THE OPENING OF THE WANGANUI BRIDGE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 43, 18 November 1871, Page 15

THE OPENING OF THE WANGANUI BRIDGE.

The following is published in the local journals as the programme of proceedings on the forthcoming opening of the Wanganui bridge :—The Governor may be expected in the Luna on the forenoon of Tuesday or Wednesday next. He will be met on the Wharf by the committee, when Mr F. Williamson, chairman of the Town Board, will present an address of welcome to him. The Rifle Corps will form a guard of honour on the occasion, and Mr Gordon will have an open carriage and four with outriders to convey His Excellency to his hotel. There will be no further public demonstration on the first day. In the evening his Excellency will honor the Philharmonic Society or the Dramatic Society (the two societies seem unable to agree as to which it shall be), one or other of which proposes giving an entertainmeut in the Odd Fellows’ Hall. The next day will be the day when the bridge will be formally opened. It is expected that we shall have the pleasure of seeing an immense number of our country cousins, who will help us to make a really joyous holiday. The Committee have sent a special invitation to the Rangitikei Volunteers, and the fine band under the leadership of Lieut. Hey wood, to come in on that day. The Bridge will be opened with some Masonic ceremony (if his Excellency is a Mason, of which, however, there is some doubt) and the Bridge Committee will present him with an address. The various volunteer corps, infantry and cavalry, will be upon the ground. After the opening a collation is spoken of, and in the evening there is to be a ball and supper. Tickets for these last are fixed at 21s for gentlemen and 10s Od for ladies —much too high, we should think, but it is manifestly wished that only the creme de la creme should he present, and ordinary folks need not break their hearts over the exclusion. The proceedings of the third day are as yet somewhat indefinite. A picnic up the river by steamer is spoken of, but, so far as we are aware, no arrangements have yet been made. Sub-committees have "been appointed to carry out the various parts of the programme we have sketched, and, with fine weather, there is every reason to anticipate a pleasant time of it.

A pleasant part of the programme, says the “ Chronicle,” will he the excursions by steamers. The s.s. Wanganui will time her leaving from Wellington to suit the departure of the Luna, and the two steamers will come up the river together—the Luna taking the post of honor. The AVanganui will carry excursionists at cheap rates, and most likely a number of our Wellington friends will take advantage of the chance thus offered to them. If the St Kilda is in the river, it has been suggested that she should go out and meet the two steamers in the offing and make a little squadron in honor of the occasion.