The Evening Mail. THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 1878.

Oamaru Mail, Volume III, Issue 659, 13 June 1878, Page 2

The Evening Mail. THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 1878.

The people of Dnnetlm—aye, of the World—onght to feel grateful to the writer in yesterday's Herald, signing himself "Public Opinion." In a pantWlic manner he forcibly discloses the fact that there is a slanderer somewhere, and that it is necessary that he should bo hunted, if e says that in rural districts there are sometimes people who steal wood and coal, and rob hen-roosts. Tin's is very shocking-- We wonder in what rnral district " Public Opinion" lived prior to taking refuge in the_ City of Dunedin—we were going to say, in the Herald oltice ; whether there have been any robberies since he left ; and whether Dnnedin. is indebted to the hunting process for his

presence in that city. It 13 quite bad enough for a man to have to buy coals and roosters for himself, but it is annoying when, just as he has -rot in the coal necessary to cook a rooster that he has fattened and feasted bid eyes on for weeks, and hopes to feast hi 3 something else on iin a few more weary hoi-is, tbey are taken from him "at one fell innocence, we were qui-e ignoraiir uiat • such wickedness existed around us. •' The wood and coals begins to lessen." There is something wrong here, but the Latin makes up for all the imperfections of the writer's English. ''Dt nobis fahv.la nurnrfur." Certainly. The writer, after telling us of his narrow escape from some rural spot, offers an insult to the Herald by saying that " The Tress of Ota"o has for inanv ye;»rs ben fairly respectable." Such" an inuendo is unpardonable. Anybody can s-:c th.it he meant what he did not like to say outright—that the Press of Otago was respectable prior to the establishment of the Herald. or. rather, up to the last week or so. 'J he gentle-

man so familiar with inueiidoes, awl who occasionally fills the editorial chair of the Herald, there beinc ii" H'al subjects to treat upon, was, of course, absent when this letter was handed to the printer of that paper, or it oiirely would never have been inserted. It contains the most audacious insult we have rem! for many a day ; and, although the Herald has lately traduced the characters of honorable men, by accusing them of motives and actions uf which they never even nivamed. the man who was tli.r cinse of such unprincipled conduct expjctocl a very different return as the result of labors that have rendered the hitherto respectable and harmless newspiper notorious. "The characters <-f privato individuals

has seldom been attacked." Our little imp informs us that this scu.-i.ee is .1 Itttl. shaky. But let us proceed to ascertain IN drift. The writer means' that M-ssrs. .Ree.s and Hisi.op and Air. Jones have been vilely slandered by the Herald. We are much obliged to "Public Opinion" for pointing to this circumstance with the evident desire to enlist the sympathies of the public : hut the public have needed no mentor to influence them in their opinion that an attempt has been made to do those gentlemen an injury. Speaking for ourselves, we prize the disinterested efforts of " Public Opinion"' put forth in our behalf, but think than we can manage the fellow single-handed ; and ■" Public Opinion " must not be surprised at seeing himself brought to bay after the fashion of the man "that v.oie the rooster, and j

I evil with v.l : -h t,- c-jok it. in that wicked ! pL-.ce from whence " Public Opinion *' ! was compelled to ret 1,.. it in order to j guard his personal safety. There e::n be j only one paper meant by " Public j (Opinion." because iie asserts that i neither he nor the public know who the sl.inuerer ,is. Now, the editors of the Times, Star, and Age. are well known, so that he must mean some writer on the 'Herald, which paper has no recognised editor, but is bttti'etted about by diverse opinions, and occasionally made a tool of. "Only last week a paper was handed about the street containing a tissue of vile slanders upon a citizen who has for many years occupied a position of respectbiltty/orie who. like all others, has. no doubt, the ordinary defects of humanity, but who, to say the Vast of it, has :io greater share than his neighbour." We circulated SO') copies of the issue of the 'Mail in Dunedin last week, but, of course, "Public Opinion" cannot mean us. Thpaper " handed round,'* we are certain, was the Herald, because we know that the proprietors are reeessitatcd to push its sale, and the citizen slandered mean.; Mr. Eee-s, Mr. Hislop, or Mr. Jones. For ourselves, we protest against the manner in which the writer has written of us. We want no champion to come forward to confess our sins and plead in justification that they are not worse than those of other men. In a!l kindness, we must dissent from " Public Opinion's" method of treating a matter in which our good name is concerned. It might be necessary for the legal gentleman that wrote in the Herald against his brethren, actuated by feelings of jealousy and spite, to employ a trumpeter to herald the discover}- of any little virtue that might give him the appearance of a gentleman, because his conduct proclaims him to be something else. It is a negative respectability that will only admit of a man asserting through a second part}- that he is no worse than other men. In a state of laudable anxiety for our good and that of the public, "Public Opinion" asks: ■' What is to be done "" and replies, '' We must watch the slanderer, and hunt him." Now, this is something like. But we must find him before we can do anything to him. " Public Opinion " 111 aire ly upon our hearty co-operation with him in discovering the wicked rascal ; and n hen we have got him, we will put him in a bag with the fellow that stole the chickens.