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INTELLIGENT VAGRANT.

(From the New Zealand Mail.)

Quls scit an adjiciant hodiernte crastina summso Tempora Di Superi.— Hokace.

His Excellency Brigadier Commodore-in-Chief Captain Louttit, has been good enough to send me an order to apologise. X suppose it is all right, but I really am not conscious of having ever mentioned the great man’s name. That will not, however, prevent my doing the proper thing under the circumstances. I desire, therefore, to express my most sincere heartfelt and thorough regret that poor Leßoy should have fallen from the topgallant yard of the Rodney, and been killed, and should have been subsequently buried in an unostentatious manner. Can I say more ?

Hr. O’Shea, I congratulate you. Your definition of the qualifications necessary to become a leading politician had all the merit of candor and simplicity. I agree with you entirely that to take such position one must be ostentatious and unquiet, and above all have plenty of brass. I regret with you, sir, that the lack of these requisites was a fatal obstacle to the progress of Mr. Gisborne. But lam comforted by one thing. I hear you are not without an intention yourself of having a go in at politics. Permit me in our mutual faith to predict for you an entire and complete success. Nothing annoys me so much as to hear an honest gentleman speaking with sincerity to an utterly unappreciative audience. Need I therefore mention the disgust with which I saw the effect, -or want of effect, of Mr. Dignau’s speech on Thursday in the House of Representatives. But if the members failed to appreciate him, he was not left unrecognised by a stranger. I heard one gentleman, when leaving the public gallery, say to another :’“ls it Pat Diguan ye mane ? The gratest thrate of thedibbate, sor 'His spache smelt of the ould sod all over. Whin he implored hon. mimbers to pause on the pat they wor purshooing, begorra I almost cried hare, hare? Av anyone but O’Rorke had been in the cheer X couldn’t have restreened mesilf, but respict for a pathriot made me dumb.” Those member's who got supplements printed for their little paper friends are naturally indignant that one of their dearest privileges should be done away with. lam not going to argue the right or wrong of this matter. I am merely anxious to put a question and tell a little story. First for my question : Please Mr. O’Conor, you said that you sent your little broadsheets to the newspapers published in your district for distribution. Then may I ask you, ■without notice, to tell me how many you sent to the Westport Times and Butter News respectively ? Bearer waits. And now for my little story ; During a session of Parliament other than that now going on, a member had 1000 copies of a speech of a Minister printed at the Government Printing Office, and then distributed them amongst his, the member’s, constituents by means of 0.P.5.0. envelopes. It was a patriotic action, and it economised in the way of posta e stamps. I am not unaccustomed myself to settling with my creditors either by recourse to a bankruptcy court or by the less expensive process known as a “judicious slither.” When I say anything about such matters then, I am able to do so with an utter absence of false pride. My young friend Kafoozle found occasion to leave Wellington lately. It was to his advantage to do so -without giving any unnecessary publicity to the fact. On the wharf, looking at the steamer by which Kafoozle was to depart, was his bootmaker, Mr. Hupper, in whose books he occupied a prominent position; Kafoozle, seeing this, wrapped a comforter around his throat, and was assisted in a feeble condition up the gangway by a friend who sympathised with him. Hupper ran on board after him, and inquired solicitously where he was going. He said to the genial climate of Nelson for a week ; that he had been suffering for some time from congenital fissure of the sternum, and a few friends had provided him with the means to take change of air. He further hinted that it was not improbable that on his return his friends would help him out of his pecuniary difficulties. Hupper stood a glass of stout (as a liquor suitable to the complaint under notice), , and went ashore. When he heard afterwards that Kafoozle 'was off for Melbourne, he made an entry in his books under that gentleman’s name—“ Settled by hooking it.” I am not a supporter of Mr. Thomas Russell. I do not care for capitalists, and sympathise with those who dislike them, recognising that the minute a man becomes a capitalist he is necessarily placed in antagonism to those who have not capital, and, in obedience to the dictates of human nature, uses his position to the disadvantage of the community. For this I blame the capital rather than the man, for I am certain that there is not one of us but who, if he became a capitalist, would be just as averse to a property or income tax as he is now friendly to it. But this is a digression. Not being friendly to Mr. Thomas Russell, I am delighted to see that the newspapers have cornered him. First there was an outcry that he was being largely paid directly by the country for his services at Home. When under the heading “Payments to Mr. Thomas Russell” there appeared the entry “nil,” it was refreshing to find that, even if he had not received a stated payment, he was certain to have recouped himself in some indirect manner. There -is an honesty of purpose about thus insisting that a charge is correct, somehow or another, that commands my admiration. I flatter myself that no one knows what my politics are. If they do, they are my superiors in knowledge. I make these remarks in order to clear the ground before me, and prevent my being misinterpreted. In a Tasmanian paper lately, I read a little jocular synopsis of the Ministerial measures there, and I am tempted to reproduce this synopsis, on account of its apparent applicability here, with a few alterations to suit local circumstances. But in doing this, I do not wish to be misunderstood. I have not the least doubt but that if those who are now in Opposition were in power tomorrow the synopsis would be equally applicable to them. It is this :

Ist. A Bill for dissolving old-established principles into new theories, and for defining State expediency to be the exact measure of a Minister’s own personal requirements. 2nd. A Bill for removing all doubts as to the meaning of political honesty, by enacting that it shall in future mean personal interest. 3rd. A Bill for declaring that a large expenditure for roads and bridges is necessary. 4th. A Bill to declare it unlawful to give any assistance to the construction of roads and bridges, until Bill No. 3 has been amoug the Statutes for at least fifteen years.

sth. A Bill to relieve the present and all future Ministers from even the apprehension of responsibility to the Legislature. Gth. A Bill for effectually securing jthe moral and political purity of all electors and their representatives inNew Zealand, by bringing them under the operation

of the Scab Acts. 7th. A Bill to increase, if possible, the confidence and respect of the people for their benefactors, the members of the Ministry, and by providing that no . persons shall presume to address them in public, except while bareheaded, or dare to make any remark of, or relating to them either privately or publicly, unless their names, when mentioned, are prefixed by “Honorable.” The provisions of this Bill are to extend to the Honorable gentlemen’s “ laundresses” and “boots," who are to exhibit their reverence for the Honorable proprietors’ soiled linen and boots when receiving their pious porters, by humbly touching with respectful lips some portion of the hems of the one and the toes of the other. A good many members are complaining that Mr. Stout talks too often. The same complaint was made in the British House of Commons of John Pope Hennessy when he got in there. But the qualification to the complaint

which was admitted in Mr. Hennessy’s case is quite &s admissible in Mr. Stout's, He never talks without knowing what he is talking about. It would be difficult to predicate the same of many other members.

An unreported incident in the House of Representatives is not bad. Mr. Stout was accusing the Government party, by its silence of endeavoring to burke discussion, and was enlarging on the advantageous effects of the contact of mind with mind. Mr. Luckiethrew in remarks contradictory to Mr. Stout, Then this happened— - Mr. Stout : “Why, I never heard the honorable member for Nelson (Mr. Luckie) speak on this question.” Mr. Luckie : “ I have spoken on it once." Mr. Stout : “A certain animal mentioned in the Bible also spoke once.”

Mr. Luckie then let Mr. Stout alone,

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZTIM18750911.2.13

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4517, 11 September 1875, Page 2

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,516

INTELLIGENT VAGRANT. New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4517, 11 September 1875, Page 2

INTELLIGENT VAGRANT. New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4517, 11 September 1875, Page 2

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