THE WEEK.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIII, Issue 203, 5 October 1878, Page 2

THE WEEK.

I have been _ little troubled in my mind of lale witb regard to a question which, from tbe way iu wbich it 19 so frequently treated, appears in itself to be of very trilling importance although at times it is made a good deal of. I refer to that intangible thitig known as " a great constitutional principle." The term— and really lam beginning io doubt

Whether it is anything more than a mere meaningless term— was very frequently used in the House trie other night over Mr MacandrewV Tapanui railway job, and on perusing the reports of, what was then said, I alpinst felt that I was reading the account of {'.football match; tlie '.' coii.iit^titjnal p.iti.ij)le*'b.inj? the lji. 1. At .... . loi.e.t your fancy could paint one of the players—or members-snatching up the hall, hugging it to his breast, and rushing off with it through u crowd oi: opposing and jeering antagonists, as though to him it was the dearest thing on earth, on tlie retention of which his hopes of happiness in this world and the nest entirely depended. Then it would be snatched from him. laid on the ground, and kicked in the Most ignominious maimer off the field altogether; then Drought back, and over it such 4,.erlmi,il_ge t.oj.hi.cn.ue tliat you would be disposed to think that life itself would not be worth having without it. And so the struggle,wa. maintained uiilii at last that wilyoFd player Macandrew got hold of it, administered a tremendous kick aud sent it flying out of sight altogether, amid loud cheers even from those who pretended to attach such value to it. But to adjourn from the football field to the House. Is there not something deliciously ludicrous in the idea oE the representatives of the people when asked to affirm the principle that in future they should be consulted ou the question of what great public works should or should not be constructed, refusing to accept the responsibility and handing over to Mr Macandrew, the Otago man, the power of saying where the public money was to be expended on railways. Those who thought the people ought to have some little say in the matter urged very earnestly indeed that the principle at stake was a very grave oue, but they wero only laughed at by the out and out Government supporters, while even of those who thought with them, some were of opinion that it was of far greater importance ihat the Ministry should not be defeated, and others that to' hurry on with the estimates was the chief aim and end of their Parliamentary existence. A section of the Press too seems to be afflicted by a mania similar to that under which the representative guardians of the public interests suffered on that particular occasion. A certain journal published in the north, which has usually been a great stickler for constitutional privileges, has recently become so rabidly Grey in its pr oclivit'ies that when writing upon this particular question it brought itself to say:—" We are disposed to wink at informal infringements of what is called constitutional rule." &c. After that I ceased to wonder at the spell laid upon members by Grey, Sheehan, Macandrew and Co. " Pirst catch your hare." There is a good deal of strong common sense in this advice, preface, as it is, to instructions what to do with the hare afterwards. This is what passed through my mind when reading the other day the accouut of the preparations made for holding an inquest iu Wellington recently ou the corpse of a living child. There's a savour cf old Erin about those last five words, but I shall let them pass, if it's only for the novelty of their appearance, for I confess f never saw them strung together ill that or . er before. Evidently the coroner was in too great a hurry ou that occasion, or he never would have submitted the jurors whom he summoned to the disappointment that awaited them on learning that they were to he deprived of the delicious treat of "viewing tho body," which our laws provide shall be participated in by a dozen men whenever an accidental or sudden death occurs. Dr Johnson ought to have taken care first to catch his hare. Then up in the North again they seem on a late occasion .to have disregarded this excellent maxim,' but as it appears to have been immaterial to them whether their hare was caught or not, their success in this respect was not [a matter of much consequence. I read in a Thames paper, I think it was— if the journal referred to was published elsewhere I crave to be leniently dealt with at the hands of the editor fcr my remissness in not noting from whence I culled the extract— at all events I read in some Northern paper: — " The settlers of the Ohiuemuri district gave a. dinner to Mi* James Mackay on Saturday last, but unfortunately Mr .Mackay was unable to attend, being laid up in bed with a severe attack of illness" The reporter then goes on to describe how, notwithstanding this slight drawback, the festivities proceeded, aud what a jolly e v cuing was spent by those who were present. Xow in that case the hare seems to have heen quite a secondary consideration. My list of the terrible things that may happen to a man in sweet, sunny, peaceful Nelson is rapidly elongating. I need not reiterate the terrible bullock and horse adventures which have already been described at length, but will proceed to relate another true and reliable account of a recent event that in horror exceeds either of the preceding ones. I relate it as an item of news, but I would accompany it with _ solemn warning to those who are somewhat careless of the nature of the documents to which they occasionally append their signatures to exercise the utmost caution in future. A friend of mine who is a pillar of one of the churches in this town was recently asked to sign his name to a requisition to the minister inviting him to adopt for the use of his congregation a certain collection of hymns. My friend, I regret to say, is not so strict as he might be in examining the doctrines that are taught under the guise of long, short, common, or peculiar metre, and as for a knowledge of music -well, I once beard him sing, and ever siuce then I have stopped and listened with rapt attention to the boilermakers hammering rivets at Moutray's Foundry, and thought to myself how divine in their harmony were the sounds thus created when compared with those that had once before assailed my ears. But this is a digression. My friend, as I have said, signed the requisition aud then forgot all about it until last Saturday night, when just as he had dropped off into his first sleep there was a furious knocking at the door, wbich roused him from his slumbers. Slipping on the first garment that came to hand he went to see what was the matter, and on opening the door found a small imp standing in the verandah, who poked a pamphlet into his hands with the words " With Judge Thomas' compliments," and. then bolted. There was a good deal of sleep kuocking about the aroused one's eyes, which could only be got rid of by a deal of rubbing, but this was at last accomplished, and then he struck a light and looked to see what he had been hurried out of bed for. Beading on, and on, and on, he was first of all a little surprised, then completely astonished, and then horrified to a degree to find himself accused of having entered into a desperate flirtation witb the '• Lady of the Seven Hills " He vows most solemnly that nothing shall ever induce him again to interfere in musical matters. F.