .knowing the present real head of the insurance department, Mr Charles Godfrey Knight, i.e., that this possibly well meaning young gentlemen, notwithstanding the nursing and expense the Government have incurred in hia education, is totally deficient in tact, judgment, and knowledge of the world — that he has usurped a position in which these qualities are cardinal requisites—that should he retain the position long enough, a department which contains all the germs of a noble instititution, will be rendered worse than useless by being governed by au erratic aud uncertain head." Now, am I not right in saying that men of the Wright stamp ought to be poisoned or quieted? How can a Governwent possibly carry on if such things be allowed.

A most lamentable result, I grieve to hear, has accrued to a gentleman who attended one of the course of scientific lectures now being delivered in Nelson. A lady correspondent, whose name, in compliance with her, special request, I refrain from disclosing, has written to me as follows :— •« Mr P.— Dear Sir,— l hope we ain't going to have no more of them lecturers here. My husband were becoming a perfect moddle, and one of the soberest men alive till he weut to hear what Mr Seven had got to say, and to see what he had_ to show. I had took great care of him, and he was just going to be made a D.W.C.T., 1.0. G.T., but on Tuesday night he come home from the lecture with the hiccups, and then I knowed at once that something were wrong, and that all' the good I had been doing him by my lectures were thrown away * Mary,' says he, when he saw how I looked at him, • I can't help it. I can't drink water no more without a drop of sperrits in it just to kill the animalklee.' 'To kill what?' says I. * The animalklee,' says be. •Oh Mary, to think that there should be such a lot of spiders and beetels, and tadpoles and ugly great fishes all ready to naw away at your inards in one drop of water, Mary, you know before we was married I used to' go on the bust now and then, and once had the deetees, and when I was that way I saw on the walls of the room just what we were showed in that drop of water. No,- its no use, I can't drink water neat no longer. I must have summut to kill them great things that go a larruping and wriggling about, and playing leapfrog with each other.' Now Mr F., what I want to ask is if we ought to have lecturers a going about and making out that water's such a beastly thing to drink ? You'll find my real name at the back of this,, but for goodness sake don't say what it is but just put it — Mary Hopkins." '

Of being personally acquainted with his Worship the Mayor of Wellington thepleasnre is not mine, but from what I see about him in the public prints I am inclined to suspect that he must be just a little bit of a humbug. The last paragraph in which I saw him referred to was the following:— ."The Mayor of Wellington, who was requested by the bazaar committee to open the Primitive Methodist bazaar, said he bad little sympathy with bazaars generally, for he had, as a rule, found them to be a combination of exorbitant prices, gambling, and frivolities. He was inclined, however, to modify this opinion, as he understood the goods at this bazaar were to be sold at fair prices, and bazaars so conducted were a legitimate means of promoting either ecclesiastical orcharitable purposes." Now does not this give to anyone Hying outside Wellington the idea that his Worship was merely endeavoring to enhance the value of a favor he was about to confer. To bazaars as a rule he strongly objected, but this, this particular one, was, he was assured, to be conducted on such principles as to deprive it of any objectionable feature whatever. If he doesn't get the Primitive Methodist vote at the next election the Primitive Methodists of Wellington must be an ungrateful set of men.

That must have been a frightful accident which happened at Motueka last Monday, supposing it to be correctly reported in the Colonit, which told us that a boy "was violently thrown from a spirited horse, the girths of which had broken. * * * No bones were broken, but the boy was severely shaken and bruised. The horse must have dragged him some distance as his coat was torn to pieces." A horse with a broken girth must in itself be a horrible and disgusting sight, but to see him when thus maimed and wounded violently throwing and dragging his rider must have been a still more repulsive, not to say strange, exhibition.

Prom the meetings of Councils, Boards, and other public bodies there is often amusement to be extracted arising from the eccentricities or foibles of individual members. Last night's exhibition, however, was to use a conventional phrase, beyond a joke' and can only be treated in a serious maaner' Probably the ratepayers will know what steps to take, p r