NORMANBY.

Patea Mail, Volume V, Issue 419, 23 April 1879, Page 2

NORMANBY.

(fkom our own correspondent.) April 21. In remarking on the tine pf a letter signed “ Veritas,” which appeared in your paper of the 16th instant, you must first allow me to say that it is not one which 1 should notice, except from the fact of my being your correspondent here, and that the charge of making “ utterly false ” statements reflects, to a certain extent, on the editor, and requires some observation from me.

11 Veritas ” states that among these false statements, the principal is that in which I say there has been no contest between two bodies of the townspeople concerning the site of the railway and telegraph office—and he asserts that to be utterly false, as ever since the offer of Messrs Thompson and McGuire a fierce contest has bjen, and still is, raging. How the ;

writer can possibly fail to see tlie difference between (as 1 said in icy-previous letter) two distinct parties of the inhabitants quarrelling between themselves as io where a certain site should be, and the whole of tiie townspeople contending with the promoters ©f the extension scheme, who are not townspeople, I cannot understand. Had tire writer taken the trouble to think on the subject, he would have seen that the - position of affairs was really this. That this township had grown into a considerable degree of importance, and the inhabitants feeling the want of telegraphic communication, had applied to the Government for assistance in obtaining the same ; but a company, composed of non-inhabitants, purchased a piece of land; adjoining, and offered a portion of it to the Government as a site for the offices, and then began the fierce contest alluded to. But docs “ Veritas ” call that a quarrel between townspeople. Were half a dozen inhabitants of Kakaramea, with a view to a speculation, to purchase land near Carlyle, and offer thereon a site to the Government for certain offices in direct opposition to the wishes of your fellow citizens, would the contest that would naturally and inevitably arise, be a quarrel between yourselves or with an alien party ? The fact really is, and I am quite ready to abide by it, were it not already so well known as hardly to require allusion to, that the petition to the Governmant stating the earnest and express desire of the town as to the situation of the offices in question received the signatures of nearly every housholder in the town, with hardly an exception, as also those of the settlers round ; and putting that agains: the letter of “ Veritas,” yon will easily s ->e wherein the falseness of mine or his statements lies. As to the remarks he makes as to the wealth and intelligence of the people here, it is not necessary for me, as your correspondent, to dwell ; hut in recalling the correspondedce that took place some months since between the promoters of the Extension scheme and different writers here, it is pleasant to see tiie courteous maimer in winch that correspondence was conducted, and if the hitting was occasionally hai'd, it was given and taken in good part, and none of the gentleman who wore writing on the Extension side of the question disfigured rheir letters by the low abuse and vulgar personalities of u Vertas.” As I hope that what 1 have said will be sufficient to exonerate myself botii in your e^'os and those of the public from the charge of furnishing your columns with false statements, I shall not again recur to the subject.