MYSTERIOUS MUNIFICENCE.

New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 61, 28 February 1843, Page 4

MYSTERIOUS MUNIFICENCE.

It must have struck every one tolerably observant of things as they go, that there are moral epidemics as well as physical ones. They have their day and disappear, to give place to other forms of the same folly. To pass over that horrid sympathy with some atrocious instances of crime, which leads to imitation of it, as a thing to be spoken of slightly, we find many other forms of a feeling somewhat similar, which we can afford to laugh at, as containing in them something of the absurd. We have lately observed frequent indications of a practice which the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to pray may become universal and continuous ; it would supersede the income tax. How many paragraphs like the following have our readers lately remarked in the daily papers, headed “Advertisement”? Our specimen is from the Times of Tuesday last. “The PostmasterGeneral acknowledges the receipt of the following sums of money from anonymous correspondents, which have been placed to the credit of the public ; on the 28th of May, 1842,50/., inclosed in a letter dated London ; on the 27th June, 1842, 500/., inclosed in a letter dated Bath.” This announcement, added to others of the same kind which have preceded it, have, we must fairly confess, completely puzzled us. Who are these mysterious givers of alms to an exchequer avowedly empty ? Five hundred pounds is a sum which it is no joke to give, though we can imagine that the receiving it would be a very good one—one of the few good jokes too that we should think none the worse for repetition. , We are as much at a loss to divine the motives for the act, as to discover the doers of it. It cannot be notoriety, for they court concealment; they “ do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame,” or weuld blush if fame should ever get their names into her trumpet. Who, we repeat, are these voluntary taxers of their incomes at a heavier per centage than the law requires ? The great bulk of the nation, we fear, will only give up their “ sevenpences” on the same ground which made Falstaff refuse his reasons, viz., “ on compulsion.” How different is the feeling of these individuals of mysterious munificence who so cheerfully anticipate the tax-gatherer ! We are rejoiced to think that thex*e is an El Dorado somewhere, and nooks and corners into which

the distress of the country has not yet penetrated. The moiety of a “ cool thousand” is handed over with apparently as much indifference as the fifty, and is just as coolly and curtly acknowledged. Is it only one way of disposing of so many light, sovereigns, the trouble of changing which was too much for a millionaire to encounter in this sultry weather ? If so, it is as ingenious a mode as that hit on by the Irish gentlemen, who boasted that he always passed a had shilling by putting it between two halfpence and giving it to a beggar. But we fear we must leave the motives in the obscurity the parties have thrown around them. The next difficulty is, who can they be ? and here we are lost in a sea of conjectui e; we can only state who we think they are not. It is not ourselves, to begin with : we are almost equally sure that it is not Joseph Hume ; and we would venture to exempt Peter Borthwick and Horace Twiss from all suspicion of it. With these exceptions, our readers are at liberty to choose from the whole population of London and Bath. One last hypothesis strikes us; there may exist retired functionaries of the Exchequer or War Office, reminiscent of some capriccio movements terminating in a diminuendo passage with regard to the public funds, which they performed “i’ their hot youth, when George the Third was King,” and their consciences being awakened at the eleventh hour by the tales of public distress and embarrassment, they have resorted to restitution as their best means of atonement. We do not offer this as a fact; we only “ suppose the supposition.” Heaven forbid we should raise the veil, even were it in our power to do so, since their fits of abstraction have escaped detection by Mr. Hume and the aud : - tors.

A deputation waited on Sir Robert Peel on Saturday relative to the arrival and departure of the mails at and from Falmouth and Southampton. In proof ofthe great absurdity of the present system, one of the deputation took his letters, received on Saturday morning, enclosing a bill of lading for treasure by the Lady Mary Wood, which treasure also reached London on Saturday, whereas the bulk of the letters through the Post-office were delivered on Monday morning only. We understand the reception of the deputation, and the great attention paid by Sir Robert Peel to the subject, give confidence this abuse will be speedily remedied.

Present to the Queen. —Baboo Dwarkanuth Taj ore has presented to the Queen a magnificent Indian shawl, of torquoise-blue colour, with rich palms of a new pattern ; and a dagger for the Prince of Wales, the handle of rock-crystal, mounted in black enamel encrusted with diamonds of pure water, the sheath being studded with rabies.

Miss Adelaide Kemble a Bride.—The banns of marriage between “ Adelaide Kemble and John Sartoris,” were proclaimed in the city churches here on Sunday last. The gentleman, who is about to lead this highly-accom-plished lady and distinguished vocalist to the temple of Hymen, is styled Count Sartoris, and is reputed to be possessed of considerable wealth. The lady, we believe, although generally known in this country by her maiden patronymic of Kemble, is a widow, and, we have been informed, has two children by her first husband living at Milan. —Glasgow Courier.